How to switch weapons in Diablo 4

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You can’t swap weapons in Diablo 4 as it’s all handled by Skills, but Barbarians get to choose their Skill weapons

Diablo 4 assigning weapon to Barbarian Skill in Skill Tree menu
(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

For most builds you aren't able to switch weapons in Diablo 4, because you generally equip specific weapon(s) to your hands and those are what you use automatically. The exception to this is Barbarians, as they function differently to the others in combat. If you're a recent arrival to Diablo 4 having played other action RPGs then you might find yourself looking for a dedicated hotkey to switch your weapons.

However, because your character can only physically hold up to two weapons and all your attacks come from Skills, this isn’t the case – except for Barbarians, who get to assign their arsenal of weapons to certain Skills for maximum effect. Here’s how you switch your weapons in Diablo 4, including as a Barbarian.

Diablo 4 switching weapons explained

Diablo 4 looking at Druid character's weapon inventory

(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

In Diablo 4, there is no way to switch between weapons on the fly and whatever weapons you have equipped are used automatically with all your Skills. Weapons in Diablo 4 are mainly there to modify various stats that generally adjust your overall damage per second. Therefore, it’s best to make sure you’ve got your best weapon(s) equipped and your Skills will do the rest of the work. Note that Druids, Necromancers, Rogues, and Sorcerers all get a Main Hand and Off hand slot, allowing them to hold two One-handed weapon items at once or one Two-handed weapon, and the only way to swap is to manually equip them via your inventory.

However, if you’re playing as a Diablo 4 Barbarian, you get extra weapons slots and can assign certain Skills to a particular weapon slot so that the same weapon is always used for that Skill – weapons are swapped to automatically when using Skills. As well as the Main and Off hand slots (which are combined into Dual Wield), Barbarians also get one dedicated Two-handed Bludgeoning slot and one Two-handed Slashing slot, allowing them to have four different weapons equipped at once, even though they can’t all be used at the same time.

How to assign weapons to Barbarians Skills in Diablo 4

Diablo 4 assigning weapon to Barbarian Skill in Skill Tree menu

(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

Here’s how you can swap your Diablo 4 weapons and assign them to Barbarian Skills:

  1. Open the Character menu and navigate to the Abilities tab.
  2. Choose ‘Skill Assignment’.
  3. Move the cursor over a Skill that you have unlocked and then look under the ‘Arsenal Selection’ part of the Skill’s description box. It’ll show you which weapon slots are compatible with the Skill.
  4. Cycle through the available slots to choose which one you want for the selected Skill. You can settle for the default ‘Auto-Select’ option, but I recommend that you manually choose your most appropriate weapons for each Skill.

Once you’ve assigned your weapons, back out of the Skill Assignment menu and you’ll have your desired armaments ready for each of your Barbarian Skills. Furthermore, you can change your assigned weapons at any time. This is important for optimizing your Barbarian build, so don’t miss this step out!

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Will Sawyer
Will Sawyer
Guides Editor, GamesRadar+

Will Sawyer is a Guides Editor at GamesRadar+ with over five years of experience in writing online guides, news, and features, and has a BA (Hons) in Journalism. Starting as a freelancer, Will contributed to startmenu and Game Rant before joining the GamesRadar+ team in August 2021. Since then, he has written hundreds of guides about a huge range of games, with shooters and action games being his areas of expertise. Outside of writing about games, Will hops between multiplayer shooters with friends, such as Darktide and Helldivers 2, and delves into whatever has been on his backlog for far too long. He also tries to get through his never-ending Warhammer pile of shame of grey Tyranids, Aeldari, and Chaos Space Marines.