'Apex Legends': How Long Does it Take to Unlock Caustic and Mirage for Free?

Apex Legends has extra characters that aren't unlocked at the start, but players can add them to their rosters if they're willing to level up quite a bit or fork over some real money.

Caustic and Mirage are two of the eight total Legends in Respawn Entertainment's new battle royale game, and to play as one of them, you'll need at least 12,000 Legend Tokens. These tokens are Apex Legends' free currency that's earned by leveling up, and they can either be used to buy the Legends or get some limited-time cosmetics from the shop that'll rotate out.

If you're going the free route to purchase these Legends, you're going to have to level up to at least level 23 to unlock the first of the two characters. Players get 600 Legend Tokens when leveling up, though not every level grants them on the climb to 23. GameSpot initially reported it'd take that long to get enough Legend Tokens to unlock either Caustic or Mirage, a process we've been able to confirm ourselves by unlocking one of the Legends at the same level.

Knowing the level is only part of the process though with players still having to get there before they can unlock a new Legend. According to GameSpot, it took around 17 hours to get to that point where a new Legend could be acquired, but that's all dependent on how well one does in Apex Legends. At the end of every game, players will see their experience breakdowns that shows how much each accomplishment earned them during the match. Performing actions like eliminating the champion or the kill leader will earn players more experience and can be done multiple times while winning the match and surviving until the end of a game or close to it will be the most obvious ways to gain experience quicker. Apex Legends also rewards players for playing with friends with a nominal experience bonus, so those who consistently play with premade groups may find themselves reaching level 23 quicker than others.

After unlocking the first legend though, it'll take longer to unlock the next character. Experience requirements for the next level ramp up the higher players go and Apex Packs even start appearing every other level beyond level 20, so if players really want the second Legend, they might be better off paying with real money or waiting for some type of deal in the upcoming battle pass.

How Apex Legends' locked characters will play into the meta remains to be seen until more players have unlocked them and get the hang of the characters, but Respawn Entertainment is also likely to adjust those Legends and others in the future as it's already started looking into updates that'll affect the meta.