What is SBMM in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Warzone?

A buzzword in the Call of Duty community has been rampant on social media recently—and it could be confusing if you don’t know its definition.

If you’ve been on Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, Twitch, or basically anywhere that people congregate to talk about CoD, you’ve most likely seen people talking about SBMM.

It’s a controversial subject, but it’s something that’s worth talking about both from the standpoint of players and developers.

So what exactly is SBMM?

What is SBMM in Call of Duty?

SBMM is an abbreviation for skill-based matchmaking. This basically means that when you play a game in Call of Duty, the game itself is matching you with players of a similar skill level.

Some games use connection-based matchmaking, matching you with players of similar internet connection levels as opposed to skill, so you’re just as likely to be matched with someone who’s better than you as you are to get matched with someone who’s new to the game.

SBMM has been a point of contention in Call of Duty because some players feel that their matches are constantly “sweaty,” even in casual public matches. SBMM is necessary in ranked playlists, but many think it should be left out of public matches.

Above average and better players will feel a difference in the competitiveness of their matches in CoD once the game has an idea of your skill level. It recently happened in the CoD: Black Ops Cold War Alpha, where even pro players like Scump noticed it.

A Treyarch developer recently revealed that all previous CoD games have had some level of SBMM, but it’s only been a topic of conversation in the past couple of iterations of the game.

Basically, SBMM keeps lower-level players from getting stomped by players above their skill level but keeps high-level players playing against those with a similar skill level.