You’ve noticed that Fortnite pro players typically use female skins.
But most of the best Fortnite players are actually males in real life.
So why are they choosing to use female skins?
Do the pros know something that we don’t?
And do female skins really give an advantage in Fortnite?
Female skins hitbox
As you know, female skins are smaller than male skins.
And a common Fortnite myth is that female skins have a smaller hitbox than male skins.
If female skins had a smaller hitbox, then they would be more difficult to hit and grant a competitive advantage.
But this isn’t true.
You see, all skins in Fortnite have the same size hitbox, regardless of the size of the skin.
Of course, female skins are clearly smaller and this does give an advantage, but for a completely different reason.
Let me explain.
Smaller skins enhance vision
Fortnite is a third-person shooter game and your camera is looking over the shoulder of your camera.
So your vision of the map and of enemies is restricted by your character model. When you use bigger and bulkier skins it becomes more difficult to see, particularly when you try to aim down sites (ADS).
This is why skins that are naturally large and take up a lot of space are not used in competitive tournaments. For example, Brutus, a Chapter 2: Season 2 Battle Pass reward skin.
Just look at how much space this skin takes up. You will not see a Fortnite pro using Brutus in a tournament because he’s too big and blocks much of the screen.
Obviously, vision is very important in Fortnite and you want to be able to see as much as possible so you can gather information.
So Fortnite pro players do not use female skins because they have a smaller hitbox. Rather, pros use female skins because they’re smaller and take up less space on the screen so they can see more.
The importance of vision is also why most pros no longer use a stretched resolution in Fortnite since it reduces your field of view (FOV).
It’s all about perception
One advantage of using female skins may be due to the perceived hitbox size.
You see, when a skin looks smaller, then it will appear to you as being more difficult to hit, even if you logically know the hitbox size is the same.
So you may be more likely to miss your shots on a smaller skin as a result of this psychological factor.
This is evident with the Aura skin, which may be the most competitive Fortnite skin because she is skinny and takes up little space. And a lot of Fortnite pro players choose to use Aura for this reason.
Something else to consider when selecting your skin is that you’re going to be looking at it for the entirety of the game. Or, at least, the back of the skin.
So Fortnite pro players may simply choose to play with female skins because they prefer the look of them.
Not really relevant to the subreddit but i guess where else would you ask this.
Its a combination of liking the female models better (partly because as guys females are obviously nicer to look at) and some of the male character models looking awakward.
For example, i really only like the skinny john wick model. Not a fan of the normal male character model proportions which is most of them.
Then theres also a little bit of hipster elitism and wanting a "tryhard skin" that noobs dont use. So they use obscure skins and backpacks to look different. Skins like raven or omega or ragnorok are to overuses and cool looking and pros dont wanna use a skin that noobs use
Epic Games Many Fortnite
fans on Reddit have observed that at top levels of play, a large number of Fortnite pros opt to use female character skins. This pattern seems to occur regardless of the player's gender or whether that professional player has their
own actual Fortnite skin available to them. So what is the real advantage that pro players receive from using female character skins? This preference among Fortnite professonals has actually been noted since the game was still relatively new. In August 2018, Reddit user
SwarlesBarkley3 asked, "Why do the overwhelming majority of pros/streamers use female character skins?" One common guess is that female characters may have smaller hitboxes than their male counterparts. This is the case in other battle royale games like Apex Legends, where the developer has endeavored to
balance hitbox size against character abilities. For example, Gibraltar has one of the largest hitboxes in that game, but almost all of his tactical skills involve damage reduction for himself and
his team. Hitbox size would seem to be a reasonable assumption for skin preference, but gamers have found that the hitboxes in Fortnite seem to all be the same. In one illustrative video, Fortnite streamer Nexiph demonstrated that even characters with noticeably different profiles receive damage when players aim at the same point. One character,
Crackshot, even wears a tall hat, which makes it appear like an easier target. However, bullets pass right through the hat, just as they pass over the head of a character who isn't wearing one. While smaller character models may not be harder to hit, they could lessen player visibility. Fans have noted that since Fortnite is always played from a
third-person perspective, some players feel that a smaller character model can make a player harder to spot, while funny skins with sight-blocking accessories may increase player visibility to a dangerous degree. Also, while most
Fortnite skins are roughly the same size, skins with a lot of extras could make a player more visible around corners and behind other hiding spots, giving away their position. If these advantages seem inconsequential, keep in mind that Fortnite is incredibly competitive at the professional level, and there are millions of dollars on the line
in some tournaments. Any player skin choice that confers a slight advantage, or at least doesn't introduce a disadvantage, could make the split-second difference in an encounter that high-level Fortnite victory requires. As a result, many pro Fortnite players opt to pick skins with more slender frames, such as the new Lara Croft skin.