Cyberpunk 2077 Skill Development and Bonuses for Advancement

Cyberpunk 2077’s skill progression has received a major overhaul with the role-playing game’s big, free update 2.0. CDPR has streamlined V’s abilities, grouping them under new names and categories, and changed the way you level them up. Since the skills are completely independent from the Perks and other abilities, you’ll be able to level up all five of them and equip your V with some pretty great bonuses, depending on how you play.

In this guide, you’ll learn how the skill progression has changed in Cyberpunk 2077, how to level up all five skills, and what you’ll get for your efforts.

Cyberpunk 2077 Skill Progression

• How does skill progression work?
• Solo Skill Progression
• Solo Skill Rank Bonuses
• Netrunner skill progression
• Netrunner Skill Rank Bonuses
• Headhunter skill progression
• Bonuses to the rank of headhunter skills
• Shinobi Skill Progression
• Shinobi Skill Rank Bonuses
• Progress in the Enigneer skill
• Bonuses to the skill rank engineer

How does skill advancement work in Cyberpunk 2077?

Each of Cyberpunk’s five skill groups requires different actions to level up, but most of the tasks involve things you do while playing anyway. Headhunter, for example, levels up when you use firearms and land headshots, while the Shinobi branch levels up when you use movement skills. Since these upgrades aren’t tied to perk points, you can level them all up by playing the game normally.

The progress you made in the previous life of Cyberpunk counts towards progress in version 2.0, so if you start an old save file and notice random progress in some of these categories, that’s why.

Cyberpunk 2077 Solo Skill Progression

Leveling up in the solo game is a little strange. This category groups heavy weapons, carrying capacity and health under one banner, but the only way to level up is to repeatedly use fists, gorilla weapons, clubs and shotguns. Even if you don’t use heavy weapons that often, it’s worth bringing them out from time to time, if only for the rank bonuses. Extra health and better carrying capacity are always good.

Rank bonuses for solo skills

• Rank five: Increases load capacity by 50
• Rank 10: Increases health by 10
• Rank 15: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 20: Fists and Gorilla Arms have: +20 percent damage and +20 percent attack speed. Fists can cause bleeding.
• Rank 25: Load capacity increases by 100
• Rank 30: Health increases by 15
• Rank 35: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 40: +10 percent critical strike chance against enemies within five meters
• Rank 45: Strong attacks and fast melee attacks deal 25 percent more damage
• Rank 50: +25 percent health after a finisher
• Rank 55: When adrenaline rush is active, adrenaline degrades 50 percent slower and cannot drop below 10 percent
• Rank 60: Berserker triggers +30 percent enemy health threshold to perform finishers, +50 percent health from performing finishers, and +30 percent Berserker duration.

Cyberpunk 2077 Netrunner skill progression

Hacking will increase your Netrunner skill rank, as you would probably expect. Use your quickhacks on people and terminals whenever you can to quickly increase this rank. Some players say that any action involving intelligence will also increase your Netrunner rank. However, I haven’t noticed any significant increase, and hacking is just a faster way to do it in general.

Netrunner Skill Rank Bonuses

• Rank five: Increases RAM recovery rate by five percent
• Rank 10: Increases RAM by one
• Rank 15: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 20: +20 percent lock-on range with smart weapons
• Rank 25: Increases RAM recovery rate by five percent
• Rank 30: Increases RAM by one
• Rank 35: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 40: -20 percent RAM cost for quickhacks applied to devices and vehicles.
• Rank 45: +15 percent duration for control and transformation quickhacks, and +5 percent damage with combat quickhacks.
• Rank 50: +40 percent duration for overclocking
• Rank 55: -10 percent health loss when using Quickhacks during overclocking.
• Rank 60: When Overclock is active, enemies within 10 meters are now revealed and you can perform quickhacks on non-netrunner enemies from cover.

Cyberpunk 2077 Head Hunter Skill Progression

Increasing your headhunter rank is very simple. The best way to do this is by landing headshots, which seems to increase your skill progress significantly. Weapon techniques and targeting weak points also contribute to your progress. I’ve found that using handguns generally gives you a small amount of progress, even if you don’t perform any fancy moves.

Bonuses for the skill rank of the head hunter

• Rank five: Reduces visibility to enemies by 10 percent.
• Rank 10: +10 percent damage from headshots and +10 percent damage against weak points.
• Rank 15: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 20: No swaying of the weapon while crouching
• Rank 25: Reduces visibility to enemies by 10 percent
• Rank 30: +15 percent headshot damage and +15 percent damage against weak points.
• Rank 35: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 40: Optical camouflage is active when grabbing enemies
• Rank 45: Reduces recovery time after a roll by 30 percent
• Rank 50: 30 percent faster at squat walking and squat sprinting
• Rank 55: The damage bonus from remaining undetected outside of combat remains for three seconds after you enter combat.
• Rank 60: +15 percent optical stealth charge when you neutralize an enemy in one of the following ways: In focus mode, deadeye mode, or with a thrown weapon.

Shinobi skill development in Cyberpunk 2077

The rank of your shinobi skills is a bit more difficult to manage. You get points for the next higher rank when you use movement skills – i.e. dashing, dodging, climbing, and so on. As far as I can tell, though, these only seem to count if you use them in combat. Using katanas and other swords also counts. So if you’re not the most agile fighter, you’d better stick to these as you improve your rank.

Bonuses for Shinobi Skills

• Rank five: Increases movement speed by five percent
• Rank 10: -5 percent stamina cost when dodging and sprinting
• Rank 15: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 20: Improved accuracy after short dodging or sprinting
• Rank 25: Movement speed increased by five percent
• Rank 30: -10 percent stamina cost when dodging and sprinting
• Rank 35: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 40: Increased chance of damage limitation the faster you move
• Rank 45: +25 damage with fast attacks
• Rank 50: Air jump and glide reload 20 percent of your equipped weapon’s ammo
• Rank 55: Low stamina does not affect the accuracy of ranged attacks or the speed of melee attacks
• when you attack from the air or when time is slowed down.
• Rank 60: When Sandevistan is active: +40 critical hit chance and no stamina cost for each move

Cyberpunk 2077 Engineer Skill Progression

Engineer is the easiest skill to level up. You’ll advance by using smart weapons, throwing items and especially crafting. You’ll be able to climb the ranks faster by crafting and you won’t even have to use a smart weapon if you don’t want to, although the bonuses will obviously make these weapons more attractive and useful.

Bonuses to the skill rank engineer

• Rank five: Increases armor by 15
• Rank 10: Increases cyberware capacity by five
• Rank 15: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 20: +10 grenade percent damage and blast radius
• Rank 25: Increases armor by 25
• Rank 30: Increases cyberware capacity by 10
• Rank 35: +1 Perk Point
• Rank 40: Increased shock chance when charging a tech weapon or electric staff
• Rank 45: Health item effectiveness +15 percent
• Rank 50: +30 percent for all cyberware modifiers
• Rank 55: +10 percent damage with Bolt Shots and +40 percent burn chance with Bolt Shots. Chain lightning sets enemies on fire
• Rank 60: When Rage is active, you can trigger an EMP blast.

If you’re looking for new adventures in Night City, see how to start Phantom Liberty and meet Solomon Reed, and learn how to get the best Phantom Liberty ending ever.