Zone scaling

Zone scaling, also known as level scaling, causes mobs, quests, and loot to scale with the player character's level over a range. This allows the player more freedom to choose where they level. It was first introduced in Legion for zones in the Broken Isles, but was later expanded to include the entire game. However, scaling usually excludes content that was meant to be part of its expansion's end game: raids, heroic mode dungeons, and end-game zones such as Suramar or Mechagon.

As of patch 9.0.1, all starting zones scale from levels 1 - 10, including those for hero classes; zones from Battle for Azeroth scale to level 50; and all previous expansions scale to anywhere from level 30 to level 45. New characters can also enable Timewalking Campaigns, which causes all content to scale up to level 50. This means that players can spend almost the entirety of a character's leveling journey in the same expansion, allowing them to experience stories more fully than with the previous system.

The below list shows zones' default level ranges. Timewalking Campaigns increase these ranges' upper limits to 50.

Generally speaking, zones have a maximum level they scale to based on which expansion they are set in, and a minimum level they scale to based on how far into the expansion characters are expected to reach that zone. Dungeons follow this trend as well. All of the maximums instead go to 50 when in a Timewalking Campaigns. Some starting zones are exceptions to this rule.

The minimum scaling level, or "level requirement", varies within each expansion. For most expansions, the zone encountered first has a minimum level of 10, while the final leveling zone typically has a minimum 5 levels below the maximum for the expansion, with intermediate zones' minimums distributed in between, often in increments of 5. Dungeons follow a similar pattern, while some end-of-expansion content has a level equal to the maximum for the expansion and does not scale. Exceptions include:

• The primary five new Cataclysm zones and their associated dungeons - those introduced as completely new content rather than revised versions of the original zones - all have minimums of 30 rather than a distribution starting at 10.
• Non-endgame Legion content all scales starting with level 10.
• The "starting zones" for each race, composed of the first two to three zones they would encounter, usually have 1, 5, and possibly 7 as minimums.
• Death Knight and Demon Hunter starting areas both scale starting at 8, the starting level for those classes.
• The Exile's Reach starting zone for new players in Shadowlands naturally starts at 1.

• Scaling only applies to equipment at the moment it is obtained. Completing a quest at level 40 will reward level 40-appropriate equipment, but leveling up after completing the quest will not cause that equipment to scale to 41 or beyond.
• When scaling was added to old world zones, a number of items that had been made unobtainable by level changes in Cataclysm became obtainable again.

As of patch 8.2.5, most content was scaled based on the following level bands:

• 1 - 60: Old world and starting zones
• 60 - 80: The Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King zones
• 80 - 90: Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria zones
• 90 - 100: Warlords of Draenor zones
• 100 - 110: Legion zones
• 110 - 120: Battle for Azeroth zones

Between patch 7.3.5 and patch 8.2.5, starting zones had their own band, which spanned levels 1 - 20. Only a few instanced starting zones (such as Gilneas) retained this level band after 8.2.5.

• Timewalking - scales the player down to the content's level.
• Party Sync - scales the player down to another player's level.

Escalado de zonas