Overwatch players can now earn even more hero skins completely free

Bill Cooney

Overwatch fans will soon have a brand-new way to earn exclusive skins simply by watching the game’s esports – and no, we’re not talking about Overwatch League.

Instead, we’re referring to the lower tier of Overwatch esports known as Contenders. There’s already a couple of the neon green, white and black skins in the game already, but starting in August we’ll be able to earn even more.

That’s right; it may have taken a year or so for the rewards feature to make it from OWL to Contenders, but starting August 2, we’ll be able to unlock exclusive skins just by turning on some matches.

Much like its big brother, the Contenders skins will require you to watch the broadcasts for a certain amount of time in order to grab the reward.

But, unlike its larger sibling, you’ll have the chance to earn two exclusive skins instead of just one by tuning into live broadcasts on the official Contenders YouTube channel.

So, how much time will we have to watch to unlock them? To unlock the first skin, you’ll need to watch a total of five hours of Contenders, and to get both, you’ll need to watch ten hours total of play while the promo is active.

We don’t know which heroes will be getting Contenders skins offered up first. Ashe, Orisa, Widow, and Roadhog’s green, white, and black looks were all included with the official announcement post though, but that’s not a sure sign they’ll be included.

Ashe, Orisa, Roadhog, and Widow all had skins teased with the announcement.

One thing to note is that watching Contenders will not earn you any OWL tokens. So while you will earn some unique skins by watching 5 or 10 hours, unlike Overwatch League you won’t earn any in-game currency.

Blizzard has often been accused of not caring as much about the lower-tier scene of Overwatch esports than it does OWL as well, so it’s nice to see them giving Contenders fans something to get excited about.