Warlock Leveling Guide from 1 to 90

Welcome to our Warlock leveling guide! Here you will find all you need to about leveling a Warlock efficiently. In addition, you may wish to check out our General Leveling Guide, complete with detailed information on XP, mounts, addons, consumables, tips, and more.

Warlocks historically have proven to be one of the safest and quickest leveling classes, both in groups where they can take advantage of multi-dotting and their AoE capabilities, and in solo where their sustain combined with various crowd control and pets tanking most of the damage enable the Warlock to generally pull more than other classes.

Depending on the style of leveling and pulling mobs and the number of players in the party, Demonology or Affliction offer the quickest and safest leveling experience. Affliction, being the most versatile, especially in group play, makes it the preferred choice.

Affliction is one of the fastest leveling specializations in the game, having the advantage of being able to stack powerful DoTs on multiple targets at the same time. This enables a playstyle centered around pulling multiple mobs and bursting them down once they gather around your Voidwalker.

Leveling Information

Affliction Warlock Leveling

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Demonology can be as quick as the Affliction, but is generally better suited for smaller pulls, with strong single target damage and a variety of cleave thanks to various Demons. It is the more suited choice for soloing difficult Rares and chaining small pulls of two to four mobs at a time during questing.

Leveling Information

Demonology Warlock Leveling

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Destruction is best suited for those who prefer to pull one or two mobs at a time and focus them down in few casts before moving to the next. The powerful AoE does not come in burst, and as such is better left for group play where a dedicated tank can sustain the aggro of multiple targets for longer.

Leveling Information

Destruction Warlock Leveling

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While the most important aspect of Heirloom is the bonus Experience, to get most out of their stats allocation, you want to prioritize Intellect, then Haste, then Critical Strike. The reason behind this is that Haste generally offers a smoother combat experience while increasing your DPS in a homogeneous way, unlike Critical Strike, which is still important but less consistent by nature.

Being able to cast faster offers the advantage of tagging mobs quicker and overall has a nicer feeling when most of the actions complete quicker.

Itemization

Leveling Heirlooms

Learn how to use Heirloom gear to level your characters as fast as possible!

Heirlooms Guide

• Level 1 — Shadow Bolt is the only available spell.
• Level 2 — Corruption becomes available but with a 2-second cast time. Moderately useful for tagging multiple targets.
• Level 3 — you unlock your first pet, Summon Imp, which increases noticeably your damage at this point.
• Unending Resolve is unlocked at level 4 and is your main damage reduction cooldown.
• Level 5 — Fear becomes available, which is a better way to mitigate damage than Unending Resolve at low levels.
• Level 6 — Curse of Weakness is yet another tool to reduce auto attack damage taken by either the caster and/or the pet.
• Level 7 — Create Healthstone offers increased survivability, which in turn means less downtime between fights.
• Level 9 — Drain Life offers an additional means to sustain the caster.
• Level 10 — Summon Voidwalker becomes finally available. By far, this is the most important solo leveling pet, finding uses even in Demonology.
• Level 14 — Soulstone enable Warlocks to resurrect allies in combat or to play more aggressively while safeguarding your death during more reckless actions such as jumping over a cliff or pulling mobs beyond capabilities.
• Level 18 — Unending Breath's benefit is mostly the increased mobility underwater.
• Level 19 — Summon Sayaad offers a melee option mostly for aesthetics and dungeons.
• Level 21 — Subjugate Demon offers a situational tool to take control of sometimes more powerful demons as pets.
• Level 23 — Summon Felhunter offers the only pet with an interrupt.
• Level 29 — Command Demons enable the use of your pets' special abilities, unlocking additional utility.
• Level 31 — Ritual of Doom becomes available, but unless in a party, it is unusable.
• Level 33 — Ritual of Summoning enables you to summon players from your party.
• Level 47 — Create Soulwell becomes available, making Healthstones easier to share with the party group.

Class Guides

Warlock Class Guides

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Motoko

Guide Author

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This guide has been written by Motoko, Warlock main since The Burning Crusade, co-admin in the Warlock Discord, and theorycrafter and contributor for LockOneStopShop.