Zenless Zone Zero: How to claim free characters
Bulk up your Zenless Zone Zero roster before even touching the gacha by getting a respectable handful of Agents for free.
As a gacha game, Zenless Zone Zero plans to make its bank by releasing loads and loads of really good characters you'll be just itching to play as. But in order to describe ZZZ as free-to-play with a semi-clear conscience — and to sweeten you up so that you like the game enough to hopefully want to pay for it in the future — HoYoverse will be periodically loading your account up with free characters, especially during the all-important Version 1.0 launch period.
Whether you're committed to remaining F2P forever or just want a leg-up building your roster before you open your wallet, if you're any stripe of gacha game fan then it's a good to nab all the free characters you can get. Here are all the free characters in Zenless Zone Zero 1.0 and how to claim them.
Zenless Zone Zero: Which Agents are free to claim?
Starter characters
In true gacha game tradition, Zenless Zone Zero grants you a trio of free characters who will join your party over the course of the game's prologue missions and stick with you from there on in with no strings attached. This means that you'll never be left unable to field a full team even before you've touched the gacha.
In ZZZ, your initial trio are the three A-rank (a.k.a. 4-star) units from the Cunning Hares faction: unofficial game mascots Nicole Demara and her adopted ward Anby Demara, and their cyborg buddy Billy Kid. Good news for faction collectors, as this means that you're only one S-rank (a.k.a. 5-star) character short of recruiting every member of the Cunning Hares right from the start!
Here's a quick run-down of their respective kits:
- Nicole has the Ether attribute, and the Support/Strike fighting style
- Anby has the Electric attribute, and the Stun/Slash fighting style
- Billy has the Physical attribute, and the Attack/Pierce fighting style
It's particularly notable that Nicole is the only Ether character available in the game at launch, and the only A-rank Ether character in Version 1.0. The only other character associated with the Ether attribute is Zhu Yuan, the premium S-rank who will be released on the Phase 2 banner of Version 1.0. Therefore, while all of the starting characters in ZZZ are solid choices, Nicole is an especially great shout for investing your resources into when deciding who to build early on.
Pre-registration reward character
Corin Wickes is a Physical Attack/Slash character and the only A-ranked member of the Victoria Housekeeping faction. She's the bonus character unlocked at 35 million pre-registrations — which ZZZ recently soared past — and will become available to players once they unlock their in-game mailbox.
It's worth noting that you likely haven't missed out on a free Corin even if you didn't personally pre-register for Zenless Zone Zero. Previous HoYoverse releases like Honkai: Star Rail have kept pre-registration bonuses active and claimable for anyone who joins the game for months or even years after release. However, the full suite of rewards doesn't necessarily stick around forever — although odds are very good that you'll still be in time to claim Corin for a long while yet.
The Protagonists
At the beginning of the game you'll be prompted to choose your player character from sibling duo Belle and Wise.
The one you choose will become your avatar in New Eridu, although note that unlike in Genshin or HSR, Belle and Wise are not Agents (combat characters): instead they're a Proxy, with a slightly different purpose in-story and in-game.
Whichever character you don't choose will still be a near-constant presence in your game, as they live with your chosen character and act as the other half of the Proxy. So your decision basically determines who you want to run around the city as (choose this one), versus who you want to hear call out advice during Hollow missions (don't choose this one).
Event reward characters
Two free characters will be available to claim as part of Zenless Zone Zero's Version 1.0 events, although since there's no time limit on display for those at the moment, it's entirely possible these rewards will persist for a while to help new players fill out their rosters:
- Soukaku can be claimed for free once you begin "Chapter 2 - Intermission" of the main story, as part of the "Eridu Frontier" event.
- Ben can be claimed for free after completing the "Call Ben Bigger" main story mission in Chapter 2, as part of the "Rookie on the Road" event.
Soukaku is an A-rank Agent and currently the sole playable member of the Section 6 faction. She has the Ice attribute and the Support-Slash fighting style. She's potentially a little weak in Version 1.0 due to having no teammates to form up an ideal squad with, but so many early-game enemies have Ice weakness that she's worth having around regardless, as she's the only A-rank Agent in the game to possess that attribute.
Ben is also an A-rank Agent and member of the Belobog Heavy Industries faction. He has the Fire attribute and the Defense-Strike fighting style. Ben is the only Defense character available in Version 1.0, so you'll almost certainly have a surplus of W-Engines to equip for him, plus he's your only chance to get to grips with how this style plays for the time being.
Gacha pull guarantees
Unlike Genshin Impact or Honkai: Star Rail, Zenless Zone Zero doesn't guarantee you any particular character for completing its gacha tutorial. However, you are guaranteed an S-rank Agent after 50 pulls on the standard banner, which can be obtained for a "discount" of 8 Master Tapes per 10-pull rather than the usual 10.
Plus, as in Honkai: Star Rail, you'll be given a one-off free selection among the permanent S-rank characters (pick one from: Grace, Rina, Koleda, Nekomata, Soldier 11, or Lycaon) once you've made a total of 300 wishes on the standard banner.
Furthermore, Version 1.0 promises 100 free pulls to players who complete every event, and while this doesn't guarantee any particular character, it does mean you will get to obtain at least one more S-rank Agent or W-Engine, and gives you a decent chance of filling out the V1.0 A-rank Agent roster to near-completion while you're at it.
As you can see, you can get your hands on a pretty solid roster of ZZZ characters without touching the gacha at all. But, if you decide to give it a go anyway, be sure to check out our Zenless Zone Zero codes list to claim all the free currencies you can before starting your pulls.