Guide · Support

Zilean Guide

the Chronokeeper

Support

Mage

Tier C Support

Zilean, the Chronokeeper, is a support and mage champion of medium difficulty. Across our 546 analysed ranked games, Zilean is mostly played as Support (75% of its games), and more rarely in Mid (13%) and in Top (12%), with a 55.0% win rate in that role: tier C among Support champions (#26 of 38, ranked by win rate). Zilean's damage is mostly magic (79%): magic resistance items are therefore effective against this champion. Win rate stays steady whatever the game length (54.0% to 57.4%): a reliable pick in every phase of the game.

Updated Oct 10 2026 · Patch 26.21

Average KDA

1.5 / 4.7 / 15.3

ratio 3.6

Damage / min

283

CS / min

1.3

Gold / min

305

Kill participation

56%

Vision / min

2.68

Averages measured over 409 Support games played with Zilean, from our ranked Solo/Duo data collection.

How to play and combo preview

Written guide · based on the official ability texts

Zilean is a time support-mage: Time Bomb sticks to a unit and explodes after 3 seconds, Rewind reduces his abilities' cooldowns, Time Warp slows an enemy or speeds up an ally, and Chronoshift sends an ally back in time if they take lethal damage. His passive stores experience he can give to an ally.

The stun

When: An enemy is within bomb range.

Throw a bomb, then a second: if one bomb explodes early because of another, the enemies are stunned; Time Warp slows the target.

Tempo

When: You want to recast your bombs fast.

Rewind reduces the cooldown of your other abilities: immediately recast Time Bomb.

See all 3 Zilean combos: key order, when to cast them, cooldowns →

Laning phase

Place bombs on enemies and minions: they stick to the first nearby unit, prioritizing champions. A bomb that explodes early because of another one stuns.

Common mistakes

Placing the ultimate on an ally too late: it has to be placed before the lethal damage.
Placing a bomb with no target approaching.
Forgetting your passive: give experience to an ally.

Riot's official tips for playing Zilean

You can combine the use of Time Bomb and Rewind to place two Time Bombs on a target quickly. Placing the second bomb will detonate the first and stun all nearby enemies.
Time Warp is an effective way to enable allies to finish off enemies, or escape from a losing battle.
Chronoshift is a powerful deterrent to attacking your carries, but casting Chronoshift too early in a fight can cause the enemy to switch targets too soon, making it less effective.

Build, runes and summoner spells

The most-played core build is Shurelya's Battlesong, Bandlepipes, and Imperial Mandate (23 games, 52.2% win rate).

Shurelya's Battlesong

Bandlepipes

Imperial Mandate

23 games · 52.2%

Shurelya's Battlesong

Bandlepipes

Locket of the Iron Solari

14 games · 64.3%

Shurelya's Battlesong

Locket of the Iron Solari

Imperial Mandate

12 games · 58.3%

Skill order

Max order : E > W > Q61.1% · 18 games

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15
Q	●													●	●
W		●						●		●		●	●
E			●	●	●		●		●
R						●					●

Max order : Q > E > W56.2% · 16 games

The order shows which abilities reach rank 5 first; the grid shows the most-played level-up sequence with that order (measured over 63 games).

Starting items

Health Potion

Health Potion54.0% · 63 games

Laning phase (averages)

At 10 min: 2759 gold, 15 CS, 2894 XP. At 15 min: 4315 gold, 22 CS, 4631 XP.

Summoner spells

Flash + Heal57.1% · 301 games

Exhaust + Flash48.8% · 80 games

Flash + Ignite50.0% · 24 games

Most-played runes

Summon Aery + Domination

60.6% · 137 games

Primary tree · Sorcery

Manaflow Band96%

Transcendence90%

Waterwalking80%

Secondary tree · Domination

Relentless Hunter88%

Cheap Shot85%

Shards

Ability haste96%

Adaptive force80%

Health scaling86%

Summon Aery + Inspiration

52.9% · 119 games

Primary tree · Sorcery

Manaflow Band98%

Transcendence98%

Waterwalking52%

Secondary tree · Inspiration

Cosmic Insight76%

Triple Tonic67%

Shards

Ability haste87%

Adaptive force67%

Health scaling60%

Guardian + Sorcery

48.9% · 45 games

Primary tree · Resolve

Font of Life100%

Bone Plating51%

Overgrowth47%

Secondary tree · Sorcery

Manaflow Band96%

Transcendence93%

Shards

Ability haste98%

Health scaling53%

Health49%

For each row, the most picked rune among the games played with this page (share of games in brackets).

Which items to build against the enemy team?

We sort every game by the enemy team's damage. These are Zilean's completed items and their win rate in each situation; "▲" marks an item that does at least 3 points better than its usual win rate.

Mostly magic-damage enemy team53.2% · 126 games

At least 50% of their damage is magic

Shurelya's Battlesong 56.5%

Locket of the Iron Solari 54.8% ▼

Bandlepipes 62.9% ▼

Imperial Mandate 62.5% ▲

Mikael's Blessing 47.1%

Redemption 80.0%

The item that stands out most is Imperial Mandate: 62.5% win rate, +6 points versus its usual win rate.

Mostly physical-damage enemy team61.3% · 106 games

Less than 35% of their damage is magic

Shurelya's Battlesong 56.2%

Locket of the Iron Solari 66.7% ▲

Bandlepipes 79.3% ▲

Imperial Mandate 60.0% ▲

Knight's Vow 65.0%

Mikael's Blessing 60.0%

The item that stands out most is Bandlepipes: 79.3% win rate, +13 points versus its usual win rate.

Balanced enemy team52.5% · 177 games

Mixed physical and magic damage

Shurelya's Battlesong 50.5% ▼

Bandlepipes 62.3% ▼

Locket of the Iron Solari 61.5%

Imperial Mandate 48.6% ▼

Mikael's Blessing 55.0%

Knight's Vow 75.0%

No item clearly stands out in this situation: the usual build remains the reference.

Counters and matchups

Who counters Zilean as Support

Lulu Zilean: 31.2%16 games

Lulu has the edge in 69% of the 16 Support duels against Zilean. See the Lulu guide.

Nami Zilean: 46.7%15 games

Nami has the edge in 53% of the 15 Support duels against Zilean. See the Nami guide.

Who Zilean is strong against

Nami46.7% · 15 games

Lulu31.2% · 16 games

How to play against Zilean

If you're able to match Zilean's speed, it can sometimes be beneficial to wait until his ultimate has faded before landing the killing blow.
Zilean is fragile if a team focuses on him, but otherwise he's very difficult to kill. Commit to killing him as a team.

Riot's official tips.

Win rates measured over direct same-role duels; only matchups with more than 15 games are listed. See all of Zilean's matchups.

Zilean Support: what our games say

Laning phase against the Support average

Measure	Zilean	Support average	Gap
Gold at 10 min	2759	2918	−159
CS at 10 min	15	14	+2
XP at 10 min	2894	2711	+183
Gold at 15 min	4315	4507	−192
CS at 15 min	22	20	+2
XP at 15 min	4631	4325	+307

Measured over 63 Zilean games with a timeline; the average covers 51 champions played Support in our ranked games.

Win rate by game length

short under 25 min55.7 %131 games

medium-length 25 to 35 min54.0 %224 games

long over 35 min57.4 %54 games

Best result: long (over 35 min). Only groups of at least 30 games are shown. A gap of several points shows the phase where the champion is the most reliable.

Zilean in another role

Role	Games	Win rate	CS/min	Gold/min	Most-built items
Mid	70	45.7 %	6.6	359
Top	67	58.2 %	6.2	346

Roles where we have at least 40 Zilean games.

Abilities

PassiveTime In A Bottle

Zilean stores time as Experience and can grant it to his allies. When he has enough Experience to finish an ally's level up, he can right-click them to impart it. Zilean receives as much Experience as he gives.

QTime Bomb

Tosses a bomb to target area that sticks to units that come near it (prioritizes Champions). It detonates after 3 seconds, dealing area of effect damage. If a Time Bomb is detonated early by another Time Bomb, it also stuns enemies.

WRewind

Zilean can prepare himself for future confrontations, reducing the cooldowns of his other basic abilities.

ETime Warp

Zilean bends time around any unit, decreasing an enemy's Move Speed or increasing an ally's Move Speed for a short time.

RChronoshift

Zilean places a protective time rune on an allied champion, teleporting the champion back in time if they take lethal damage.