Black Cat in Marvel Rivals: Release Date and Everything We Know So Far

Black Cat is officially arriving in Marvel Rivals on April 17, 2026, as part of the Season 7.5 mid-season update. She’s the second hero of Season 7, following White Fox, and NetEase locked in that date on the official roadmap shortly before the season went live.

Season 7 is running on a tighter timeline than previous seasons, so April 17 isn’t as far off as it might seem. There’s already a fair amount to get up to speed on before she drops, though, so here’s the full picture.

Marvel Rivals Black Cat Release Date and What to Expect

The Season 7 roadmap confirmed April 17 as the Season 7.5 go-live date. Before that, April 10 will bring a cosmetics drop with new skins for Deadpool, Jeff the Land Shark, and Iron Fist, so the season stays active right up until Black Cat crashes the party.

White Fox has turned out to be one of the most fun-to-play additions to the Strategist role since launch, and if you’re still finding your footing with her, our White Fox beginner’s guide is worth a look before the meta shifts again come Season 7.5.

As for Black Cat’s role, NetEase has yet to make an official announcement, but Duelist is where most people’s money is. The case for it is straightforward given Felicia Hardy’s identity as an acrobatic, close-combat thief built around speed and aggression.

The community wasn’t always so sure, though. A wanted poster for Black Cat appeared in the in-game player hub, Times Square, ahead of the Season 7 reveal, and at one point her listed height was quietly bumped to above 7’5″ (which players instantly read as a Vanguard tease). However, NetEase has since corrected it back to 6 feet (via Reddit).

Duelist is already the most populated role in Marvel Rivals, so if that’s the direction the studio goes, the kit had better bring something fresh. Given what we know about the character, there’s reason to think it will.

Black Cat’s Powers, History, and Her Place in Marvel Rivals Lore

The official Season 7 Gallery Card. | Credits: NetEase Games

Felicia Hardy has been a fixture of Marvel Comics since 1979, built around a powerset that goes well beyond acrobatics. Her signature ability is passive probability manipulation, where she subconsciously warps the “luck field” around her so that things just tend to go wrong for whoever she’s up against. It’s subtle, deeply weird, and it has made her one of the more creative characters in the Spider-Man corner of Marvel.

Her Marvel Rivals lore has already leaned into exactly that. As we learn from the Gallery Card “Catch Me If They Can,” Wilson Fisk (aka Kingpin) hired her to steal the Tablet of Life and Time from Doctor Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum, handing her the Ring of Zona to get past the magical front door. That ring is a portal-opener, which could be a hint toward portal-based mobility showing up somewhere in her kit.

Fisk’s final line to her was “I have a feeling you will need it,” and her response was simply that “luck” tends to be on her side. NetEase isn’t being subtle about her probability powers, and it’ll be interesting to see how that gets translated into actual gameplay mechanics.

For anyone whose Marvel knowledge comes mainly from movies and games rather than comics, Black Cat is nowhere near as obscure as White Fox was at launch. Insomniac’s Marvel’s Spider-Man introduced her to a whole new generation through a dedicated DLC arc in the first game, and she showed up again in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2. She arrives in Marvel Rivals with name recognition already firmly in place.

What role do you think NetEase will go with for Black Cat, and how do you think her luck-based powers will factor into her kit? Let us know in the comments below!