Quick answer. Every S-Rank W-Engine in the game is an Exclusive — a signature weapon built around one Agent. Nine are permanently accessible: the six Star-Studded Cast engines at 684 Base ATK, plus Riot Suppressor Mark VI, Tusks of Fury and Timeweaver, which sit as non-rate-up Custom Search picks on every W-Engine Channel. Those nine cover five Specialties. Rupture and Armorer mains have no permanent route to an S-Rank W-Engine at all. Free-to-play, your realistic best-in-slot is often an A-Rank, and the A-Rank ceiling is 624 Base ATK — reachable only through the thirteen Exclusive A-Ranks.
Article status: checked 17 September 2026 against Zenless Zone Zero Version 3.2 "Their Secret Histories", Phase I.
Most W-Engine tier lists rank weapons the way people rank Agents: one S/A/B ladder, a paragraph of opinion, done. That hides what actually decides your loadout. The W-Engine roster is less a ladder of power than a ladder of availability, and the two track each other closely enough that you can usually predict an engine's Base ATK from how hard it is to get.
The wiki lists 100 W-Engine entries as of Version 3.2 — 47 S-Rank, 37 A-Rank and 16 B-Rank. Setting aside the B-Ranks and the unlaunched S-Rank, 83 engines have published stats. Eighty scale off Base ATK, in exactly five tiers:
- 743 Base ATK — 4 engines, all S-Rank Exclusives
- 713 Base ATK — 35 engines, all S-Rank Exclusives
- 684 Base ATK — 6 engines, the entire permanent Star-Studded Cast pool
- 624 Base ATK — 13 engines, all A-Rank Exclusives
- 594 Base ATK — 22 engines, generic A-Ranks
The other three are Armorer engines, which scale off Base DEF instead: Crimson Thirst at 431, Catty Luck and Bloodmarrow Coffer at 356 each.
The 624 line is the tidy one. The thirteen A-Ranks at 624 Base ATK are the same thirteen tagged Exclusive — no exceptions either way. At A-Rank, being somebody's signature and being on the top stat tier are the same fact.
Why every S-Rank W-Engine in Zenless Zone Zero is someone's signature
Of the 47 S-Rank W-Engine pages on the wiki, 46 have released and all of them are tagged Exclusive. There is no generic S-Rank W-Engine in Zenless Zone Zero. That is why "just pull the S-Rank" is weak advice here: an S-Rank you did not build a team around will often lose to an A-Rank that matches your Agent.
Nine S-Ranks are obtainable without chasing a specific limited rate-up. Six come from the Star-Studded Cast permanent pool:
| W-Engine | Specialty | Base ATK |
|---|---|---|
| Steel Cushion | Attack | 684 |
| The Brimstone | Attack | 684 |
| Hellfire Gears | Stun | 684 |
| The Restrained | Stun | 684 |
| Fusion Compiler | Anomaly | 684 |
| Weeping Cradle | Support | 684 |
Three more come through the W-Engine Channel's Custom Search feature, as non-rate-up options on every weapon banner: Riot Suppressor Mark VI (Attack), Tusks of Fury (Defense) and Timeweaver (Anomaly), all at 713 Base ATK.
Add them up and five Specialties have a permanent S-Rank option. Rupture and Armorer have none. No amount of standard pulling or Custom Search will hand a Rupture or Armorer main an S-Rank for that Specialty — a limited channel or an A-Rank are the only routes. And the Star-Studded Cast six carry a 29 Base ATK deficit against the 713 tier, widening to 59 against the four at 743.
How the W-Engine Effect gate actually works
Every W-Engine has three layers, and only the first two apply universally:
- Base ATK (or Base DEF on Armorer engines) — always applies.
- Advanced Stat — CRIT Rate, ATK%, Impact, Energy Regen, PEN Ratio, Anomaly Proficiency. Always applies.
- W-Engine Effect — the named passive. Only fires if the equipping Agent's Specialty matches the W-Engine's Specialty.
That third line is the whole game. Bolting a 713 Base ATK Attack signature onto a Stun Agent gives you the stat block and nothing else, while a 594 Base ATK Stun A-Rank gives you a live passive. Specialty match beats raw rarity more often than new players expect, which is why the tier list below splits by Specialty rather than collapsing into one column.
Three progression systems are easy to mix up. Enhancing levels the engine and raises its Main Stat. Modification is the ascension step that lifts the level cap every 10 levels up to Lv. 60 and raises the Sub Stat. Overclocking feeds in duplicates to strengthen the W-Engine Effect through Phases P1 to P5. A P5 A-Rank can beat a P1 off-Specialty S-Rank — and A-Rank duplicates are cheap while S-Rank duplicates are not.
ZZZ W-Engine tier list by Specialty
Roster counts per Specialty, so you can see how thin some pools are:
| Specialty | Total | S-Rank | A-Rank | B-Rank | Permanent S-Rank access |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Attack | 25 | 14 | 8 | 3 | Steel Cushion, The Brimstone, Riot Suppressor Mark VI |
| Stun | 19 | 10 | 6 | 3 | Hellfire Gears, The Restrained |
| Anomaly | 19 | 11 | 5 | 3 | Fusion Compiler, Timeweaver |
| Support | 13 | 5 | 5 | 3 | Weeping Cradle |
| Defense | 11 | 2 | 7 | 2 | Tusks of Fury |
| Rupture | 9 | 4 | 4 | 1 | None |
| Armorer | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | None |
Stun reads 10 S-Ranks because the total includes the unlaunched Crimson Moon Casket. Read the table as a priority list, not a power list. Attack, Stun and Anomaly players have deep pools and can afford to skip a banner. Armorer has four W-Engines in total, and all four arrived with Version 3.2 — an Armorer main has no bench whatsoever. Defense has eleven engines but seven are A-Ranks, which is why the free picks below matter more there than in Attack.
Practical ranking inside each Specialty:
- Attack. Steel Cushion is the permanent-pool default and a safe long-term investment. The Brimstone is the ATK% alternative, with Scorching Breath stacking ATK up to eight times. Riot Suppressor Mark VI adds a CRIT DMG line through Custom Search.
- Stun. Hellfire Gears and The Restrained both carry Impact as their Advanced Stat, so pick on passive, not stat. This is where the permanent pool holds up best.
- Anomaly. Fusion Compiler is the accessible S-Rank and Timeweaver the Custom Search alternative. With eleven S-Ranks in the pool, Anomaly mains rarely need to force a weapon channel.
- Support. Weeping Cradle is the only permanent S-Rank, but the pool is thirteen deep — the least reason of any Specialty to gamble on a weapon channel.
- Defense. Tusks of Fury via Custom Search, otherwise the seven A-Ranks are the plan.
- Rupture and Armorer. Treat A-Ranks as the plan, not the fallback.
Still deciding which Agents to build around these? Our ZZZ agent tier list for September 2026 covers the roster side, and the ZZZ Bangboo tier list handles the third slot most guides ignore.
The best free W-Engines and where to get them
Four routes, three genuinely free, one of them an outright S-Rank.
Beginner Guide selection. Version 3.2 added a selectable S-Rank reward, with conditions. HoYoverse's Version 3.2 update announcement states: "If a Proxy did not obtain the selectable limited S-Rank Agent & W-Engine from the Marcel Anniversary Gift event in Version 3.1… After completing the required Missions in Phase 2 of the Beginner Guide, they can select one of the following S-Rank W-Engines: Sharpened Stinger, Myriad Eclipse, or Severed Innocence." Gated to players who missed the 3.1 event, behind Phase 2 missions — but a limited-pool S-Rank for nothing. Pick the one matching an Agent you already intend to build.
Signal Shop. All six Star-Studded Cast S-Ranks listed above are stocked at 600 Residual Signal each, one per monthly refresh. Residual Signal accrues from every Signal Search channel, not just the standard one: 8 per duplicate A-Rank Agent, 8 per any A-Rank W-Engine, 40 per duplicate S-Rank Agent and 40 per any S-Rank W-Engine. The slow-but-certain path to a named S-Rank.
Box Galaxy. The gadget store sells A-Rank W-Engines at 18,000 Denny plus 6 W-Engine Chips, and B-Ranks at 3,000 Denny plus 1 Chip, all at unlimited stock. The A-Rank list covers Bunny Band, Original Transmorpher, Precious Fossilized Core, Rainforest Gourmet, Slice of Time, Starlight Engine, Steam Oven, Street Superstar, Weeping Gemini, Puzzle Sphere and Catty Luck. Unlimited stock makes this the cheapest route to P5 Overclocking: buy five copies and stop thinking about that Agent's weapon slot.
New Eridu City Fund. Bloodmarrow Coffer, the new A-Rank Armorer engine, needs the Growth or Premium Plan unlocked, City Fund Lv. 30, and a Great Builder's Certificate — the one paid-track entry here, listed for completeness.
A-Ranks that punch above their rank
| W-Engine | Base | Advanced Stat | Effect | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Precious Fossilized Core | 594 ATK | Impact 15% | Behemoth Hunter | Standard pool, Box Galaxy |
| Catty Luck | 356 DEF | DEF 40% | Lucky Pawpad | Signal Search, Box Galaxy |
| Bloodmarrow Coffer | 356 DEF | CRIT Rate 20% | Moment of Unsealing | City Fund Lv. 30 track |
Precious Fossilized Core is the standout. Behemoth Hunter grants bonus Daze while the target's HP is no lower than 50%, and a second tranche while it is no lower than 75%, scaling +10% at P1 to +16% at P5 per half. That front-loads the exact window where Stun matters, so it reads best in long boss fights such as Deadly Assault — our ZZZ Deadly Assault guide covers that mode's HP pools.
Catty Luck and Bloodmarrow Coffer are Armorer engines released on 9 September 2026, both at 356 Base DEF — a different axis from the ATK ladder above, not a weak number. Within Armorer, Catty Luck is the accessible pick: a DEF bonus starting at 8% and reaching 12% at P5, doubling for 40 seconds after an EX Special Attack, and obtainable from Signal Search or simply bought from Box Galaxy.
W-Engine Channel pity rules before you pull
The weapon banner is not the Agent banner, and the differences favour you:
- S-Rank hard pity is 80 pulls, not the 90 you are used to from Agent channels.
- The featured S-Rank W-Engine is 75/25, not 50/50 — three in four S-Ranks are the one you want.
- Worst case for the promotional W-Engine is 160 pulls.
- A-Rank guarantee lands on the 10th pull, the featured A-Rank is 50%, with a 20-pull worst case.
- No S-Rank Agents appear in the W-Engine Channel pool.
- Pity counters carry across W-Engine Channels only. They never transfer to or from Agent channels.
Deliberately, no base drop rates appear above. HoYoverse publishes those in-game on each channel's details screen, and that screen is the only place worth reading them from.
Version 3.2 "Their Secret Histories" went live on 9 September 2026 at 06:00 (UTC+8), and per the official announcement "Version 3.2 will run for 42 days, ending on 2026/10/21 06:00 (UTC+8)." Phase I weapon channels — Crimson Thirst and Neon Fantasies — close 30 September 2026 at 11:59 server time, with Drill Rig - Red Axis and The Vault as the default rate-up A-Ranks.
What is not confirmed yet
Version 3.3 datamines are already circulating with W-Engine names attached. None are sourced from HoYoverse and none appear in this tier list.
- Any unreleased Version 3.3 W-Engine. Names pulled from test-client builds are not announcements, and test-client kits change before release more often than not.
- Crimson Moon Casket's stats. This S-Rank Stun engine exists as a wiki entry with blank stats, and HoYoverse has not announced which channel or phase it arrives on. It is counted in the Specialty table but excluded from every Base ATK tier above, because there is nothing to count.
- Any best-in-slot verdict for an Agent whose kit is not live. That is an opinion about an unpublished kit.
This section will be updated when HoYoverse publishes Phase II details, not before.
FAQ
What is the best W-Engine in ZZZ? There is no single best one, because the W-Engine Effect only activates when the Agent's Specialty matches the engine's. The best engine for any Agent is that Agent's own signature; the best one you can reliably get is a permanent-pool or Custom Search S-Rank in your Specialty, or a P5 A-Rank from Box Galaxy if your Specialty has neither.
Are all S-Rank W-Engines signature weapons? Yes. All 46 released S-Rank W-Engines are tagged Exclusive — each was introduced alongside a specific Agent. There is no generic S-Rank W-Engine in the game.
Which Specialties have no permanently available S-Rank W-Engine? Rupture and Armorer. Attack has three permanent options, Anomaly and Stun two each, Support and Defense one each, counting both the Star-Studded Cast pool and the Custom Search picks.
Is an off-Specialty S-Rank better than a matching A-Rank? Usually not. It still gives its Base ATK and Advanced Stat, but the W-Engine Effect stays dormant. A matching A-Rank at 594 or 624 Base ATK with a live passive often wins, and an Overclocked P5 A-Rank wins more clearly still.
What is the W-Engine Channel pity in Zenless Zone Zero? S-Rank hard pity is 80 pulls with a 75/25 split toward the featured engine, so 160 pulls is the worst case. The A-Rank guarantee is every 10 pulls at a 50% featured rate. Counters carry between W-Engine Channels but never to Agent channels.
How do I get a free S-Rank W-Engine? If you missed Version 3.1's Marcel Anniversary Gift event, Version 3.2's Beginner Guide grants a selectable S-Rank from Sharpened Stinger, Myriad Eclipse or Severed Innocence once you clear the Phase 2 missions. Otherwise the Signal Shop stocks all six Star-Studded Cast S-Ranks at 600 Residual Signal each, once per monthly refresh.
Why do Armorer W-Engines have lower numbers? They use Base DEF, not Base ATK — 431 on Crimson Thirst, 356 on the two A-Ranks. That is a separate scale, not a weaker one.
Sources and where to spend next
Counts and stat tiers were compiled from the Zenless Zone Zero wiki's full W-Engine index as of Version 3.2. Schedule, reward and channel details come from HoYoverse's official Version 3.2 announcements on HoYoLAB and zenless.hoyoverse.com.
For the wider patch, the ZZZ 3.2 banners guide breaks down the phase schedule, the current ZZZ codes are free Polychrome toward these channels, and the September 2026 events roundup covers where Box Galaxy's Denny and W-Engine Chips come from.
