If you’ve just downloaded Deadlock and want to round up all your friends for a match, the first question you’re probably asking is how many people can you invite to Deadlock for a single lobby. I’ve spent dozens of hours testing lobby limits with my own friend group, so I know how frustrating it is to hit a random cap right when you’re ready to queue up. I’ve run into every possible invite error you can think of, from missing invites to full lobby pop-ups when I swore I had spots left. This guide breaks down official limits, exceptions for custom games, and hacks to play with bigger groups without running into annoying last-minute issues.
Official Limits: How Many People Can You Invite to Deadlock for Standard Queues
For standard unranked and ranked play, Valve has set hard party limits to keep matches fair for all players. Standard unranked and ranked queues cap party size at 5 total players, so that means you can invite up to 4 other friends to join your queue group. If you try to invite a 5th, you’ll get a pop-up error saying the party is full, with no option to bypass it. If you’re used to other MOBAs that let you invite more people for casual queues, how many people can you invite to Deadlock might feel restrictive at first, but the limit is in place to keep matches fair for everyone. Full 5-person stacks only match against other full 5-person stacks in standard queues, so you won’t end up paired against a coordinated team if you’re playing solo or with just one friend. I tried inviting 5 friends last month to test this, and the game wouldn’t let me add the 6th person to the party at all, even if we were planning to split into two teams later. The only way to play against people you invited is to switch to a custom game lobby, which we’ll cover next.
Custom Game Lobby Limits for Larger Groups
If you don’t care about ranked progress and just want to mess around with a bigger group, custom games have far higher limits than standard queues. Custom Deadlock lobbies support up to 10 total players, split evenly between the two teams, so as a host you can invite up to 9 other people to join. You can assign players to either team manually, or let the game randomize teams for a more casual, low-stakes match. If you don’t have enough people to fill all 10 spots, you can add AI bots to fill empty slots, or set the lobby to public to let random players join. But keep in mind that custom games don’t count towards your battle pass progress, so you won’t earn XP or cosmetics for matches you play there. That tradeoff is worth it for most casual game nights, though, since you get full control over every part of the match. Some of the best perks of running a custom lobby for your friend group include:
- No rank or MMR changes, so you can mess around with off-meta builds or troll picks without ruining your standing in ranked play
- Full control over match settings, including cooldown reduction, infinite mana, faster respawn times, and even modified hero abilities for silly custom game modes
- Option to lock the lobby so only people you invite can join, no randoms popping in unannounced to ruin your group’s game night
I use custom lobbies every weekend for my friend group of 8, and we never get bored with all the different setting combinations we can test.
Workarounds to Play With More Than 10 People at Once
If you have a friend group bigger than 10 people, you don’t have to leave anyone out entirely, even if there’s no official support for larger lobbies. You just need a little extra planning to make sure everyone gets time to play. The most popular workaround for larger groups is running two separate custom lobbies, and rotating players between matches so everyone gets a turn to play. You’ll need a second person to act as host for the second lobby, but that’s usually an easy ask if you have people who don’t mind taking a break from playing for a round or two. You can also set up spectator slots for people waiting to play, since custom lobbies support up to 30 spectators at a time. Spectators can chat with everyone in the lobby and even switch between player perspectives to watch the action while they wait for their turn. A lot of community groups use this setup for small local tournaments, where people can watch the current match while waiting for their turn to compete. I did this for a friend’s birthday party last month with 14 people, and we had zero issues keeping everyone entertained between matches. We even set up a small prize for the winning team of each round, which made the spectator time way more fun since people were rooting for their favorite players.
Common Invite Errors and How to Fix Them
Even if you’re inviting people within the official limits, you might run into errors that stop people from joining your lobby. Most of these are super easy to fix once you know what’s causing them, so you don’t have to spend half an hour troubleshooting before you can play. “Invite failed: user is already in a party” is the most common error, and it just means the person you’re inviting is still in another lobby they forgot to leave. Ask them to back out to the main menu and leave their existing party, then send the invite again. If that doesn’t work, have them restart their game entirely to reset their party status. Next, if someone gets a “lobby is full” error even if you have open spots, it’s usually a sync bug between your game and the Deadlock servers. Restart your lobby by disbanding it and creating a new one, then send out invites again. That fixes the issue 9 times out of 10, in my experience. Another common issue: If you’re playing on a different server region than your friend, your invite might not show up at all. Double check that you’re both set to the same server region in your settings before sending invites, and make sure neither of you has crossplay disabled if you’re playing on different platforms.
At the end of the day, the answer to how many people can you invite to Deadlock depends entirely on what kind of match you’re playing. Standard queues cap you at 4 invites for a full 5-person party, while custom lobbies let you invite up to 9 other people for casual 10-person games. If you have a bigger group, rotating players between two lobbies or using spectator slots works perfectly to keep everyone included. I’ve hosted dozens of Deadlock game nights with groups of all sizes, and I’ve never had to leave anyone out just because of lobby limits. Next time you’re planning a game night with friends, just double check the lobby type before you send out invites, and you won’t run into any last-minute headaches.