Benchmarks

A benchmark is a standardized set of scenarios you run once, compare against a wider player base, and re-run later. It shows whether you're getting better, instead of relying on how a session felt.

• Read the breakdown, not the rank. Your lowest subcategory is where to train.
• Re-run every few weeks, not every session. No schedule fits everyone.
• Ranks don't translate. A Voltaic rank doesn't carry over to a Revosect rank.
• The rank is a check, not the goal. Grinding one strength won't fix a weakness.

Explanation¶

What a benchmark measures. A benchmark is a fixed list of scenarios, split across Clicking, Tracking, and Switching subcategories. Every player runs it the same way, so scores are comparable across people and across your own attempts.

The fixed list is the point. Change the scenarios and you lose the comparison, which is why benchmarks are versioned into seasons rather than edited in place.

Finding your weaknesses from it. The value isn't the single combined rank at the bottom. It's the subcategory breakdown above it.

Whichever subcategory scores lowest relative to the others is clearer evidence of where your aim needs work. It's less subjective than a hunch about what feels weak in a real game.

Some benchmarks withhold a rank until you have a score in every subcategory. That's deliberate: it forces you to test the areas you'd otherwise skip, which are usually the ones worth training.

How ranks usually work. Most benchmarks group ranks into difficulty bands. Players at very different levels each get a track to climb, rather than sharing one ladder.

A combined score across subcategories typically drives your placement. How that score is combined matters more than it looks.

A scheme that weights your weakest subcategory more heavily than your strongest rewards fixing weaknesses, not grinding a strength.

Rank names, thresholds, and verification rules differ per benchmark and change between seasons. Read them from the benchmark's own site, not from a table reproduced elsewhere.

The main benchmarks¶

Two communities run the benchmarks most players on this wiki will encounter. Both build primarily on KovaaK's.

• Voltaic runs a Season 5 benchmark for KovaaK's and a Season 3 one for Aimlabs. Each splits into subcategories per category, across three difficulty bands: Novice, Intermediate, and Advanced.¹²
  • You get a rank only once you have a score in every subcategory. It's driven by an overall "Energy" score that combines subcategories with a harmonic mean, which weights your weakest more heavily than your strongest.⁴
• Revosect runs a Season 5 benchmark for KovaaK's covering six subcategories across the same three categories. It has Entry, Intermediate, and Advanced tiers. The top tier requires a recorded VOD to verify a score.³

Rank names and season numbering are independent between the two, so a rank on one doesn't translate to a rank on the other.

Smaller communities run their own benchmarks as well. The Evxl Benchmark Tracker scores you against many of them at once.

How often to rerun a benchmark¶

There's no fixed schedule that works for everyone. But running a full benchmark every session usually wastes time you could spend training the weakness your last run found.

A benchmark measures where you are. It doesn't train you the way a focused routine does.

A gap of a few weeks between full re-runs gives your training time to move the number. It also keeps ordinary day-to-day variance, a bad night's sleep or an off session, from looking like a real change in either direction.

Why not to over-focus on rank¶

Treating the rank itself as the goal encourages exactly the behavior the scoring is built to discourage. That's finding one scenario you happen to be great at, and grinding it for score instead of training broadly.

Where a benchmark weights your weakest subcategory most heavily, chasing a single high score can't substitute for fixing an actual weak area. See Practice Principles.

Treat your rank as a rough, occasional check on whether your training is working, not as the thing you're training for.

Do this next. Run one full benchmark, note your lowest subcategory, and build your next routine around it.

Related¶

• Routines: building a routine around whatever a benchmark shows is your weakest area.
• Practice Principles: why benchmark scoring resists score chasing.
• Aim Trainers: the trainers community benchmarks run on.
• Progress and Plateaus: what to do when a benchmark score stops climbing.
• Clicking: the clicking subcategories a benchmark scores.
• Tracking: the tracking subcategories a benchmark scores.
• Switching: the switching subcategories a benchmark scores.
• Designing Around a Weakness: turning the subcategory a benchmark flags into a scenario.

Resources¶

• Evxl Benchmark Tracker: scores your runs against community benchmarks automatically.

References¶