How to Get the Most XP in XDefiant

Despite a somewhat different take on progression, you’ll still need to know how to get the most XP in XDefiant as you can. Without it, your weapons won’t have the best attachments, you can’t unlock certain things for free, and you won’t be leveling the Battle Pass with any urgency. Here are the best ways to get more XP in XDefiant.

Best Ways to Farm XP in XDefiant

There are only a few sources of XP in XDefiant, but if you’re smart about how you farm them and can do well in matches consistently, you’ll level up your weapons and Battle Pass with relative ease. There are four primary ways you earn XP: performance in a match, commendations, challenges, and objective play. Here they are in more detail.

Match Performance XP in XDefiant

The most straightforward way to earn XP in XDefiant is just to do well in a match. In particular, getting more kills and dying less for longer spans of time will net you the most overall XP in the game. I know that’s now always achievable, especially if you’re having an off day or you run into sweatlord team after sweatlord team, but it is how it is. In my experience, I’m able to get a level or two in a single match if I pop off, topping the scoreboard in kills, objective points, defends, etc.

You should also focus a bit on getting what I’ll call “special” kills. Not that there’s much special about them: long shot, point blank, one-shot kills, and so on. However, whenever you get a “special” kill, you’ll be awarded with an on-screen medal and a few points of additional XP. Longshots and Point Blank Shots are 50 XP, repeatedly defending an objective can be up to 200 XP, and so on.

Kills are likewise worth 100 XP each, and most weapons require at or around 3,500 XP to level up at the beginning, with that number increasing with each level. In other words, a 35-kill match will take a base-level weapon to Level 2 and will likely also have tons of other XP to go along with it, whether objective play, kill bonuses, etc. So, yeah, try to top the scoreboard as much as you can, or at least do your absolute best to do your absolute best.

Challenges

There are lots of different challenges in XDefiant, and while most of them grant access to new gear or characters, daily challenges are pure XP. And they’re easy to do. Depending on the difficulty or grindiness of a daily challenge, you can get from 5,000 XP to 10,000 XP. “Difficulty” in this scenario is relative. In one example, the 10,000 XP challenge is simply to get 30 kills with LMGs. Doing so is difficult because of that weapon class’s penalties to your mobility and the weapons’ heavy recoil.

If you know your way around the M60, RPK, or M249, however, not only does that particular challenge provide an easy 10k XP, but you also get the additional 3,000 XP from the 30 kills you need. The same goes for lower-tier challenges with “easier” weapons. The simplest 8,000-10,500 XP you’ve ever earned.

Objective Play

This XP farm is a bit of an extension of doing well in a match, but I’ve found that even if you’re only average at shooting, being your team’s objective specialist can be just as rewarding. More so in the right situations. Every few seconds you spend capping a flag, pushing a payload, defending a captured point, or generally being a benefit to your team is worth around 25-50 XP. Stack even a modicum of kills while keeping your team in a winning position is a clear ticket to the top of the scoreboard.

I’ve had games where I’ve been even or negative on kill/death ratio but topped the entire lobby in score because I was always the one to recapture a home flag or push for the middle. Or, maybe I was always on the objective when it flipped or pushed the payload when it was going in reverse. All of these actions grant a small but easily accrued experience and make a 5,000-point game possible even without the aim of a gaming demigod.

Commendations

Commendations are a little end-of-match boost of XP you can give to yourself and a teammate, should you choose to. During the final stat screen after a match concludes, each player will have a different stat listed, the best thing they did during that game. If you hover over a player’s stat box, a little green thumbs-up symbol will appear below it. Click it, and you’ll receive 100 XP for being a good sport, and the teammate you commended will receive 200 XP for a job well done. Should you be commended in turn, you’ll also get 200 XP, to a maximum of 300 post-match XP, just for being nice and receiving kindness in turn.

So, yeah, commend the player you think did the most to help the team, even if you didn’t win.

Those are the best ways I know of farming the most XP possible in XDefiant. It’s ultimately a very forgiving game, rewards-wise, and is more about the fun of playing than it is about grinding for maximum level as fast as possible. If you like this article, we’ve got plenty more coverage in our XDefiant guides hub, including whether the game uses SBMM (the answer might surprise you).