So you’ve reached level 90 in World of Warcraft: Midnight. Now the real gearing game begins.

If you’re wondering what to do first, you’re not alone. Midnight gives you a lot of ways to improve your character—Delves, Prey, dungeons, Mythic+, raids, world activities, crafting, the Great Vault, and the newer Voidforge system.

The trick isn’t to do all of them.

Your best gearing route depends on what you actually play.

If you’re mostly solo, Delves and Prey give you a strong progression path. If you enjoy dungeons, move through Mythic 0 and into Mythic+. Raiders can build around raid progression while using other activities to fill gaps. And if you’re gearing an alt, catch-up systems and targeted rewards become much more important.

This guide breaks down how we’d approach Midnight Season 1 gearing, what to prioritize at each stage, and where it’s worth spending your upgrade resources.

Last updated: August 2026
Season: Midnight Season 1

The Short Version: How to Gear Up in Midnight

If you don’t want to read the entire guide, here’s the basic approach:

Fresh level 90: Replace your weakest leveling pieces and start the endgame activity you enjoy.

Mostly solo: Build around Delves and Prey, then add higher-difficulty content as your character improves.

Dungeon player: Use Heroic and Mythic 0 as a bridge into Mythic+.

Raider: Get into the raid difficulty your group can handle and use Delves, dungeons, and other activities to fill weak slots.

Every week: Complete worthwhile activities for your Great Vault rather than leaving potential upgrades on the table.

Later in the season: Start thinking less about average item level and more about specific weapons, trinkets, tier pieces, crafted gear, and targeted upgrades.

The biggest mistake is trying to optimize every slot immediately.

Early-season gear gets replaced quickly. Get strong enough to move into better content first; optimize once your upgrades start becoming harder to find.

Your First Hour at Level 90

Don’t overcomplicate this part.

Open your character panel and look for the obvious weak spots. A few low-level pieces left over from leveling can hold your character back more than a missing perfect secondary-stat combination.

At this point, prioritize large, meaningful upgrades.

You don’t need a perfect stat setup yet. You also don’t need to spend expensive upgrade currencies on every piece that happens to be upgradeable.

Start with the content that fits your character

If you prefer playing alone, start with the solo-friendly systems available to you.

If you already have a group, dungeons are an easy way to start replacing gear and getting comfortable with your level-90 rotation and mechanics.

If you’re already an experienced raider or Mythic+ player, there’s no reason to spend a week doing content far below your usual level just because a generic gearing guide says you should.

Your previous experience matters.

A veteran Mythic+ player should progress differently from someone who has just returned to WoW after two expansions away.

The Best Gearing Path Depends on How You Play

If you…	Start with	Then work toward
Mostly play solo	Delves + Prey	Higher-tier Delves and Nightmare Prey
Prefer dungeons	Heroic → Mythic 0	Mythic+
Raid regularly	Catch-up gear + raid	Higher raid difficulties
Play a mixture of everything	Delves + dungeons	Mythic+ and raids
Are gearing an alt	Catch-up systems	Your preferred endgame activity
Mainly PvP	PvP gearing	Rated PvP progression

There isn’t a single “best” activity for every player.

The best route is the one that gives you useful upgrades and that you’re actually willing to keep doing.

Solo Gearing: Delves and Prey

Midnight is particularly friendly to players who don’t want their entire gearing routine to revolve around finding a group.

Two systems are especially important: Delves and Prey.

If you’re primarily interested in solo progression, Midnight Prey guide goes into the target system, difficulties, and rewards in more detail.

Delves

Delves remain one of the easiest ways to build a solo-friendly endgame routine.

Midnight launched with eleven Delves in total, including ten new Delves and the seasonal Nemesis Delve. Blizzard also made Delves Tier 8+ part of the Season 1 endgame schedule.

For a solo player, the important question isn’t simply:

“What’s the highest Delve tier I can enter?”

It’s:

“What’s the highest tier I can clear comfortably without turning every run into a slog?”

That’s the tier I’d focus on.

A slightly lower tier that you can clear consistently is usually a better gearing routine than repeatedly struggling through content that takes significantly longer.

How we’d use Delves

Use them to replace weak gear early in your progression.
Prioritize Bountiful Delves when their rewards are useful to you.
Push higher tiers as your character becomes stronger.
Don’t waste expensive resources upgrading an item you expect to replace soon.
Keep Delves in your weekly routine if you enjoy solo progression.

Delves also become relevant to later-season systems such as Voidforge, which makes them more than just an early catch-up activity.

Prey: A Good Alternative to Group Content

Prey gives you another way to pursue endgame rewards while hunting specific targets.

The system has Normal, Hard, and Nightmare difficulties.

If you’re already comfortable with the lower difficulties, Nightmare Prey becomes particularly interesting for advanced progression. Nightmare Prey also feeds into the Season 1 Voidforge system.

Our advice is simple:

Don’t run Prey just because a guide tells you that you “have to.”

Run it when:

You enjoy the activity.
The rewards can improve your character.
You’re progressing toward the difficulty you want to play.
You want another source of endgame progression outside dungeons or raids.

That’s especially useful for players who don’t enjoy spending every evening in Mythic+.

When Should You Move Into Dungeons?

If you like group content, dungeons are a natural next step.

Heroic Dungeons

Heroic dungeons are useful for getting comfortable with your class and replacing weaker pieces before you start pushing harder content.

Don’t worry about staying here longer than necessary.

Once your character is comfortable and you’re ready for more difficult mechanics, move on.

Mythic 0

Mythic 0 gives you a useful bridge into Mythic+.

You can learn the dungeon mechanics and get used to the more demanding version of the content without the added pressure of a timed keystone.

Once you’re comfortable, start moving into Mythic+.

Mythic+: When Dungeon Progression Really Starts

Mythic+ is one of the core endgame gearing paths in Season 1.

The current rotation contains eight dungeons:

Magisters’ Terrace
Maisara Caverns
Nexus-Point Xenas
Windrunner Spire
Algeth’ar Academy
Pit of Saron
Seat of the Triumvirate
Skyreach

Blizzard’s Season 1 schedule also ties Mythic+ progression into seasonal rewards and the Great Vault.

Don’t rush into keys that are too high

This is one of the easiest mistakes to make.

If you’re constantly timing out or wiping, pushing a higher key isn’t necessarily helping your gearing speed.

Start at a level where you can complete the dungeon reliably.

Then move upward.

Your Mythic+ routine should ideally give you three things at the same time:

Gear
Rating and experience
Great Vault progress

If you’re getting all three, you’re moving in the right direction.

Raiding: The Other Major Endgame Path

Midnight Season 1’s raid progression centers on:

The Voidspire
The Dreamrift
March on Quel’Danas

The season’s raid and Mythic+ progression opened in stages, with The Voidspire and The Dreamrift available at the start of Season 1 and March on Quel’Danas following the season schedule.

If you’re a raider, don’t feel that you need to complete every other gearing system before stepping into a raid.

Raid progression itself is part of your gearing path.

Use other activities to fill the gaps

That’s where Delves, Mythic+, Prey, world activities, and crafting become useful.

If your raid team needs you to improve a particular slot, don’t necessarily wait for that exact item to drop from a boss.

Look at the other available sources and work around the gap.

That’s much more efficient than treating the raid loot table as your only source of progression.

Understanding Midnight’s Gear Progression

It’s tempting to build a gearing guide around a giant item-level table.

The problem is that those tables age quickly.

Seasonal tuning, content updates, and new reward systems can change the numbers, while the underlying progression philosophy stays largely the same.

So here’s the rule we recommend:

Think about the quality and source of the item first, then its item level.

A higher item-level item isn’t automatically the best long-term upgrade if you’re about to replace it.

Conversely, a slightly lower-level item can sometimes be worth keeping if it has an important effect, set bonus, or role in your build.

This becomes increasingly important as you move from basic gearing into optimization.

What Should You Upgrade First?

This is where a lot of players waste resources.

The right answer depends on your class and specialization, but there are a few sensible priorities.

1. Weapons

Weapons are often among the most valuable upgrades, particularly for damage dealers.

If you get a weapon that you’re likely to keep for a while, upgrading it can make much more sense than spreading the same resources across several temporary armor pieces.

2. Important Trinkets

A strong trinket can have considerably more value to your character than a small item-level increase on an ordinary armor slot.

If you’ve found one of the trinkets you’re planning to use long-term, it’s a much better upgrade candidate.

3. Tier Pieces

Once you’re building your class set, consider the value of maintaining or completing your tier bonus before blindly upgrading individual slots.

4. Major, Long-Term Upgrades

After the obvious high-impact pieces are handled, spend resources on equipment you’re likely to keep.

5. Temporary Gear

This should usually come last.

If you expect to replace an item after your next dungeon or raid night, don’t pour expensive resources into it just because the upgrade button is available.

Loot Strategist’s rule of thumb: Don’t ask, “Can I upgrade this?” Ask, “Will I still be wearing this when my next major upgrade drops?”

That’s a much better question.

The Great Vault Should Be Part of Your Weekly Plan

Don’t treat the Great Vault as something you remember to check on reset day.

Build your weekly activities around creating useful choices.

Blizzard specifically reminds players to check the Great Vault each week during Season 1.

The exact activities you choose will depend on your playstyle.

A Mythic+ player will naturally build their week around keys.

A raider will have raid progression.

A solo player can use Delves, Prey, and the other activities contributing to the relevant reward categories.

And Midnight’s later 12.0.5 content added Ritual Sites, which also contribute to the World-content Great Vault row alongside Delves and Prey.

Our advice

Don’t feel compelled to complete every possible activity simply to fill every Vault slot.

If one activity takes a huge amount of time for a reward you’re unlikely to use, your time may be better spent progressing your character elsewhere.

Matrix Catalyst: Don’t Waste Your Charges

The Matrix Catalyst is one of the most important tools for completing your class set.

But that doesn’t mean every non-tier piece should immediately be converted.

Before using a charge, ask yourself:

Is this item a meaningful upgrade?
Will converting it help complete my set bonus?
Do I already have another piece that can fill this slot?
Am I likely to replace this item soon?
Is there another item I should save the charge for?

The right answer depends heavily on your current tier progress.

If you’re one piece away from an important set bonus, the value of a Catalyst charge can be much higher than it would be for a character that’s nowhere near completing the set.

Voidforge: Targeting the Gear You Actually Want

Voidforge is one of the more interesting additions to Midnight’s endgame gearing system.

Once unlocked, it lets you use Nebulous Voidcores to obtain random eligible equipment from the loot pool associated with qualifying Season 1 activities.

Those activities include:

Season 1 raid bosses
Mythic+ dungeons
Bountiful Delves
Nightmare Prey Hunts

Blizzard’s system also removes obtained items from the relevant loot pool until eligible items have been collected for that difficulty, which makes Voidforge particularly interesting for players targeting specific missing pieces.

Why Voidforge matters

This is especially useful when your character reaches the point where one or two missing pieces are holding back your build.

Instead of simply hoping that the right item appears naturally, Voidforge gives you another way to target the available loot pool.

It’s also potentially useful for alts later in the season.

Ascendant Voidcores and High-End Gear

Voidforge also introduces Ascendant Voidcores, which can be used to further empower eligible weapons and trinkets after they meet the required upgrade conditions.

This is firmly in the “optimize your character” part of progression rather than the “I just hit level 90” part.

Don’t build your early gearing strategy around it.

By the time this system becomes a major consideration, your priorities should already have shifted from:

“How do I replace this bad item?”

to:

“Which pieces are actually worth investing in?”

Midnight’s Newer Solo-Friendly Gearing Options

If you’re reading an older Season 1 gearing guide, be careful with advice written before the 12.0.5 update.

Midnight has added more endgame activities since launch.

Void Assaults

Void Assaults provide another world-content activity and contribute to the broader progression system.

Ritual Sites

Ritual Sites are small one-to-five-player instances where you choose challenges as you progress through the tiers.

They also contribute to the World-content Great Vault row and reward Field Accolades that can be used for Champion and Hero-quality gear and other rewards.

That makes them worth mentioning in a current gearing guide—particularly for players who prefer solo or small-group content.

A Practical Weekly Gearing Routine

Here’s the routine we’d recommend rather than a rigid “do these 17 activities every reset” checklist.

First: Check your gear

Look for:

An obviously weak slot
A missing tier piece
A weapon upgrade
A strong trinket you want to keep
Gear that’s ready for a meaningful upgrade

Next: Play your main content

If you like Delves, run Delves.

If you’re a Mythic+ player, run keys.

If you’re raiding, raid.

If you prefer solo content, combine Delves, Prey, Ritual Sites, and other available world activities.

Then: Build your Great Vault

Make sure your normal weekly activities are contributing toward useful choices.

Finally: Spend resources carefully

Before upgrading something, ask:

Is this likely to survive my next few upgrades?

If yes, invest.

If no, keep the resources.

That’s the entire philosophy.

You don’t need a spreadsheet open every time you loot a pair of boots.

How to Gear an Alt

Alts are where Midnight’s broader gearing ecosystem becomes particularly useful.

Don’t approach your alt as though you’re starting the expansion from scratch.

First, get the character to a reasonable endgame baseline.

Then use the catch-up and account-wide systems available to you, followed by the activities that provide the most useful upgrades for that character.

A sensible alt progression looks like this:

Reach level 90.
Replace the weakest leveling gear.
Use available Warband/account-wide resources.
Run the endgame content you enjoy.
Build useful Great Vault choices.
Target missing pieces as your character improves.
Save expensive resources for equipment you’re likely to keep.

If your main has already taught you how the season works, don’t make your alt repeat every inefficient step.

Common Gearing Mistakes to Avoid

Upgrading everything

Just because an item can be upgraded doesn’t mean it should be.

Chasing average item level

Item level is useful, but it isn’t the entire character.

Ignoring your tier set

A small item-level increase isn’t necessarily better than progressing toward an important set bonus.

Saving every upgrade forever

The opposite mistake is also common.

If an upgrade is meaningful and you’re going to use the item for a while, use your resources.

Don’t wait forever for some hypothetical perfect drop.

Doing content you hate

If you absolutely hate Mythic+, don’t build your entire gearing plan around Mythic+ because someone called it the “fastest” method.

A sustainable routine beats a theoretically optimal routine you abandon after three days.

Following outdated guides

This is especially important in Midnight.

New content updates can add activities, change reward structures, and introduce new ways to target gear.

Always check when a gearing guide was last updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

What should I do first after reaching level 90?

Replace your weakest leveling gear, then start the endgame content that fits your preferred playstyle. Delves and Prey are natural options for solo players, while dungeons and Mythic+ are better suited to players who enjoy group content.

Are Delves still worth doing if I play Mythic+?

Yes. Delves can provide another source of progression and remain relevant to systems such as Voidforge. They can also be useful for filling gaps between dungeon runs.

When should I start spending upgrade resources?

Start spending when the item is a meaningful upgrade and you’re reasonably confident you’ll keep it for a while. Don’t spend heavily on gear you’re likely to replace immediately.

Should I use the Matrix Catalyst immediately?

Not necessarily. If using a charge completes an important tier bonus, it can be extremely valuable. Otherwise, consider whether you’re likely to receive a better item soon.

What’s the fastest way to gear an alt?

Get your alt to a reasonable baseline, use available catch-up and Warband resources, then focus on the endgame activity you already understand and enjoy. There’s little reason to repeat every inefficient gearing step you went through on your main.

Final Recommendation

Don’t make gearing harder than it needs to be.

At the beginning of the season, your job is simply to replace bad gear and get strong enough to enter better content.

Once you’re established, start being selective.

Use Delves and Prey if that’s how you like to play. Run Mythic+ if you enjoy pushing keys. Raid if raiding is your thing. Use the Great Vault every week. Work toward your tier set. And when you reach the point where upgrades become scarce, use systems such as Voidforge and targeted gearing to chase the pieces that actually matter.

Most importantly, don’t confuse higher item level with better progression.

A good gearing week isn’t the one where every number on your character sheet goes up.

It’s the week where you made your character noticeably stronger, spent your resources wisely, and are now ready to tackle content that was previously out of reach.

That’s the gearing loop worth building around.

Sources & Updates

Last updated: August 2026
Current season: Midnight Season 1

This guide is maintained as Midnight’s gearing systems change. We use Blizzard’s official documentation to verify major changes to rewards, progression systems, and new Season 1 activities.

Official Sources

Midnight Season 1: Blizzard’s official Season 1 overview, including raid, Mythic+, Delve, and seasonal progression information.
12.0.5 Content Update: Blizzard’s official patch notes covering Void Assaults, Ritual Sites, Voidforge, Nebulous Voidcores, and Ascendant Voidcores.
Voidforge: Blizzard’s official explanation of how Nebulous Voidcores and Ascendant Voidcores work with Midnight Season 1 gear.
12.0.5 World Content: Blizzard’s overview of Ritual Sites, Field Accolades, and their relationship with the World-content Great Vault.

Why we include these sources: Midnight is a live-service game, and gearing systems can change during the season. We update this guide when Blizzard changes the underlying reward or progression systems rather than relying on launch-day information.

WoW Guides