Maximizing your drop in Fortnite

Maximizing Your Drop

As said in our basic section, you can’t win a game right off drop, but you can certainly lose it. There is a lot to understand about dropping well, and a big part of that is planning and study before ever boarding the bus. Dropping well involves knowledge, mechanics, planning, and communication (if playing in a team).


Dropping from the Battle Bus


  • Most players know they need to get to their desired loot first (i.e. quickly), so we’ll start there.


  • Riding bus vs Diving vs Free Fall vs Gliding
  • These types of movement are not equal!


  • When comparing speed: Bus > Diving > Free Fall > Gliding > Running > Walking
  • Try to minimize the time from the start of the bus path to get to your desired landing place through a combination of bus travel, diving, and gliding. Try to avoid free fall generally, unless it is required to reach a far location (since it is faster than gliding still).
  • Another way to increase speed of movement while dropping is to spam your jump button, which deploys and returns your glider. This results in a movement through the air that is faster than simply gliding.

But to drop well, you really need to start with a plan. There is a method to the madness…


Order of Operation:

1) pick your landing zone / POI

2) determine your best path from the Battle Bus to define when to jump

3) have a plan for your loot path upon landing.

  • Plan EXACTLY where to land and what path you will take to loot all the items of interest before moving on.
  • If playing duo or more, and your team is landing in the same POI, establish who will land where exactly, and the paths that each person will take to most efficiently loot the area as quickly as possible, and be able to defend one another quickly in case one of you is challenged by opponents.

4) have a plan for where you are moving to next, after looting the POI. This will likely be determined by your overall strategy of pushing or camping or trying to stay in motion, etc.


To plan your landing zone and loot path, use an interactive map like the one available at fortnite.gg


This version allows you to see all the different elements available across the map and turn on and off certain elements to help you find what you're looking for to plan a drop location and loot path that fits your play style and overall strategy.


Simply filter on the left side of the map to enable/disable the items you want to see. Be especially intentional about studying the map, along with your teammate(s) to define primary and secondary drop points and paths.


Having one good plan is a good start, but having backup plans is necessary if the bus is coming from a different direction than what is best for your desired drop, or if you can see that your POI is going to be more contested or less contested than you desire.

  • EXAMPLE 1: if your strategy is to camp and generally stay away from fights, but your POI is very close to the starting point of the bus, there may be a lot of people contesting for the same loot you are, and you will be heavily contested. In this case, you'd rather have a drop point near the end of the bus path to align with your strategy.
  • EXAMPLE 2: if your strategy is to push and deal major damage early, but your POI is far from the starting point of the bus, there may be very few people at your POI and you may fall behind in dealing damage. In this case, you'd rather have a drop point near the beginning of the bus path to align with your strategy.


So, planning at least two drop points, ideally totally across the map from each other, will give you a primary and secondary plan to choose from to execute as soon as you see the bus's flight path.


Also make sure to discuss and agree this with your teammate(s) in advance, before ever boarding the bus, so that you're not fighting each other for the same loot. Fighting each other makes for poor team dynamics right from the start, wastes time, and opens you up to your opponents unnecessarily.