Matchmaking

Matchmaking is the process through which the system groups players into opposing teams for public games. With the exception of bot games, matchmaking is mostly determined by matchmaking ratings (MMR).

Criteria

Valve has stated that matchmaking tries to fulfil several criteria:

The teams are balanced. (Each team has a 50% chance to win.)
The discrepancy in skill between the most and least skilled player in the match is minimized.
The highest skill Radiant player should be close to the same skill as the highest skill Dire player.
The discrepancy between experience (measured by the number of games played) between the least experienced player and the most experienced player is minimized.
Each team contains about the same number of parties.
- For example, the matchmaker tries to avoid matching a party of 5 against 5 individual players.
Players' language preferences contains a common language.
Wait times shouldn't be too long.

Types

Normal Match

Unranked or casual games do not display matchmaking ratings and still doesn't track your MMR for solo and party queues.

All PvP game modes are available for unranked matches.

Ranked Match

Ranked matches track and display two visible matchmaking ratings, one for solo queue, and one for parties.

Players must be at least level 20 to queue for ranked matches.
Only Ranked All Pick, Captains Mode, and Random Draft are available for ranked matches.
Players must play 10 trial games for the system to calibrate their MMR.
- Parties with any player below the Profile Level requirement will not be able to queue for ranked matches.
Players in Low Priority cannot queue for ranked matches.
- Parties with any player in Low Priority will not be able to queue for ranked matches.
Parties of 4 are unable to queue for ranked matches.
Coaches are not permitted in ranked matches.
Parties with members whose MMRs are 2000 or more apart are unable to queue for ranked matches.
Any form of Abandonment will incur full penalties for the entire party.
- Any player who abandons will automatically receive a loss, regardless of the match's outcome.
Separate MMRs are maintained for both solo and party queueing.
- Unlike casual matches, MMRs for all players in ranked matches are made visible at the endgame screen.

Practice 1v1

This function matches you against another player in the Mid Lane. This match is over when one player dies twice, loses a tower, resigns or disconnects. Type gg in chat to resign.

Bot Match

This function matches you or your team against AI-controlled bots.

Co-op bot matches are always played in All Pick mode.
No MMR is tracked for bot matches.

Settings

Settings allow players to be matched only with others who have selected the same settings. Selecting more settings can significantly reduce wait time, as the system will be able to search for compatible players from a larger population pool.

Game Modes

Game Modes determines which modes you would like to queue for. Checking more game modes will increase matchmaking speed.

Current game modes for public matchmaking include:

All Pick
Captains Mode
Single Draft
Random Draft
Least Played
All Random
Captains Draft
Ability Draft
All Random Deathmatch

Region

Region determines which regional server you would like to play on. Checking more regions will increase matchmaking speed, but may cause latency issues if the server location is far away. You can select up to 3 regions. It is recommended that you only choose regions where the language you speak is the dominant language for that region, this is to avoid people reporting you from speaking another language (this does happen).

Current regions include:

India
US West
US East
Europe West
Europe East
Russia
South America
SE Asia
Australia
Dubai
South Africa
Chile
Peru
Japan
South Korea

Language

The language window allows you to select up to 2 languages. You will be matched with other players who have selected the same languages. Checking more languages will increase matchmaking speed. If no languages are checked, you will be matched with the current language of your client.

Matchmaking Rating

Main Article: Matchmaking Rating

All PvP matchmaking is based on an Matchmaking Rating (MMR) similar to the Elo system. Players of roughly equal skill will be placed in the same game.

Penalties

Players who decline or fail to accept a ready match are blocked from finding another match for a small amount of time.
Players who decline or fail to accept a ready match repeatedly may be placed in Low Priority.

Priority

Main Article: Priority

Priority determines how quickly the player is matched with other players. There are 3 types of priority: high priority, base priority, and low priority. Players in low priority will not gain battle points from the match, will find games slower and will be put with other players in low priority. Low priority is a common punishment for abandonment. Base priority is granted to any player when they enter a matchmaking queue provided that they are not in low priority. High priority is granted when a player is returned to queue after a recently failed matchmaking attempt due to another player failing to connect to the game or declining the Ready Check.