Version 11.0.0: Hype Moments and Aura Update... and LUTI?!

A series-changing update is followed by the announcement of Splatoon’s longest-running competitive league

The final week of January 2026 was a rapid-fire burst of big news beats for Splatoon. First teased on January 12th, Version 11.0.0 was shown off on the 28th, right before the big update dropped on the 29th. While all eyes were on Splatoon, few missed the quiet awakening of Leagues Under The Ink (LUTI) for Season 17.

The Hype Moments

The last big patch for Splatoon 3, 10.0.0, released in June 2025, brought the first wave of third kits–30 new weapons–into the game. Six months later, the next patch had to match that expectation. What does Version 11.0.0 add into Splatoon 3?

• Health Bars
• Flow Aura
• Increased hitbox changes for every single main weapon in the game
• Decreased hitbox size for swim form
• Various buffs and nerfs to a handful of weapons
• Reefslider damage, radius, and hitbox update
• Adjustments to Super Jump air time based on having Stealth Jump equipped
• Some additional bug fixes

While many of these updates were unexpected, most were warmly welcomed, especially the jump shot radius nerf to the S-BLASTs and the special points increase for S-BLAST ‘91 and Mini Splatling. The nerfs to S-BLAST ‘91 were met with cheer in most circles, as the Blaster had it coming for a while.

Even the changes to Reefslider, while mostly nerfs, were taken thankfully by players, now that the special has had its ability to solo-cap the Splat Zone heavily reduced, with an explosion radius and travel distance decrease, and a hitbox moved higher so the tiniest of ledges couldn’t save opponents from being splatted.

When it comes to buffs, who was the biggest winner? From what we can tell with the short amount of time we’ve had with the patch, it seems to be the Dynamo Rollers.

Panel from Volume 5, Chapter 16 (“Team Yellow-Green vs Team Emperor Part 1”) of the official Splatoon manga, showing the character Rider with his Gold Dynamo Roller.

The paint output for both horizontal and vertical swings are much more consistent, albeit more ink-hungry. Without any gear abilities put toward Ink Saver (Main), the Dynamo Rollers have approximately 4.7 swings before running out of ink. As a tradeoff, the weapon has an increased one-shot range, able to deal 100 damage minimum:

• At 12.9 units (horizontal swing), or just slightly above .52 Gal’s effective range.
• At 14 units (vertical swing), or close to the same range as a grounded Slosher.

Many are comparing the newly-buffed Dynamo Roller to its glory days on the Wii U where it reigned supreme on the field. With the base kit’s Sprinkler and Tacticooler, many teams are already seriously considering its viability in comps.

Overall, 11.0.0 seems to have given a general buff to short-range weapons, with a greater hitbox increase than the ones long-range weapons received. Fast, short-to-midrange weapons like Dualies and N-ZAP ‘85 were already popular in competitive play, and are likely to stay present more so after this update.

And weapons weren’t the only hitbox update; Nintendo justified the decision to make swim form smaller after being static for over ten years by seeing that over the years, their player base just got too good:

“Since the original Splatoon on Wii U, a little leeway was built into the size of the hit box as players got used to aiming with motion controls.

As players have become more adept with this playstyle, this has become less important. The adjustment in version 11.0.0. makes the hit box similar to that of the hit box in kid form, and should stop Inklings and Octolings in swim form from being hit when they’re hiding behind walls or around corners.”

Kid form and swim form hitboxes between Ver. 10.1.0 and Ver. 11.0.0. Image source: Nintendo UK

The hitbox change to every main weapon is also directly tied into the swim form change, as Nintendo worried that decreasing swim form’s hitbox would have made the game “unfun” if enemies were too hard to hit. So they gave short-range weapons a much bigger bullet hitbox, and long-range weapons only a slightly bigger bullet hitbox.

Aura Farming as a Mechanic

Perhaps the biggest surprise–and biggest meme–to come out of 11.0.0 is the introduction of Flow Aura, a mechanic that awards consecutive splats on opponents with a crackle and a shower of sparkles.

And 30 AP of Swim Speed, Run Speed, Ink Resistance, and Intensify Action.

Also, it lasts for 30 seconds, and doesn’t go away if you get splatted.

Without assists, the minimum number of splats you need to get to activate your Flow Aura is three. Just in case you might have forgotten that you were playing Splatoon 3.

As players and analysts continue to test Flow Aura and how it interacts with the game as we know it, we’ve listed a few answers to some of the most frequently-asked questions about this new mechanic:

Q: Can I enter Flow Aura state purely through assists, even non-damaging ones? A: No. While the exact number of assists-to-splats is unknown to activate Flow Aura, it appears that only damaging assists will count toward your Flow Aura.

Q: How long can I remain in a Flow Aura state? A: At minimum, 30 seconds. If you splat more enemies while in a Flow Aura state, you will earn an extra 10 seconds, but you will never have more than 30 seconds at one time. For example, if you activate Flow Aura and then splat someone 5 seconds later, your Flow Aura duration will cap at 30 seconds rather than going up to 35.

Q: Does the number of players per team affect how many splats/assists needed to activate Flow Aura? A: No; Flow Aura is activated by number of splats/assists per limited window of time, and this is not dependent on number of players per team. If you are playing a 1v1 or 2v2 game, it may be extremely difficult or impossible to activate Flow Aura if your opponents cannot respawn fast enough.

Q: Can enemies see Flow Aura sparkles while I’m hiding in my ink, like they can see Tacticooler effects? A: No; while hiding in your ink, your Flow Aura sparkles will not give away your position.

Q: Are there any new glitches regarding this mechanic? A: Yes! Within two hours of the update being live, it was discovered that the burst of ink around your feet when you enter Flow Aura state is only visible on your screen, and not to others in the game. This leads to instances where you could appear to be hiding in enemy ink or swimming on uninked surfaces.

Source: @itsn-a-m.bsky.social‬’s two-post thread on Bluesky

Currently, this glitch is still in the game and Nintendo has not released a hotfix or statement about when they plan to fix this.

Leagues on the Horizon!

Within hours of Nintendo posting their sneak peeks at the updates in store for 11.0.0 on January 28th, the Leagues Under The Ink (LUTI) Bluesky quote posted the Stealth Jump video with just an image of a hare pointing at a pocket watch (coincidentally, the same image [K]yo used to hint toward Competitive Splatoon's "great retirement").

Around the same time, players noticed a Sendou.ink page up for LUTI, with the notice, “Congrats! You found us early. Please DO NOT REGISTER until all league features are set up after our announcement. Welcome to Leagues Under The Ink: Season 17!”

Graphic showing LUTI Season 17’s important dates. Image source: @luti.bsky.social

Later that day, LUTI officially announced their dates for the season, with FLUTI (the seeding event) beginning on February 7th, registration closing on February 15th, regular season beginning on February 23rd, and playoffs starting April 6th.

Unfamiliar with LUTI? LUTI is the biggest Competitive Splatoon league–even bigger than the Splatoon 3 North American League. In Season 16, over 480 teams registered, with the end goal of earning a LUTI division. If you’ve heard the phrase “Div X”, “Div 1”, “Div 8”, etc., participation in LUTI is where those rankings come from.

If you’re interested in more information or registering, LUTI’s Sendou.ink page is here.

Bluesky post from @dappleprod.bsky.social dated January 29, 2026; Dapple Productions announces their partnership with NSE.

Last but certainly not least, Dapple Productions has announced great news of their own! Once again, they will be partnering with National Student Esports (NSE) to provide streaming for NSE’s Spring University League. The league lasts five weeks.

National Student Esports is home of the British University Esports Championship, serving collegiate esports scenes in the United Kingdom. NSE saw participation from over 117 universities in the 2024–2025 school year across more games than just Splatoon. More info about the organization can be found at https://www.nse.gg/.

Just when players started to get too antsy about having nothing to motivate their competitive grind, one fell swoop of news has stoked the fire. Conversations abroad are filled with talk of Version 11.0.0’s quirks and team-building for LUTI.

Just a bit further on the horizon is a slew of LANs preparing to send their victors to the LAN Championship Showdown in April. The holiday break is over, and it’s time to get back in gear!

Original Posting Date: January 31, 2026 at Splatoon Stronghold

Written and formatted for publication by YELLOW.