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HearthstoneJul 6, 2021 1:00 pm CT

How to get every Hero Portrait in Hearthstone, including the new Druid of the Flame Malfurion and Shaman Ragnaros

How does one get new Hero Portraits in Hearthstone? It’s a bit difficult to give one simple explanation, because there are many different ways to get portraits. There’s been no standard: Instead, over the years, different portraits have been obtainable through different sources.

Hearthstone’s first alternate hero portraits were available for purchase, with Magni Bronzebeard, Alleria Windrunner, and Medivh released for the Warrior, Hunter, and Mage classes, respectively. But the idea of buying these portraits from the store wasn’t universally well-received, and Blizzard has since come up with a variety of new ways to earn customized hero looks. You could earn portraits by taking part in the Recruit a Friend system, or attend a Fireside Gathering, or sign up to Twitch Prime and link your Battle.net account there. It was all pretty arcane, and some of those portraits (like Nemsy and Tyrande) were out of reach for most players — which was, perhaps, even more infuriating than when they were simply added to the store.

Recently, most portraits come from purchasing the high-priced Mega Bundle for upcoming expansions, or from leveling up your Rewards Track — as long as you purchase the Tavern Pass to earn those extra rewards. But older portraits from past promotions sometimes return to the store, and can be purchased for a brief period of time.

If you’re looking to customize your Hearthstone experience, here’s how to get every Hero Portrait available in the game.

How to get all available Hearthstone hero portraits

There are many hero portraits, which you can obtain by several different means. So read on to find out what you’ll need to do to snatch your favorite one.

Heroes that are part of the Fire Festival 2021 Event

The 2021 edition of the Fire Festival has begun, including a few Legendary Quests, which will be available from July 6 to July 27. If you complete all of them, you’ll be rewarded with a free skin:

In addition to that, there is a new purchasable bundle in the shop: the Eternal Flame Bundle, which will only be up for a limited amount of time (from July 6 to July 20). This bundle includes three hero portraits:

Heroes from the Book of Heroes bundles

Book of Heroes: Gul’dan has just been released, including its own bundle that contains a skin.

Heroes you purchase with Gold from your collection

Starting with Patch 20.4, a selection of portraits will be purchasable with Gold, directly from your collection. Each portrait will cost either 1,200 or 1,800 Gold.

Initially, this is the set of 11 portraits you will be able to purchase:

Heroes you earn by winning 1,000 games with a class

There isn’t much to say here: to get these skins, you need to play that class a lot in order to win a thousand games with it. Once you do, their “advanced” portrait is unlocked for you to use.

Victories on pretty much any game mode will count: Standard, Wild, Classic, Arena, and Duels can all help you to your goal. There are lots of ways to work towards these Heroes, but it will take time.

Heroes you earn by leveling up in the Rewards Track — with the Tavern Pass

Most of these portraits are part of a new trend of “evolving” hero portraits, where you will unlock different versions of the same hero showcasing their progression. But all the different stages of those portraits remain in your collection, so you can still use the more “basic” ones — even after unlocking their advanced forms — if you wish to.

Note that in order to obtain the following ten skins, besides leveling up in the Rewards Track, you will also need to purchase the Tavern Pass.

Heroes you earn by reaching the end of the Rewards Track

These portraits are based on iconic Tier class sets from World of Warcraft — or, more specifically, on what our Hearthstone heroes would look like while wearing them.

These skins were added to the game with the first version of the Rewards Track during the Year of the Mammoth. If you reached level 50 on that track, you were allowed to pick one of these portraits. But you will be able to pick another one by reaching level 100 on the new Rewards Track — the one pertaining to the Year of the Gryphon — which was just added to the game.

Nemsy Necrofizzle

Heroes you earn by gaining 200 total levels across all Rewards Tracks

Like the previous ones, these portraits are also based on Tier class sets from WoW. They require you to earn 200 total levels across all Rewards Tracks — no matter which expansion they’re from.

Heroes obtainable by other means

These hero portraits that were added to the game a while ago, long before we had the now standardized forms of obtaining them. As such, each has a different requirement. Here’s how to get each one.

Paladin

  • Lady Liadrin: Level a character to level 20 in World of Warcraft.
    • This can be done even on the Starter Edition of the game — it doesn’t require an active subscription to WoW!
  • Prince Arthas: Beat the final mission of the Knights of the Frozen Throne single-player adventure nine times — once with every class. (Demon Hunter wasn’t available at the time yet, so it’s not included in this requirement.)
    • The Knights of the Frozen Throne single-player adventure can still be obtained, for free, from the Battle.net shop, by following this link.

Shaman

  • Morgl the Oracle: Take part in Hearthstone’s Recruit-a-Friend system. Your recruited friend needs to accumulate a total of 20 levels across the different classes.
    • Note that it’s possible for a player to recruit themselves, on a different account, then level up their heroes on that account, and then receive Morgl on their main account.

Warlock

  • Nemsy Necrofizzle is obtainable by participating in a Fireside Gathering.
    • She was also available for free from the in-game shop, for a limited window of time, in May 2020.

Heroes that are no longer obtainable — at least for now

Sadly, there are more Heroes in this category — 38 in total — than those that you can still obtain. Most hero portraits are added to the game in a very limited-time fashion: you need to purchase them within their restricted window or they’re gone. But thankfully, some of them do come back to the game every once in a while.

Certain skins, like the ever-popular Tyrande for Priests, have already returned multiple times. So, even if your favorite hero portrait is listed here don’t lose hope!

Heroes previously available as stand-alone purchases

These heroes were the very first skins to ever be added to the in-game shop as standalone purchases. They each came with their own card back.

Later, another hero was also added to the shop as a stand-alone purchase.

Heroes previously available by leveling up in the Rewards Track (with the Tavern Pass)

These portraits were available during the Year of the Mammoth version of the Rewards Track.

Heroes previously available by purchasing limited-time Book of Heroes bundles

These heroes became briefly available by purchasing their bundles as they were added to the Book of Heroes series of single-player adventures.

Heroes previously available by purchasing limited-time Seasonal bundles

These heroes became briefly available by purchasing their bundles during Seasonal events. There’s a chance they might become available again once those Seasonal events return.

Lunar New Year

Hallow’s End

Winter’s Veil

Heroes previously available by purchasing other limited-time bundles

Since these bundles weren’t tied to any specific event, there is no guarantee that they will ever return. This is especially true for the ones that were tied to pre-expansion Mega Bundles.

Demon Hunter

Druid

Mage

Priest

  • Madame Lazul was available with the Rise of Shadows Mega Bundle

Shaman

Warlock

Warrior

  • Deathwing was available with the Descent of Dragons Mega Bundle

Heroes that were available by various other means

Some of the most popular portraits are in this category — reminders of a time when obtaining these alternate heroes was much more complex (if not outright impossible for some players).

Druid

  • Lunara was available by winning 10 games in Standard during the Year of the Raven

Mage

  • Khadgar was purchasable from the in-game shop for a limited time, using an iOS device

Priest

  • Tyrande Whisperwind has been obtainable in multiple ways:
    • First, she was given as a reward for players who subscribed to the Twitch Prime service — which was only available on a few countries at the time.
    • Later, she was briefly added to the in-game shop for some regions that hadn’t been able to obtain her with the Twitch Prime promotion before.
    • Finally, she was briefly added to the in-game shop for free for all players, in December 2019.

Rogue

  • Maiev Shadowsong has been obtainable in multiple ways:
    • First, she was available by winning 10 games in Standard during the Year of the Mammoth.
    • Later, she was added to the in-game shop for 1,000 gold.

That’s the list! Hopefully you can find that your favorite hero is still obtainable — or, if not, hope that they’ll become obtainable again in the future.

Originally posted 04/05/2021. Updated 07/20/2021.

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