Marvel Rivals Season 7 "The Hunt Is On" end-of-season recap: who won the meta

Season 7 "The Hunt Is On" wraps on May 15, and eight weeks of tracked community matches give us a clear read on the hero list. This post walks through who actually topped the tiers at each role going into the end of season, which heroes moved in unexpected directions, and what to watch for Season 8.

Season timeline

Season 7 launched on 2026-03-20 and closes 2026-05-15. Roughly eight weeks of ranked, with the usual early-season churn followed by mid-season settle. By week four the community sample was large enough that shrunk win rates stopped swinging day to day and the tier list locked into the shape we have now.

Balance adjustments during the season followed the usual NetEase pattern: small targeted tweaks rather than large systemic changes, with the mid-season pass focusing on backline Strategists and Duelist mobility. Daily tracking showed the expected movement in most cases: heroes who were buffed climbed the shrunk list, heroes who were nerfed dropped.

Vanguards: Peni Parker runs away with it

The #1 Vanguard of Season 7 is Peni Parker at 54.9% shrunk win rate across roughly 52,000 tracked matches. She has held the top spot since the mid-season settle. Her zone-control kit punishes every flank the meta Duelists want to make, and the sample size behind that 54.9% is large enough that the placement is about as confident as it gets.

The rest of the top 5:

Bruce Banner: 52.1% across ~35,000 matches. Heavy-frontline anchor that scales with team coordination.
Captain America: 51.5% across ~28,000. Mobility-plus-disruption kit that plays better on a split lineup than in a stacked brawl.
Rogue: 51.4% across ~52,000. High pickrate and consistent numbers across ranks.
Doctor Strange: 51.0% across ~106,000. The highest sample count in the role, meaning low variance in the placement: he is exactly as good as the number says.

Peni's edge over the rest of the role is wide. The next closest Vanguard is almost three percentage points behind her on the shrunk list, which is an unusual gap for a role and suggests her kit is over-tuned for the current map pool.

Duelists: Magik on top

The #1 Duelist is Magik at 54.9% shrunk win rate over roughly 49,000 tracked matches. She matches Peni Parker's edge at the role level almost exactly: both heroes are running about three points ahead of the rest of their slot.

Top 5 Duelists:

Magik: 54.9% across ~49,000 matches.
Daredevil: 53.7% across ~30,000.
Spider-Man: 52.5% across ~65,000 matches: one of the biggest sample sizes in the game, so his placement is rock-solid.
Black Panther: 52.3% across ~27,000.
Black Cat: 52.2% across ~3,000 (lower sample, more variance: treat this one as provisional).

The dive/mobility cluster dominates the list. Four of the top five Duelists are characters whose kits revolve around repositioning fast and converting openings rather than ranged poke. That is the shape of the meta right now.

Strategists: Ultron breaks through

The Strategist slot is the most compressed of the three roles. The top is Ultron at 53.8% shrunk across ~27,000 tracked matches, with White Fox at 52.5% across a huge ~101,000-match sample in second.

Top 5 Strategists:

Ultron: 53.8% across ~27,000.
White Fox: 52.5% across ~101,000: the highest-sample Strategist in the game.
Invisible Woman: 51.0% across ~155,000 matches. Massive sample, placement is extremely confident.
Rocket Raccoon: 51.0% across ~56,000.
Mantis: 50.6% across ~27,000.

Notice how fast the numbers compress below Ultron: after the top two, the next three Strategists sit within a percentage point of each other. That is a sign of a balanced role where the right pick often depends on team comp and map rather than one hero being obviously best.

Heroes that moved

Two hero-level stories are worth calling out, both with the sparsity caveat in mind: Counterwatch's tracked DAU has grown roughly 5× over the past year, so cross-season pickrate deltas read as directional, not precise. Shrunk win rates within Season 7 are confident; cross-season pickrate comparisons are less so.

Black Panther's climb into the top 5 Duelists is notable. Late-season data shows him converting more reliably at Grandmaster and above than he did in early weeks. Some of that is probably teams learning his dive windows; some of it is probably the mid-season patch landing well for his archetype.

Invisible Woman's huge sample at #3 Strategist means she is carrying a large share of the role's total games without being a clear top-2 pick by win rate. That is the signature of a "safe" hero: high pick rate, slightly above baseline win rate, reliable in a lot of comps.

What to watch for Season 8

Season 8 begins 2026-05-15. A couple of things worth watching in the first four weeks:

Does Peni Parker retain her Vanguard lead? Her edge is wide enough that it is unlikely to flip immediately, but a targeted nerf would move the list faster than any other single balance change.
Do the dive Duelists stay on top, or does ranged poke reset? If NetEase buffs mid-range specialists or widens map sightlines, the Magik/Spider-Man/Black Panther cluster could lose ground.
Does Ultron stay #1 Strategist? He is a relatively new Strategist and his sample is still growing. The placement is likely real, but watch for shrinkage to shift it in either direction as more matches roll in.

We will publish the Season 8 early meta snapshot four weeks into the new season. In the meantime, the live data keeps updating daily on the full MR tier list, and the Counterwatch app's in-game overlay runs the numbers live during your matches for real-time counter and synergy calls.

For the long-form on how we compute shrunk win rates and handle cross-season pickrate comparisons, see the methodology page. For the role-by-role best-pick-to-main rankings, the best one tricks page weighs consistency and sample size alongside raw win rate.