In a surprising new update from Riot Games, you’ll only get to change your Riot ID every 365 days unless you pay the fee of $10 USD. This was announced alongside the reveal of the transition to Riot IDs from Summoner Names. For Valorant players who used to love changing their names every thirty days, you’ll now have to pick a name you’ll enjoy for the next year.
Riot Games transitioning from Summoner Names to Riot IDs and announces free yearly name changes
Starting November 20, all players who enjoy Riot’s games such as Valorant or League of Legends will only get one free Riot ID change every 365 days, with a $10 USD fee to change it again. Riot IDs are a combination of a game name and a tagline proceeding a hashtag including three to five alphanumeric characters. They carry over for all Riot games you play, which is behind the reasoning behind the new switch to Riot IDs.
Explained in the blog post, Riot Games stated that the lore of Runeterra, League of Legends, and Summoner’s Rift has changed over the years. Players were initially Summoners, but eventually the focus shifted to Champions. Summoner Name doesn’t work very well with the lore of League of Legends, so this update is here to create fluidity between all Riot Games titles.
I honestly thought this was to combat the very unique name changes I’ve spotted throughout Valorant. As you can tell from many comments in this Reddit post about the Riot IDs, fans are saying how they’re going to miss seeing the funny e-dater names like ‘I miss her’ and ‘I miss him’.
There are also some upset fans at the monetization. I presume it’s to prevent abusing the constant name changing and to keep your Riot ID special. All players will receive a free name change starting November 20, but after that, you’ll have to pay up to switch your name before 365 days pass.
