Overwatch 2: How to Play Ana (Abilities, Skins & Changes)

Overwatch 2’s supports are many and Ana stands out among them thanks to her capacity to not only maintain her teammates alive but also respond to enemy attacks as well as deal damage. She is a more active type of healer, since Ana uses a sniper rifle to shoot allies to keep them alive or to take down annoying enemies. Her kit can be powerful although she is not the easiest support to play with. Here is a complete guide on how to play Ana in Overwatch 2.

Ana’s Abilities

Ana’s kit is simple since it gravitates around shooting allies and enemies, but it’s effective in many situations. On the other hand, how well you will perform playing her depends on whether you have good aim or not.

In case you’re considering choosing her to play as a healer, you should understand how her healing functions. Ana uses her Biotic Rifle to shoot allies in order to heal them. In contrast with other healers present in the game, Ana does healing over time (HoT). In other words, whenever she shoots a teammate this character will receive a small quantity of healing over a short period of time.

Her Biotic Rifle has another function. If you shoot an enemy with it, instead of healing it, you’re going to deal damage over time (DoT). Although it will work similarly to the healing process, Ana can be quite lethal with her shots considering an average character (Soldier: 76 for example) may die after getting hit by two to three darts.

Remember that if you hold the Secondary Attack button, you can aim using Biotic Rifle’s scope!

Because Ana’s healing/damaging capacity is directly connected to her Primary Attack, her abilities are more focused on filling some gaps.

One of Ana’s abilities is the Biotic Grenade and this is meant to compensate for the slow healing she has as well as help deal with enemies. By using this ability, Ana throws a grenade that heals and amplifies the healing received in the players hit by it. At the same time, hitting enemies with it will not only damage them, but the Biotic Grenade also prevents their healing.

The second ability Ana has at her disposal is the Sleep Dart. Using it makes Ana shoot a dart that puts the enemy player to sleep for some seconds, preventing them from using skills and moving. This ability’s goal is not to deal damage since its efficiency in this matter is quite low. However, you can interrupt some ultimates from other characters by hitting them with a dart. Keep in mind that the effect of the dart ends upon hitting an attack on the sleeping character.

Ana’s ultimate is called Nano Boost. Once used, Ana shoots a boosting dart to an ally, increasing their damage and reducing the damage taken by them. Even though this is not an extremely powerful ultimate that can mitigate the enemy team’s attacks, it can be fundamental in helping your team to take an objective or wiping enemies off the map.

In terms of passive abilities, Ana hasn’t much to offer. She comes with her Passive Role ability Support, a trait that makes her automatically heal herself over time. This ability triggers after some seconds without taking damage. This is a good passive to have, so support characters can prioritize healing teammates.

Overwatch 2 Ana Changes

Compared to other characters, Ana hasn’t suffered any major change in Overwatch 2. The Support Passive Role ability has been added to her kit and the amount of ammo she has was increased by 3 rounds, but besides that, she’s still the same from the previous version of the game. Her skills have gone through minor tweaks that made Ana a little less powerful and demand players to be more intentional when using her abilities.

This is what changed in Ana’s kit:

Ana’s Sleep Dart cooldown is fifteen seconds.
The effect of Biotic Grenade was reduced from four to three seconds.

Ana Strategy and Team Composition

Playing Ana demands players to know where to position themselves and how to prioritize when a skill should be used. Ana is a quite squishy character, so you must always try to stay in the backline of your team while you heal your teammates and hit some enemies. After all, choosing Ana over other healers means that you will be looking for opportunities to damage enemies. If this is not what you’re looking for, consider other healers.

Since Ana is a sniper and her healing potential depends on you hitting shots, she is a character with a high skill ceiling. The fact she also eventually needs to use the scope to reach farther enemies or allies in a fight makes Ana a very vulnerable character for enemies whose goal is to finish the team’s backline. So, it’s important to take cover inside a house or on higher ground. By doing so, you’ll be capable of offering support to your team without taking too much risk.

Another important aspect of playing Ana is to know when to use her skills and which teammate should be boosted with your ultimate. First, the Sleep Dart is extremely powerful. Look for situations such as an attack from the enemy team to take their tank down. Did you see a teammate being pulled by Roadhog’s hook? Shoot him with it and save your friend. Keep your eyes open for when some ultimates that you can cancel with her Sleep Dart. Soldier: 76, Cassidy, Genji, Roadhog, and Pharah are just some examples of whom you can save your Sleep Dart for.

On the other hand, Biotic Grenades are great to save your team from a combo or for moments in which you see Ana’s healing won’t do the job by itself. Since it works as an area-of-effect healing skill, prioritize using it when more than two teammates are closer.

Ana’s ultimate is not difficult to use, but you should always consider who is the best option to capitalize from it. The general rule of thumb is to boost a tank, such as Reinhardt, Roadhog, or Zarya, and damage dealers, such as Genji and Soldier: 76.

Considering all these aspects of how to play Ana, the compositions she works the best are always with another support that can quickly provide the party with a big quantity of healing. Mercy, Moira, and Lúcio are great options because their healing is more potent. Having fast characters in your party like Genji and Tracer that are supposed to flank the enemy team, can be hard for less experienced players. However, with good communication and practicing your aim, this is not an impossible scenario.

Overwatch 2 Ana Skins

As of the time of writing this guide, Ana has 20 different skins to be unlocked. Keep in mind that not all of them are always available, since Overwatch 2 has a considerable number of skins from seasonal events.