How to apply Fortnite weapon mods and mod bench locations

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Some weapons can be customized with Fortnite weapon mods at several mod benches

Fortnite weapon mods at bench
(Image credit: Epic Games)

Fortnite weapon mods can be applied to your various guns to enhance their performance, though you'll need a hidden mod bench to fit them. Fortunately, pretty much every weapon in Fortnite now comes equipped with at least one mod depending on its rarity, though it can be good to switch up some mods to optimize a weapon for your playstyle and loadout. However, it's important to mention that these weapon mod benches aren't without their problems and might not be worth your time outside of challenges. Regardless, I've laid out all you need to know about Fortnite weapon mods, including a map showing where to find all the mod benches.

Where to find Fortnite weapon mod benches

Fortnite weapon mod benches vault map chapter 5 season 1

(Image credit: Epic Games)

Before you can even mod your weapons, you need to get to one of the five mod benches marked on the map above. There's one at Lavish Lair, Reckless Railways, Grand Glacier, Fencing Fields, and Snooty Steppes. One bench also spawns on the floating island above the map too.

Fortnite lavish lair weapon vault chapter 5 season 1

(Image credit: Epic Games)

You'll notice that these POIs are also where the five Society bosses hang out, and you've got to defeat whichever one is in the area to get their medallion with the floating island bench being the only exception to this. Once you've got the boss's medallion, look for the large vault door in the area – fair warning: some of these are not easy to find, but they're usually at ground level or lower, so make sure you break down walls to find passages and steps that leads down. Stand next to the vault scanner and you'll unlock it by having the medallion on you granting you access to the vault's treasures and the weapon mod bench hidden inside.

Before you start modding your new Fortnite weapons, I found that it's far more useful to loot the entire room first. Make sure you open the super chest and any other chests and open all the weapon cabinets surrounding the mod bench itself – ideally you want purple-rarity weapons so that you have to do as little modding as possible. Once you've looted your favorite weapons from whatever you find in the vault, then visit the mod bench to start making changes as detailed below.

Fortnite weapon mods explained

Fortnite weapon mods

(Image credit: Epic Games)

Go over to bench in the vault to start applying some Fortnite weapon mods. Do note that you can only mod weapons that have mod slots and can't modify fixed weapons, such as the mythic-rarity weapons dropped by Society bosses. Every mod you apply costs 75 Fortnite Gold Bars to fit on your weapon, and if you remove a mod or swap for a different one, you will have to pay again to reapply the same mod. As far as I can tell, every weapon type has access to the same mods, which are as follows:

  • Optics:
    • Red Eye Sight - 1.15x Scoped View
    • Holo-13 Optic - 1.3x Scoped View
    • P2X Optic - 2x Scoped View
    • Sniper Scope - 4x Scoped View
  • Magazine:
    • Drum Mag - Increases Magazine Capacity
    • Speed Mag - Increases Reload Speed 
  • Underbarrel:
    • Angled Foregrip - Reduces Time to ADS
    • Vertical Foregrip - Improves ADS Recoil and Spread
    • Laser - Increases Hipfire Accuracy 
  • Barrel:
    • Muzzle Brake - Reduced Recoil
    • Suppressor - Reduces Muzzle Flash and Dampens Audio

The hefty Gold Bar cost along with the quality of loot available in vaults and the entry requirements to get into a vault means I don't think modding weapons is worthwhile. It's a time-consuming process and the improvements they offer are largely quite marginal. You'd be better off hunting down other players or Society bosses for their weapons if you really want superior gear.

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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.

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