Borderlands 4 is getting a major update today, including, among other things, the addition of the long-awaited Photo Mode that was announced prior to the game’s launch, but was allegedly held due to the need to prioritize polishing other elements.
The update was announced via the official Borderlands 4 website, and it isn’t just a Photo Mode being added. Harlowe’s Zero-Point Action skill is getting a rework, and Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode levels will now increase dedicated loot drop levels.
But Photo Mode is the crown jewel here, and it’s available now by restarting your game and downloading the update. Once the update is installed, you can find Photo Mode in the Pause menu while you’re playing. It’ll let you adjust the camera and apply a variety of visual effects including Field of View and Depth of Field adjustments, filters, changing the time of day, and even toggling visibility of elements such as characters or even damage numbers. Entering Photo Mode will also pause the game entirely in single-player mode (sorry multiplayer folks, just doesn’t work that way). There’s a full guide to how to use the Photo Mode and all its settings right here.
Photo Mode was promised for Borderlands 4 way back in June of 2025, with creative director Graeme Timmins saying on social media that while it was planned, the team was prioritizing polishing other core elements, and Photo Mode thus wouldn’t be around at launch.
I had us prioritize polishing some other elements, more core to the moment-to-moment experience. We’ve always planned for it, and had it tasked up, we just needed to spend a bit more time on things that would directly impact QoL of playing the game.
— Graeme Timmins (@ProdigyXL) June 24, 2025
Below we’ve pasted the full patch notes, including all the other updates to Harlowe and Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode:
Contract Missions:
- Patrol: Order troops: Now progresses when killing enemies
- Trace: Scrap Core: The scrap core object is able to be interacted with consistently and the contract from Dominion can now be completed
- Convinced the Intrusive Thoughts Vile Ripper, Deep State Phalanx, and Breaux Chambeaux Phalanx bounties to show up when a player has taken their contracts
Vault Card Challenges:
- “Loot or Purchase 10/15 legendaries” Vault Card weekly challenge will no longer reset with a save/load
- “Loot or Purchase Ordnance” will now increase when conditions are met
- “Kill enemies with Torgue guns and gear” will now progress when using Torgue legendary grenade Firepot
- “Kill X enemies with Maliwan guns and gears” and the Maliwan Challenge “Last Wan Standing” will now progress as intended
Challenges:
- Legendary Forsaken Chaos and Legendary Midnight Defiance have been removed from the Collect All Phosphene Challenge
- Updated Maliwan status effects to better identify what triggered the status effects, leading to better tracking on challenges
Progression and rewards
- Addressed a reported issue that was causing travel to Dominion to be locked by a player leaving a transition area in multiplayer
- “Potty Mouth” Mission: Objectives are no longer blocked when exiting to the main menu
- Addressed an issue causing unlocked DLC content to be unavailable while offline
- True Mode is now able to be consistently enabled for newly created level 30 UVHM characters
- Added a tutorial for True Mode when the campaign is completed
- Players creating a new character in multiplayer will now receive all intended rewards
- Addressed a reported issue causing all equipment to be lost when quitting to the main menu during a countdown in multiplayer when switching to solo play
- Addressed issues with the “Gourd Your Loins” cosmetic reward not being awarded with SHiFT code
- If you were impacted by this issue the first time around, or you missed these gourd-geous heads during the Horrors of Kairos event, this SHiFT code will redeem your missing cosmetic! This code will not reward anything to those that successfully received their cosmetic rewards the first time.
- Redeem the SHiFT code below (check out our SHiFT User Guide if you don’t already know how) to get the “Gourd Your Loins” Vault Hunter Head and the “Hex Appeal” Weapon Skin!*
- THFB3-R9XKK-CFBJW-T33BB-9R3CC
- *Requires a copy of Borderlands 4, SHiFT Account, and Internet connection. Must redeem by December 31, 2030. One redemption per SHiFT Account. Terms apply.
- Addressed reported issues where critical hit damage sometimes wasn’t being applied to critical hits
Specializations
- Daredevil: Action Skill Cooldown rate has been adjusted to .5% and a multiplicative Action Skill Damage bonus has been added
- Runner: Melee Damage bonus is now a multiplicative instead of additive
Harlowe the Gravitar Skill Rework
Dev Note: We’re making several changes to Zero-Point as another step towards making this skill tree feel more satisfying and better balanced relative to Harlowe’s other trees. Because we’re changing the fundamental behavior of Zero-Point to include the old Inertia Augment behavior in the base skill, we want to see how these changes balance out before doing more work in the rest of the tree.
We have our eye on a few other passives that may be candidates for some buffs, but between the recent passive buffs that were implemented several weeks ago, combined with today’s changes, we’ll revisit those in the future once we’ve gathered adequate feedback on the current changes.
Long term, we want to ensure that each Vault Hunter has plenty of build diversity, with each Action Skill having its own pros and cons. If and when we see one falling behind, we’ll continue to explore changes like today’s.
- Zero-Point (Base Skill): Now includes the benefits of the previous “Inertia” Augment. Killing an enemy in Stasis now resets the duration, searches for a new target, and makes the duration decrease faster
- Inertia Augment (Changed): Updated to increase Harlowe’s Slam Damage. Whenever she slams an enemy, create Mini Unstable Energy Pocket projectiles that randomly deal Cryo or Radiation damage. Additionally, she also gains increased Status Effect Damage and Status Effect Chance. This effect stacks.
Amon the Forgeknight
- Amon now consistently deals bonus Cryo Damage when equipping Cryonic Thrum Augment in multiplayer
- Prevented unintended increases in the number of segments in the Vault Hunter bar when Amon activates his Action Skill
- Dragon’s Breath now applies properly to Ripper Heavy Weapons with beams
- Firewall Forgeskill will now block Moon-Maddened Callis projectile attacks
Vex the Siren
- Addressed the cooldown for Prismatic Ichors sometimes resetting when applying a status effect
- Phase Pocket Passive no longer resets the Taser underbarrel magazine when using a Vladof Enhancement
- Healing numbers now present correctly when Specters are using Ripper Legendary Sniper Rifle Tankbuster
- Addressed Incarnate Action Skill behavior so that it continues to work while using the Vibe Check Capstone with the Legendary Class Mod Technomancer
Bloomreaper Boss Fight:
- Falling into the fog will now consistently kill players instead of having them fall out of the map
- The purple rift will now only appear after the boss is defeated
- Addressed an instance of Bloomreaper keeping the Invincible health bar in the second phase
- Addressed an exploit that would allow UVHM time trial rewards to be obtained while not in UVHM
- Addressed an issue that would cause the chest for Platinum rewards to be empty after fulfilling the requirements
- Disc-shooting heavy weapons will now damage Bloomreaper’s crystals
- Vile Creeps should no longer get stuck in the air
World Events and Bosses:
- Increased the spawn rate of world bosses in the Punitive Manufactorium area
- Rewards will now reliably spawn when completing the Airship or The Goredello world events
- Minister Screw is no longer able to be frozen
- Toy Pinheads are now affected by singularity grenades
- Idolator Sol now takes damage from Elemental Hazards created by skills while Bio Armor is broken
- Vile Lictor’s limbs will now continue to respawn after freezing them
- Gennifer will now remain inside the refugee even if the player is dying near the area
- Lowered the amount of Badass enemies spawning in one spot by Electi Safe Collectable
- Ensured that boss fights consistently reset when all players have died
- Restored the ability to interact with Fortresses if travel was canceled by leaving a transition area in multiplayer
Loot and Stations:
- UVH levels now increase dedicated loot drop levels. The higher the level, the higher the chance of dedicated loot dropping!
- Changed the Respawn Station outside of Umbral Foundry to a Fast Travel station to allow for easier travel to the entrance
- Prevented loot items from dropping into unintended areas after defeating The Oppressor or killing all enemies in Ripper Drill Site Saw’s Clench
- Red Chest in Coastal Bonescape will only unlock when all enemies are killed
Mission, Enemy and ECHO Location Updates:
- Guns Blazing: Arjay will now consistently engage in combat against enemies
- The Power Ballad of Rodd Vomit: Addressed enemy pathing to reach the player
- Missions will no longer progress unexpectedly in multiplayer when switching from splitscreen to solo play
- Radioactive Rail Liner will now attack if players are close to it
- ECHO Location guidance improvements
- Rift Champion icon removed from the Compass, with cleaned-up functionality for those icons in the Map
Enhancement:
- Adjusted the Underdog enhancement to only apply to Vladof underbarrel weapons as intended. This will remove an unintended damage bonus that was happening when some guns switched their ammo or element types. We also updated Wombo Combo rockets so they now correctly count as underbarrel damage and receive this boost
Tediore:
- Tediore Legendary Assault Rifle Chuck now throws properly when the player has over 120% gun reload speed
- Addressed a behavior that prevented homing on the third gun spawned by Tediore reloads when specific conditions were met
- Removed extra gun from Tediore shotguns with Ripper magazines
Maliwan:
- Maliwan Legendary SMG Ohm I Got will no longer consume Energy Shield when Overshield is active
- Only active element Status Effects will spread when killing an enemy with a Maliwan-licensed part with Maliwan Enhancement and Transfuser Core
- Singularities now spawn correctly on Maliwan Sniper Rifles with Singularity Grenade Launcher underbarrels
Jakobs:
- Addressed Jakobs ricochet damage to apply the intended amount of damage on Jakobs weapons
Torgue:
- Torgue Legendary Pistol Hardpoint will fire as intended with Tediore licensed-part “Shooting”
- Torgue Legendary Shield Compleation now properly triggers Segment Break armor shield augments
Order:
- Order Legendary Sniper Rifle Rooker needle projectiles will consistently home in on enemies at a distance with the Callous augment. It will also no longer spawn unintended underbarrel projectiles with Jakobs licensed parts and a Jakob enhancement with Leaper and Bounce Pass
Ripper:
- Ripper Legendary Shield Watts 4 Dinner will now consistently give the overshield in multiplayer from Overshield drops
CoV:
- Weapons with CoV magazines now continue to fire when using Bullets to Spare firmware level 3 with the Ventilator enhancement
Daedalus:
- Daedalus SMGs with the Overcharge attachment and a Ripper Magazine will now inherit the Ripper magazine charge-up time
Atlas:
- Atlas Sure Shot perk is no longer triggered by Rafa Peacebreaker Cannons Action Skill while equipping a weapon with Atlas licensed parts and the Sure Shot enhancement
- Updated Tracker Antenna and Trauma Bond to no longer incorrectly apply to gear without Atlas-licensed parts
Ordnance
- Heavy Weapons now cause damage to BoomBoom Drones during the Callis boss fight
Firmware:
- Skillcraft will now receive the proper amount of stacks when dealing skill damage to enemies
- Deadeye 2-piece now functions as intended with intended projectiles
- High Caliber 3-piece now functions as intended with Atlas Tracker Grenade
- Get Throwin’ now properly increases Heavy Weapon Ordnance damage
Visual, Audio, and Animation updates to Guns and Gear:
- Restored prefixes to Tediore Legendary Grenade UAV
- Order Legendary Pistol Bully with Hyperion Shield enhancement now display with all parts on the item card
- Repkit will no longer disappear when trying to heal after climbing
- Corrected animations for Daedalus SMGs with Atlas Underbarrel attachments when switching
- Corrected audio on the Daedalus Legendary Shotgun Missilaser
- Maliwan Legendary Shotgun Mantra now shows the Amara Phase Fist when fired
- Adjusted effects on Maliwan Legendary SMG Ohm I Got and Daedalus Legendary Shotgun Missilaser to be consistent throughout gameplay
- Adjusted animation on Tediore Shotguns to prevent shell cases from appearing when using secondary fire
- Tediore weapons no longer explode when thrown if they overlap with water
- Tediore Assault Rifles and Pistols have consistent laser sights on gear
- Effects for Vladof Legendary Assault Rifle Whiskey Foxtrot will now expire as intended
- Adjusted reload animation for Ripper Shotguns with CoV magazines
- Adjusted Ripper effects when shooting Ripper guns with Maliwan-licensed underbarrel parts
- Ripper Grenade Transmitter effects have been restored when they are despawning
- Adjusted missing effects of needles when using the Order Legendary Sniper Rifle Rooker
- Vault Hunter voices now return to normal after unequipping the Kittycopter head customization
- Marcus now talks at the proper time
- The second round of the Goredello will now announce the enemy type
- Updated various sound effects to play while fighting Bloomreaper
- Updates to various incorrect or missing VO lines
- Damage numbers have been removed when continuing to shoot Arjay when the fight has ended
- Corrected ECHO-4 appearance when using the ECHO-IVIV frame and Nurple paintjob customization
- Ensured Vex the Siren’s tattoos glow as intended with all skins
- Melee animations for Rafa the Exo-Soldier will now play correctly in multiplayer
- Characters can now climb after double jumping at the Abandoned Post Safehouse in the Coastal Bonescape
- Resolved climbing animations not syncing in multiplayer
- Using the grapple point by the propaganda speaker in The Howl will now take the player to the roof of the house
- Adjusted Idolator Sol animations when buying Boss replay in multiplayer
- Reduced the brightness of Seeker Witness’ laser effects
- Ripsaw’s rotating blade effect will now disappear after death
- Minister Screw’s triangle effects now disappear after death
- Ensured Bruce’s head consistently disappeared in multiplayer during Angry Mob mission
- Addressed reported instances of NPCs performing their animations early or in the wrong locations
- Adjusted effects on power cores during the “Powerdrop” Mission
- Carried items will no longer become attached to a weapon after firing and reloading quickly
- Adjusted fading distance in the intro
- Addressed hitching with Vault Hunter saves in the main menu
- Reduced the number of unused materials throughout the game
- Prevented Shield Boosters from blocking the screen
- Trees inside buildings no longer blow in the wind
- Missing animations when destroying the grate near the Vault Fragment in Tonnage Peel have been restored
- Unintended transition effects will no longer appear on players outside of Vile Lictor boss arena
- Fire no longer starts popping when getting closer to Dominion
- Prevented flickering after opening an Electi Safe
- Haybales in The Howl no longer show glass VFX when hit
- House now displays properly during Breeding Daisies
- The lights on the Candlelight Catastrophe skin now flash consistently
- Ensured the launch pad in Cuspid Climb is consistent with other launch pad areas
- The Black Market Vending Machine will no longer have an obstructed view if spawned in Tonnage Peel
- Lowered several floating items
- Addressed multiple cases of lootables not being able to be opened
- Updated various cinematics for consistency
- Addressed clipping, missing collision, out-of-bounds access, stuck spots, and visual errors in various areas of the game
- Sorting in the Customization Menu now defaults to show Unlocked Customizations first
- Corrected an issue causing the Backpack to appear empty after filtering
- Repkits now appear as intended in Inventory
- Addressed a reported issue causing Vault Cards to not update or progress in multiplayer
- Addressed a reported issue causing Vault Card progress to reset or disappear after a disconnect
- Vault Cards will no longer carry over progress if the same challenge reappears after the daily reset
- Updates to Vault Card UI
- Various optimization updates to UI
- Addressed various reported issues with scroll bar, sorting, and menu UI
- Updated localization, various text descriptions, subtitle timings, icon visibility, and alignment across the game
- Material thumbnails in the Customization menu now appear correctly
- Updated Credits
Splitscreen
- “Flip Card” functionality has been restored after level transitions
- Corrected various scrolling issues in the Vault Cards Menu during splitscreen
- Corrected a case of a persistent “Logging in” message when a secondary player joins splitscreen
- The Golden Chest will no longer get stuck with the “Transaction in Progress” message when the secondary player leaves after opening
- Both splitscreen players will now see all mission items during “Breeding Daisies” mission
- Resolved an issue with Recent Friends not functioning as intended when a player is added to splitscreen during gameplay
- Adjusted Vault Card UI to prevent overlapping or not displaying the entire Item Card
- Vehicle FOV will now change for both players
- Adjusted nameplate text sizes to scale correctly in splitscreen
- Updated various UI elements for correct placement and to prevent overlapping
Player Experience
- [Console Only] Several instances of incorrect gear meshes have been corrected on consoles
- [PC Only] Adjusted default mouse sensitivity and added a setting option to disable mouse smoothing
- Blended facial animations for better optimization
- Visual optimizations for Jakobs Legendary Shotgun Rainbow Vomit
- Optimizations to Mission Menu
- Various improvements to stability and optimization
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to [email protected].
