Before the match, players form into two- or three-player squads, and select from pre-designed characters with distinctive abilities, known as "Legends".

In "Battle Royale", up to 20 three-person squads or 30 two-person duos land on an island and search for weapons and supplies before attempting to defeat all other players in combat.

Apex Legends received generally positive reviews from critics, who praised its gameplay, progression system, and fusion of elements from various genres.

[2][3] The game is free-to-play and monetized through microtransactions and loot boxes, which allow the player to spend both real money and in-game currency on cosmetic items, such as outfits for the Legends and new colors for weapons.

Starting with Season 16, each legend is assigned to one of the five unique class styles: Assault, Skirmisher, Recon, Controller and Support.

Should a player be killed completely, they can still be resurrected if their team member(s) collect their respawn banner, which appears at the place where they died, and bring it to one of several beacons on the island.

Now Season 20 update, Breakout, introduces significant changes with upgradeable skill trees for playable Legends, offering MOBA-like progression and promising intense battles.

Some events also introduced changes to the current season map with a new point of interest (known as a "Town Takeover"), which is themed around one of the legends.

One such "action block" was inspired by the success of the battle royale game genre led by PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds; this prototype, which applied gameplay mechanics of previous Titanfall games in a battle royale format, was considered very successful and the studio decided to expand this model.

[74] The designers decided that having the pilotable Titans (large mecha) from their previous games would not work well in a battle-royale setting and instead focused on creating strong character classes which felt appropriate for the Titanfall franchise.

[75] They also found that some maneuverability features of prior Titanfall titles, such as wall-running, would make gameplay too challenging in a battle royale format, as identifying the direction of threats would be too difficult.

[76] Design director Mackey McCandlish also stated that with Apex Legends, they were looking to challenge the conventions of the still relatively young battle-royale genre and to add their studio's unique touch to that class of games.

McCandlish claimed that the studio felt the need to create a "defensible space" in the battle-royale mode which could not be easily imitated and that the communication system, the three-man squads, and the smaller playing area were all aligned with this goal.

[72] As part of the development process, the game underwent extensive play-testing to ensure that all elements felt fun and balanced.

'"[73] Concerned that a standard six-month marketing campaign for the game would have generated negative publicity from disgruntled Titanfall fans, Castro claims they eventually took inspiration from musical artist Beyoncé whose release of her self-titled album came as a surprise to fans—a strategy which proved financially successful.

[74][78] Wanting to generate some buzz about this new product before its release, the studio secretly arranged for about 100 social media influencers to travel to their studio to try the game and then instructed them to "tease" news of it on their social media accounts during halftime of the Super Bowl LIII, the day before Apex Legends' formal release.

[74] Respawn CEO Vince Zampella felt the approach was "gross", according to Castro, as he found it reminiscent of the infamous Fyre Festival "hype" which later turned out to be a fraudulent event.

[80][81] According to anonymous reports, Tencent Games is working with Electronic Arts to bring Apex Legends to China, as partnering with a local Chinese firm is a requirement for Western media companies wishing to make their products legally available in the country.

[84] As part of the June 2020 EA Play presentation, Respawn announced that Apex Legends would be brought to the Steam storefront for Windows players, as well as to the Nintendo Switch by late 2020.

[90] In July 2021, Apex Legends was hacked by individuals wishing to draw attention to persistent problems with cheating in the Titanfall series that had been unaddressed by Electronic Arts and Respawn.

[91] In February 2022, Respawn announced that a native version of Apex Legends for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S was "coming very soon..." and that it would introduce new features specifically for the next generation consoles.

The Global Series follows a similar approach as Fortnite Battle Royale by using multiple tiers of events to qualify players.

[citation needed] Year 3 of the ALGS began on July 7, 2022, consisting of 40 teams around the world with a total US$2 million prize pool.

Destructoid referred to the gunplay as the best they had experienced in a battle royale thus far; however, they felt let down that some of the mechanics from the previous Titanfall games were not present.

Polygon's Khee Hoon Chan opined that it "rendered voice chat with strangers largely unnecessary", and was emblematic of Apex Legends' accessibility and astuteness.

Rock Paper Shotgun called it the "gold standard for non-verbal communication in games" and noted that, while not an entirely new concept, Respawn Entertainment had refined the idea.

[154] In July 2019, EA told investors that the game had 8 to 10 million players a week[155] and also credited Apex Legends with the company's recent upturn in live services earnings as their Q1 2020 financial results exceeded expectations.

[160][161] On August 11, the game broke its all-time record for number of concurrent players on Steam with 510,286, according to stat-tracking database Steamcharts.

[168] As a result, Respawn Entertainment apologized for what they agreed was unfair monetization and promised to allow players the chance to purchase cosmetic items directly (rather than rely on loot boxes), albeit at an increased price.

[170] Around July 4, 2021, unknown agents appeared to have broken EA and Respawn's server security as to change in-game messages to point to a website that purportedly was trying to "Save Titanfall".