All-chat is being removed from League of Legends to ‘address verbal abuse’
Dom Sacco, Senior Editor
Last Updated: 21/06/2025
Update: Riot has posted an update, saying it will be removing all-chat “in a few regions” over the next couple of patches.
Riot said: “All-chat will be disabled in matchmade queues in a few regions. Since our original announcement, response has varied between regions, so we’re shifting our approach and only disabling /all chat where players were most receptive to trying it out. This test will last for 11.21 and 11.22.
“In regions where the disable rolls out, /all chat will still be available in custom games, and no other tools are being disabled. We’ll evaluate the impact of this change through verbal abuse reports, penalty rates, surveys, and direct feedback. When the test ends, we may leave /all chat disabled, make changes to the disable, or turn it back on, on a per-region basis. We may also make adjustments during the test itself based on initial results.”
Original article: Riot Games has announced it is removing all-chat functionality from League of Legends, meaning opposing teams will no longer be able to type to one another mid-game.
/All chat will be disabled in matchmade queues. While there is an in-game setting to disable this, it’s currently optional – this new change will make it compulsory (though Riot has described it as a ‘test’ and will ‘evaluate the impact of this change’ for now).
It’s good news for Team Liquid’s Welsh top-laner Alphari, who won’t have to mute G2’s all-chat shop promotions anymore (see image above).
“While /all chat can be the source of fun social interaction between teams, as well as some good-hearted banter, right now negative interactions outweigh the positives. We’ll evaluate the impact of this change through verbal abuse reports and penalty rates, as well as surveys and direct feedback from you all.”
Riot Brightmoon and Meddler
The all-chat change will be made in patch 11.21, which is due to go live on Wednesday October 20th 2021.
Game director Andrei Van Roon, aka Meddler, and lead gameplay producer Jeremy Lee, aka Riot Brightmoon, said in an all-chat update on the League of Legends website just now: “While most of our focus around behavioral systems in 2021 has been on gameplay-based behaviors like AFKing and inting, we’ve heard from you that verbal abuse has been a rising problem this year, too.
“While /all chat can be the source of fun social interaction between teams, as well as some good-hearted banter, right now negative interactions outweigh the positives. We’ll evaluate the impact of this change through verbal abuse reports and penalty rates, as well as surveys and direct feedback from you all.”
Riot added that it is working on a number of other changes to address verbal abuse.
TLDR – trying a test where we turn off All Chat (team chat still exists of course). Test is driven by rate of negative interactions versus positive
— Andrei van Roon (@RiotMeddler) October 12, 2021
Will see what people think of the experience with it off, assess whether to keep it off or re-enable. https://t.co/Ugru2ClBdV
Players will still be able to communicate across teams using emotes, champion voice lines and Champion Mastery symbols, and chat to one another in the post-game lobby. And those on the same team will of course be able to chat to one another as usual.
“We’re aware that verbal abuse happens in team chat too, so disabling /all chat won’t get rid of abuse altogether,” Riot admitted. “But team chat also plays an important team coordination function, so the potential value it brings is much higher, even if it can also host some negative experiences.”
RIP those cross-chat ‘1v1 me bro’ challenges, then.
UK LoL reacts – ‘band aid solutions won’t fix the underlying problem’
Here’s how a number of UK League personalities have reacted so far:
while I have /all chat permanently disabled because of toxicity, I'm really upset to hear this
— Vicksy 🦊 | Fox VTuber (@Vicksy) October 12, 2021
they have no idea how to deal with the toxic player base and it shows… why ban if you lose money? so many band-aid solutions and losing features that won't fix the underlying problem pic.twitter.com/N6kT69sWjy
Team chat in soloQ is WAY more toxic than all-chat. Very strange decision by RIOT.
— Rich (@RichsWrath) October 12, 2021
Next move by Riot should be removal of the names of all of your team-mates and opponents. Just make the experience an entirely blank social setting in which you only play a shittily balanced Dota clone based on decades old tech.
— Thorin (@Thorin) October 12, 2021
Ridiculous that Riot is disabling all-chat in SoloQ next patch. The issue of flaming and toxicity is nearly ALWAYS within teams rather than getting abused by your enemies.
— No Arm Whatley (@WhatleyLeague) October 12, 2021
Allow people the autonomy to turn all-chat off if they so choose and leave it on for the rest of us.
That’s… sure something.
— Alex ‘Nymaera’ Hapgood (@Nymaera) October 12, 2021
I feel like /all chat’s mostly positive or comedic between teams, it’s team chat that becomes a bit of a cesspit.
Not sure I like this direction personally. https://t.co/Aa3keIWWj0
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Dom Sacco, Senior Editor
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He has almost two decades of experience in journalism, and left Esports News UK in June 2025. As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late '80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He also previously worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation.
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