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Abilities are special skills that all Warframes, Archwings, and Necramechs possess, which are used to provide tactical advantages in battle by either affecting enemies directly or bolstering teammates in some manner. Every Warframe has a set of four unique Abilities that directly influence their gameplay and their role within a team. For example, 
Frost's Abilities are based around slowing down enemies and blocking damage, making him more suited to a defensive role. 
Nova, with her damage-oriented Ability set, is a good choice for offensive playstyles.
Most Abilities require Energy, which is spent every time an Ability is used. Warframes have only a limited Energy capacity, so Ability use must be carefully managed to prevent running out of Energy at critical moments. Energy costs vary between Abilities; in general the more advanced/powerful the Ability, the greater its Energy cost.
Controls[]
- Main article: Key Bindings
| Platform | 1st Ability | 2nd Ability | 3rd Ability | 4th Ability |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PC | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |
| PSN | R1 +  |
R1 +  |
R1 +  |
R1 + 
|
| XBX | RB +  |
RB +  |
RB +  |
RB + 
|
| Switch | R Button + B | R Button + Y | R Button + A | R Button + X |
Types[]
Warframe Abilities are internally classified into four different types loosely according to their theme: damage, buff & debuff, mobility, and perception. Some Warframe Abilities fall into more than one classification, while 
Reunite is the only ability with no classification. The abilities below are classified by what a corresponding Corpus Comba / Scrambus will disable.
Damage[]
The most common Ability type. Damage Abilities deal direct damage to enemies, however some abilities like 
Quiver have nothing damage related but are classified as such anyways. They are disabled by the Sap Comba.
Buff & Debuff[]
These Abilities modify a unit's innate stats. Buff-type Abilities enhance a Warframe or their allies, while Debuff Abilities weaken or cripple enemies. Some Abilities perform both. They are disabled by the Nul Comba.
Mobility[]
Mobility Abilities alter a Warframe's ability to travel between two points. Some abilities like 
Speed make the Warframe faster, while others like 
Undertow make it slower. Some abilities like 
Rhino Stomp have nothing mobility related but are classified as such anyways. They are disabled by the Slo Comba.
Perception[]
Perception Abilities are used to confuse, distract or disappear from enemy sight, fooling some to engage false targets or prevent them from seeing the player entirely. They are disabled by the Fog Comba.
Diminishing Returns On Bosses[]
Some Bosses have a mechanic where they are immune to certain effects from abilities or apply a "diminishing return" effect on repeated uses of a single ability, reducing their duration by 25% on subsequent casts. This mostly pertains to abilities that have crowd control effects since bosses have high resistance to them.[1][2]
Examples of diminishing returns or CC resistance:
Equinox's Rest & Rage will slow boss-type enemies instead of putting them to sleep.- Ivara's Sleep Arrow has diminishing returns against boss-type enemies.
- Nyx's Mind Control and Chaos have diminishing returns against boss-type enemies.
- Valkyr's Warcry has diminishing returns against boss-type enemies.
- Vauban's Bastille will slow boss-type enemies instead of lifting and placing them in stasis.
Examples of CC immunity:
- Zephyr's Tornado will not ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Zephyr's Tail Wind will not knockdown or ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Valkyr's Paralysis will not stun boss-type enemies.
- Volt's Shock and Discharge will not electrocute boss-type enemies.
- Hydroid's Tidal Surge will not ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Hydroid's Undertow will not pull in boss-type enemies.
- Hydroid's Tentacle Swarm will not grab boss-type enemies unless they've died.
- Limbo's Banish will not ragdoll or move boss-type enemies into the Rift Plane.
- Loki's Switch Teleport will not relocate boss-type enemies.
- Loki's Radial Disarm will not disarm, stun, or dismember boss-type enemies.
- Loki's Irradiating Disarm will not confuse boss-type enemies.
- Mag's Pull will not move boss-type enemies.
- Mag's Crush will not lift or ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Mag's Fracturing Crush will not stop boss-type enemies.
- Banshee's Sonic Boom, Silence, and Sound Quake will not push, stun, or stagger boss-type enemies.
- Ember's Fire Blast will not knockdown boss-type enemies.
- Excalibur's Radial Blind and Radial Javelin will not stagger boss-type enemies.
- Frost's Freeze and Avalanche will not freeze boss-type enemies.
- Frost's Snow Globe will not freeze or push boss-type enemies.
- Rhino's Rhino Charge will not ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Rhino's Rhino Stomp will not put boss-type enemies in stasis.
- Mesa's Shooting Gallery will not jam or stun boss-type enemies.
- Mesa's Muzzle Flash will not blind boss-type enemies.
- Oberon's Smite will not ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Oberon's Reckoning will not lift boss-type enemies.
- Nekros' Terrify will not fear boss-type enemies, but will continue to apply an armor reduction debuff.
- Nezha's Divine Spears will not pin or ragdoll boss-type enemies.
- Fatal Attraction will not attract boss-type enemies.
- Lifted proc does not affect boss-type enemies.
Outliers:
- Saryn's Spores will be able to properly spread and receive spores from nearby boss-type enemies.
- Nekros' Shadows of the Dead will not summon boss-type enemies.
- Ivara's Prowl will not steal from boss-type enemies.
List of Abilities[]
- Main article: Category:Warframe Abilities
Injectable[]
- Main article: Helminth#Ability Replacement
Some abilities can be injected into other Warframes, replacing one of their abilities via the Helminth. These include:
Raw Data[]
- Main article: Module:Ability/data
For a community-contributed list of player abilities in WARFRAME, see Module:Ability/data.
Ability Mods[]
Warframes Abilities can be affected by five types of modification: 
Ability Duration, 
Ability Efficiency, 
Ability Range, 
Ability Strength, and Casting Speed. With the proper combination of mods and gear Abilities can obtain a maximized value (see Power Mods and Abilities).
Ability Duration[]
- Main article: Ability Duration
These mods affect how long a Warframe Ability lasts.
Mods that affect Ability Duration positively:
Crimson Archon ShardMaximized at +221% with a negative effect of -66% Ability Range. Note that 
Continuity and Primed Continuity are mutually exclusive; the maximized value assumes the use of Primed Continuity.
Ability Efficiency[]
- Main article: Ability Efficiency
These mods affect how much a Warframe Ability costs to cast. Ability Efficiency has a hard cap of 75%. For example, an Ability which costs 100 Energy cannot be reduced below 25 Energy.
Mods that affect Ability Efficiency positively:
Maximized at +105% (or +135% with an active Pax Bolt buff) with a negative effect of -60% Ability Duration. The 75% hard cap mentioned above means it is more efficient to combine a fully-leveled Fleeting Expertise with Boreal's Hatred in the same build, unless also utilizing a mod that decreases Ability Efficiency, such as Blind Rage, or minimizing the drain of channeled Abilities with as few mods as possible.
Ability Range[]
These mods affect the radius and targeting range of Warframe Abilities.
Mods that affect Ability Range positively:
Maximized at +180% with a negative effect of -60% Ability Strength.
Ability Strength[]
These mods and Arcanes affect the damage and the potency of Warframe Abilities (such as Banshee's 
Sonar and Energy restored by Trinity's 
Energy Vampire).
Mods & Arcanes that affect 
Ability Strength[]
Crimson Archon Shard
Maximization[]
In the arsenal, Ability Strength is maximized at +285% (equipping all Umbral mods) with a negative effect of -55% Ability Efficiency and -27.5% Ability Duration.
In-game, without any additional Warframe ability buffs or effects, Ability Strength is maximized at +465% (equipping all Umbral mods, Energy Conversion, 
Pax Bolt, and if all players in a squad equip Growing Power). With the Helminth Invigorations, Ability Strength is maximized at +665% (equipping all of the above mods/Arcanes).
Using 
Empower can raise this cap by 50%, but only for the next ability cast, and Empower cannot stack with itself nor benefit from mods aside from Ability Efficiency. The same way, Power Drain can provide an additional 50% bonus for the next ability cast after performing a Mercy kill.
The total Ability Strength can then be doubled by a corruption buff from opening Void Relics, bringing it up to +1630%.
The theoretical max Ability Strength for any Warframe (except 
Volt, 
Excalibur and Frost because of their Arcane Helmets, and 
Ember, 
Nidus, and 
Protea because of their passives) will be +10,862.0% taking into account +80% Ability Strength from 
Equinox's Peaceful Provocation and 5.8x Ability Strength multiplier from Nidus' 
Parasitic Link with an Invigoration and a corruption buff on both the warframe and Nidus.
- To achieve this,
![EquinoxIcon272](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="31" height="32"><rect fill-opacity="0"/></svg>)
Equinox must first cast 
Pacify & Provoke then Nidus' cast ![ParasiticLink130xWhite](data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="32" height="32"><rect fill-opacity="0"/></svg>)
Parasitic Link on any Warframe. - Volt's theoretical max Ability Strength will be +10,978.0% if under the above effects with Arcane Volt Storm Helmet equipped.
- Frost's (with Arcane Frost Squall Helmet equipped), Excalibur's (with Arcane Excalibur Pendragon Helmet equipped) and Nidus' theoretical max Ability Strength will be +11,036.0% if under the above effects.
- Protea's theoretical max Ability Strength will be +12,022.0% if under the above effects with her passive active while Ember has no limit other than the number of enemies she can apply a
Heat status effect to.
Last updated: Hotfix 31.0.10 (2022-01-20)
Casting Speed[]
These sources affect the casting animation speed of Warframe Abilities (such as 
Nekros' 
Shadows of the Dead or 
Mag's 
Crush).
The calculation for casting time is (Base Animation Time) ÷ (1 + Speed Bonus).
Sources that Ability Casting Speed positively:
Amber Archon ShardAbility Ranking[]
Since Update 15.0 (2014-10-24), Warframe Abilities unlock and rank up with affinity. Maximum Rank for Abilities is Rank 3.
| Warframe / Archwing / Necramech Rank | Ability and Rank | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First Ability | Second Ability | Third Ability | Fourth Ability | ||
| Unranked | Unranked | Locked | Locked | Locked | |
| 3 | Unranked | Unranked | Locked | Locked | |
| 5 | Unranked | Unranked | Unranked | Locked | |
| 7 | Rank 1 | Unranked | Unranked | Locked | |
| 10 | Rank 1 | Unranked | Unranked | Unranked | |
| 12 | Rank 1 | Rank 1 | Unranked | Unranked | |
| 14 | Rank 2 | Rank 1 | Unranked | Unranked | |
| 16 | Rank 2 | Rank 1 | Rank 1 | Unranked | |
| 18 | Rank 3 | Rank 1 | Rank 1 | Unranked | |
| 20 | Rank 3 | Rank 1 | Rank 1 | Rank 1 | |
| 22 | Rank 3 | Rank 2 | Rank 1 | Rank 1 | |
| 24 | Rank 3 | Rank 2 | Rank 2 | Rank 1 | |
| 25 | Rank 3 | Rank 2 | Rank 2 | Rank 2 | |
| 27 | Rank 3 | Rank 3 | Rank 2 | Rank 2 | |
| 28 | Rank 3 | Rank 3 | Rank 3 | Rank 2 | |
| 30 | Rank 3 | Rank 3 | Rank 3 | Rank 3 | |
Ability Disrupting Enemies[]
Ability Immune Enemies[]
Full Immunity[]
Partial Immunity[]
Notes[]
- The majority of Warframe abilities with duration or changes to the user/enemies will be canceled if the player falls into a pit (e.g. Shadows of the Dead,
Invisibility, and 
Iron Skin).
Patch History[]
Update 37.0 (2024-10-02)
- Unlocking an Ability will now show the Input needed to cast it in the “Ability Unlocked” pop-up!
Update 25.6 (2019-08-08)
- Added numerous Warframe Ability Augment stats to the Ability Screen. We debuted this with Wukong’s rework, and you will now be able to directly see the Stat changes associated with Augments on the Abilities!
Hotfix 25.5.2 (2019-08-02)
- Fixed the Warframe Ability screen breaking if a given Warframe didn't have any Ability hints.
- Fixed the width of the Passive button textbox on the Warframe selection screen being too small for some languages, resulting in text wrapping awkwardly.
Hotfix 25.5.1 (2019-08-02)
- Fixed missing Warframe Ability Tips section when playing Warframe in Korean and Russian.
Update 24.6 (2019-04-04)
- Warframe “In Air” Ability Changes
Right now, there are certain powers that just cannot be cast in the air. Some of those powers are easy to address, and we simply remove the restriction. A full breakdown can be found here in the Developer Workshop: https://forums.warframe.com/topic/1079249-dev-workshop-cannot-cast-in-the-air-friend-or-foe/
- Removed "cast on ground" requirements for the following Warframe abilities:
- Trinity Well of Life
- Trinity Energy Vampire
- Trinity Link
- Frost Avalanche
- Atlas Tectonics
- Mag Crush
- Chroma Effigy
- Loki Radial Disarm
- Additionally, the following abilities require ground to activate, but can now be cast in the air and will do a melee-esque slam to the ground:
- Rhino Stomp
- Banshee Sound Quake
- Oberon Hallowed Ground
- Khora Strangledome
- Nidus Virulence
- Harrow Condemn
Update 22.20 (2018-05-17)
- Updated several ability stat descriptors to make them clearer:
- Standardized format across all Warframe ability descriptions.
- E.g. Range (Meters) # to Range #
- E.g. “Health over Time #” to “Health / Sec #”
- Added units of measurement to the abilities where appropriate - M (meters), S (seconds), % (percentage), X (multiplier), etc.
- Converted decimals to whole numbers (e.g. Equinox’s Rest & Rage Wakeup Health Threshold has been changed from 0.5 to 50% for max rank).
- Changed “Range” to “Radius” for several Warframe abilities.
- Standardized format across all Warframe ability descriptions.
Update 17.5 (2015-10-01)
- Warframe Changes
Toggled Abilities and Energy Drain: The following adjustments have been made to Abilities that can toggle on or off with the intention of making each Ability more rewarding to use in a wider range of scenarios. We will continue to monitor the balance of all Toggled Abilities after launch.
- Duration Mods now have an effect on toggled Abilities.
- For example: Mods that added 100% duration will make a 10 Energy drain become a 5 Energy drain.
- Drain-Per-Second and other adjustments has been made on the following Toggled Abilities:
- Chroma’s Spectral Scream now drains 3 Energy.
- Chroma’s Elemental Ward’s Electric elemental discharge effect is now affected by range Mods instead of strength Mods.
- Chroma’s Elemental Ward Poison holster and reload speed are now affected by duration Mods instead of strength Mods.
- Ember’s World on Fire now drains 3 Energy and has had its maximum duration removed.
- Equinox’s Rest & Rage has had its base range doubled.
- Hydroid can now recast Tempest Barrage and Tentacle Swarm with no cooldown.
- Nyx’s Chaos no longer has a cooldown, and enemies affected by Chaos cannot be stunned by additional casts.
- The minimum energy cost of an Ability cannot go below 25% of the base cost.
- ↑ (2016, February 4). Immunity Vs Resistance. Warframe Forums. Accessed 2023-02-06. Archived from the original on 2023-02-06.
- ↑ Update 18.5 (2016-03-04) patch notes
39 comments
"Maximization
In the arsenal, Ability Strength is maximized at +285% (equipping all Umbral mods) with a negative effect of -55% Ability Efficiency and -27.5% Ability Duration."
This is outdated, no? Umbral Intensify with all 3 umbral mods, Transient Fortitude, Blind Rage, Amar's Hatred, and Power Drift (assuming they're all maxed out) results in 361% Ability Strength.
Very outdated. I'm not 100% sure of the calculations, but they shouldn't be too far off- Maximized ability strength is currently ~14502%
77% from umbral mods, 15% from amar's hatred or power drift but not both, 24% from augur secrets, 99% from blind rage, 50% from energy conversion, and finally 55% from transient fortitude for mods. 60% from molt augmented, 45% from molt vigor, and 30% from pax bolt. 40% from sling strength and 75% from tauforged crimson archon shards. Between power drain and empower that's another 100%. You can then slot growing power for an aura and power drift if you're playing alone for a total of 710% ability strength if you're alone.
With teammates you obviously have Equinox providing an 80% bonus, and then you can get another additional 20% from a teammates wellspring. With four people, you can now drop the 15% from power drift and have everyone use growing power/coaction drift- This is 132% more strength in total, but is only a net gain of 92%.
This is 902% pre-invigorations, Nidus, or corruption buff.
Add invigoration for 1102%, or 1117% on Nidus. Corruption buff brings these to 2204 or 2234%.
At 2234% ability strength that's a 558% ability strength bonus (rounded down), bringing that 2204 to ~14502%, ~40% higher than the max strength mentioned on the wiki for most warframes.
Now that's a lot of damage. Let me know if I missed anything.
High, friendly neighbor calculator with an edit here- I forgot the most important part of this whole equation, that being the base 100% ability strength.
So that actually comes out to ~17049% abilty strength, if I did it right this time.
Around 17233% for Nidus and 18465% for Protea.
Alright nerds it's September 2024 and time to talk about strength maximization again. I've opted not to think too hard about how these frames are activating the conditional buffs they need, just that it's possible. Here we go.
Squad Comp
Equinox
Jade
Nidus (of course)
And literally anybody as the target of our maximization
Base: 100%
Frame Loadout: Triple Umbral (+77%) + Blind Rage (+99%) + Transient Fortitude (+55%) + Augur Secrets (+24%) + Amar's Hatred (+15%) + Tauforged Crimson Shard 5x (+75%) + Helminth Invigoration (+100%) + Molt Augmented (+60%)
That's 605% right here, which is enough to push Jade over the cap for Symphony of Mercy's strength buff. We're also going to slap a Power Donation on her here in a second (double aura mod wooo~), but there's enough other stuff going on she'll get back over 600% easily. The rest of this only matters to Nidus and our charming protagonist.
"But that's only one arcane!" You're absolutely correct, cook with me for a second.
Other Loadout Buffs: Vome Invocation (+60%) + Sling Strength (+40%) + Growing Power 4x w/ Coaction Drift 4x (+132.25%)
Buffs from Squadmates: Hardened Wellspring (+20%) + Power Donation (Thanks Jade, +30%) + Pacify and Provoke w/ Augment (+80%) + Power of the Seven (+150%)
Conjunction Survival Lone Guardian: Gotta be an omnia fissure (+100%)
Running total: 1217.25%. Neat. Now, Nidus only needs to cast Link once, so let's stack all those "on next cast" buffs on him. This is where that second frame arcane went.
One-Shot Buffs: Molt Vigor (+45%) + Pax Bolt (+30%) + Power Drain (+50%) + Empower (+50%)
1392.25% strength doubled by the void relic buff translates to a ~7.96x strength multiplier from Parasitic Link. Very neat.
If the frame you're maximizing is just firing off a single ability, we can stop here. It'll have that same 1392.25% strength number, which is then multiplied (by the relic buff and Nidus) to 22168.10%.
If you want to keep high strength numbers consistently for whatever reason, you lose those one-shot buffs but can slot Arcane Ice Storm (+40%) for a slightly lower but still impressive total of 1257.25% * 2 * 7.96 = 20018.56%
Specific frames can go higher and there's something with Precision Intensify, but I'm about done. Cheers.
We have truly gone too far.
Remember? Controlled Slide MOD.
So... if you give your build Natural Talent, Speed Drift, have Power Transfer active on Madurai, and slot in 5 amber archon shards...
...what would your cast time be? My math comes out to 0.3% of the normal cast time, but I feel like that can't be right.
I remember years ago 50% was hard cap, is it still true?
Natural talent = 50% (0.5)
Speed Drift 15% (0.15)
Power Transfer 50% (0.5)
5 Yellow Shards 125% (1.25)
For Limbo which has 2s casting time on his Cataclysm, using that many casting speed would result in:
2s / (1 + (0.5 + 0.15 + 0.5 + 1.25)) = 0.59s
I have been very long time no play warframe, may i know newest change about warframe ability is only 8/8/2019?
Molt vigor isn't under Mods & Arcanes that affect Ability Strength positively.
This page needs proper edits to lay out the void fissure, arbitration, and Helminth invigoration effects on the various ability stats. Right now they're only mentioned for strength maximization.
Ability Strength doesn't seem to go lower than 40%. I don't know if my game is bugged, but I can't go lower than 40% even if I equip both Power Donation and Overextended, meaning that 10% Ability Strength (for Molecular Prime) cannot be done, unless my stuff isn't working properly.
Edit: I'm stupid, the 30% reduction from Power Donation only applies when in a mission.
A list with the range of all abilities would be nice. also reather or not you need line of sight for the ability or if the range is influenced by mods. I'm kind of confused about some abilities and a range specific list would eally help me out.
Heck even add other things like damage or duration. a comparison list like we have for frames and weapons.
What the + N% power means? If you have +150% power on mods, does it increase your ability strength?
Where do you see +N% power? Ability Strength bonuses increase Ability Strength. Power is an old term for Warframe abilities.
Shouldn't 'Crowd Control' be a category of ability? It doesn't neatly fit into any of the others, and it's quite influential in the game.
I'm tempted to just throw CC under the Debuff cat, but maybe it should have its own section. You're correct though, CC is an important play style so it should definitely be mentioned here somewhere.
If you were to add a CC category, make sure you give a clear definition of what it means so we don't leave any nuance. Right now we are using 'official' classification based on Combas/Scrambuses.
I wonder, is there no frame power that increase casting speed?
None so far.
I feel there should be a "summoning" class for abilities such as exalted weapons and snow globe and the like.
They forgot to put system reroute here
They need to make damage abilities not fall off so badly.
Why arbitration power buff for max strength? Did they remove the double strength buff from fissures?
I agree
i dont
i think they were drunk when they developed this stupid contorted system for bonus calculations.
Surprised how no one mentioned how outdated the ability types tables are (untouched since Update 22.0). Updating them now.
Edit: Did a lot of guessing to see which abilities fit in what category so the tables may not be 100% up-to-date.
what happens when your GAME CRASHES and the data becomes currupted. Do you reinstall it or is it gone forever?
Your Warframe player data should be safe. Just reinstall the game and log back in.
This page needs a section that addresses and breaks down the mechanics of unlocking and ranking abilities as your warframe ranks up.
It is described on the warframes page... although it may be appropriate here too...
This page also needs a section, a CLEAR when you scan through section, on how to use the abilities as well, preferably for multiple platforms.
Maximized at 237% with a whole 5%(!) efficiency increase. Now that's what I call efficiency.
That's not even taking into account the loss in range this apperantly has.