League of Legends: Ekko lore explained

Ekko has become one of the main faces of League of Legends, being prominent in 2XKO and a fan favourite throughout Arcane. He debuted with a bang in his ‘Seconds’ champion teaser trailer in 2015 and has been a staple in the LoL roster ever since, representing the steampunk-esque undercity of Zaun.

We’re going to be having a closer look at Ekko’s backstory, how he fits into the world of Runeterra, his abilities in-game, and how the LoL iteration differs from his Arcane Ekko. He is a fan-favourite for a reason, and knowing his past helps us understand why.

Ekko is a champion from Zaun, known as The Boy Who Shattered Time, famed for his Z-Drive and its ability to rewind through time. Zaun is a massive, undercity district beneath Piltover, where little light reaches its people as they wade through smog and black markets.

While Zaun is home to many morally bankrupt and dubious individuals, Ekko is one of the paragons of the region. Sometimes called ‘The Boy Savior’, this genius has been terrorising Zaun’s criminals and League of Legend’s midlane alike with his time-rewinding abilities and gadgets. 

According to the Ekko biography, he was a born genius with loving parents who, acknowledging how gifted their child was, worked themselves to the bone trying to give him a better life in Piltover. Ekko saw things differently to his parents, believing Zaun was rife with potential, and befriended scrappy orphans, inquisitive runaways, and eager upstarts.

The ‘Lost Children of Zaun’, usually forgoing formal education, roamed the undercity freely, and Ekko was no different. One day, he came across a ruined laboratory, finding a shard of blue-green crystals filled with magical energy, which he knew was Hextech. With Piltover’s enforcers nearby, Ekko fled home with the crystal.

Ekko began to tinker with the crystal, and after a less-than-scientific experiment, splintered reality, seeing ‘echoes’ of himself. Together with his echoes, Zaun’s Boy Savior managed to fix the reality break and harnessed the power of the crystal into a device that could manipulate small increments of time.

After experimenting with the device and using it to save a friend, Ekko’s Z-Drive became the LoL fans know today. This made Ekko a person of interest among Zaun and Piltover’s most powerful. Despite this, his interest lies purely with his friends and making his hometown somewhere that can dwarf the so-called ‘City of Progress’ Piltover appeared to be.

As mentioned previously, Ekko is primarily a midlaner assassin known for his effectiveness in the late-game. His kit revolves around his many gadgets, which deal heavy damage while staying highly mobile. He’s brilliant at diving in and dipping out, especially with his time-bending Z-Drive. Let’s have a closer look at Ekko’s abilities. 

Like with others who appeared in Arcane, Ekko’s backstory is quite different. He’s an orphan in Arcane and needs to go to a parallel world to create his Z-Drive. While he has an implied past with Vi and Jinx, this is far more overt in Arcane, with all three having far darker versions of their backstories explored in the show as they grew up together.

Jinx and Ekko, or rather Powder and Ekko, became a couple in Arcane, with the ship being creatively called ‘Time Bomb’, which doesn’t seem to be the case in LoL. Rather than being in charge of Zaun’s Lost Children, Ekko is the head of a rebellion called the Firelights and has a much stronger leadership role. 

He is a more mature character in Arcane, shaped by a darker past compared to the Ekko League of Legends has. While the LoL website still has Ekko’s original story, Riot has declared Arcane the canon version of Runeterra since 2023.

With him being one of the key 2XKO champions, his great characterisation in Arcane, and how effective a midlaner he has been since 2015, Ekko is popular for good reason. His time mechanic is both interesting and well-executed, while his lore as one of Zaun’s few paragons makes him stand out.

While the Ekko Arcane made popular is what Riot considers canon, the mohawk-wearing, time-shattering midlaner in LoL shouldn’t be forgotten as the character’s starting point. His fascinating story, paragon status, and time-manipulating abilities make him one of League’s most intriguing characters, and even after Arcane, the hope is that Riot isn’t done with him yet.