Cooldown

Cooldown is the delay between a unit or building's attacks or use of certain non-passive abilities, measured in seconds.

Types of Cooldown

Attack Cooldown

Attack Cooldown is the amount of delay between the damage-dealing actions of buildings or units, measured in seconds. It is a key statistic, as combined with attack damage it defines the Damage per second (DPS) of a unit or building. To calculate DPS, a unit's attack damage is (multiplied by the attack count and) divided by the cooldown period. Attack cooldown is also an important attribute to be aware of when kiting, as the kiting units should ideally be moving during the entire cooldown period.

There are upgrades that reduce the attack cooldown of specific units, such as Adrenal Glands on the Zergling. The Terran ability Stimpack reduces the attack cooldown of the Marine and Marauder by 33%, thereby increasing the DPS of those units by 50%.

Adrenal Glands

200      200      93 Hotkey: A Researched from: Spawning Pool Decreases Zergling attack cooldown to 0.35 (-0.15). Requires a Hive.

Resonating Glaives

100      100      100 Hotkey: A Researched from: Twilight Council Increases the attack speed of the Adept by 45%.

Stimpack

Duration: 11 s Hotkey: T Increases the movement speed and firing rate by 50% at the cost of 10 HP for a Marine or 20 HP for a Marauder.

Ability Cooldown

Ability cooldown is the minimum period of time that must pass between usages of an ability, measured in seconds.

Ability use is regulated, broadly speaking, by either Energy or cooldowns. Some abilities that consume energy also have a cooldown; some abilities such as Blink and Charge only have cooldowns. When using these abilities, a clock animation will appear over the ability icon, denoting how much of the cooldown period remains. A special category of cooldown usage is the Warp Gate: whereas training a unit with other buildings delivers the unit after a set period, the Warp Gate delivers the unit after a few seconds, and the Warp Gate goes on cooldown.

Certain abilities, such as Generate Creep, have no cooldown period (or energy cost) at all and may be used continuously.

Units & Building by Attack Cooldown

Unit	Race	Notes	Ground Attack CD	Air Attack CD
Adept	Protoss	Resonating Glaives	1.61 (0.64)	—
Archon	Protoss		1.25	1.25
Carrier	Protoss	Interceptor Launch	0.36	0.36
Colossus	Protoss		1.07	—
Dark Templar	Protoss		1.21	—
Disruptor	Protoss	Purification Nova	23.54	—
High Templar	Protoss		1.25	—
Immortal	Protoss		1.04	—
Interceptor	Protoss		2.14	2.14
Mothership	Protoss		1.58	1.58
Oracle	Protoss	Pulsar Beam	0.61	—
Phoenix	Protoss		—	0.79
Photon Cannon	Protoss		0.89	0.89
Probe	Protoss		1.07	—
Sentry	Protoss		0.71	0.71
Stalker	Protoss		1.34	1.34
Tempest	Protoss		2.36	2.36
Void Ray	Protoss		0.36	0.36
Zealot	Protoss		0.86	—
Auto-Turret	Terran		0.57	0.57
Banshee	Terran		0.89	—
Battlecruiser	Terran		0.16	0.16
Cyclone	Terran		0.71	0.71
Ghost	Terran		1.07	1.07
Hellbat	Terran		1.43	—
Hellion	Terran		1.79	—
Liberator	Terran	Defender Mode	1.14	—
Liberator	Terran	Fighter Mode	—	1.29
Marauder	Terran	Stimpack	1.07 (0.71)	—
Marine	Terran	Stimpack	0.61 (0.41)	—
Missile Turret	Terran		—	0.61
Planetary Fortress	Terran		1.43	—
Reaper	Terran		0.79	—
SCV	Terran		1.07	—
Siege Tank	Terran	Tank Mode	0.74	—
Siege Tank	Terran	Siege Mode	2.14	—
Thor	Terran	Explosive Payload	0.91	2.14
Thor	Terran	High-Impact Payload	0.91	0.91
Viking	Terran	Assault Mode	0.71	—
Viking	Terran	Fighter Mode	—	1.43
Widow Mine	Terran	Sentinel Missiles	28.57	28.57
Brood Lord	Zerg		—	1.79
Broodling	Zerg		0.46	—
Corruptor	Zerg		—	1.36
Drone	Zerg		1.07	—
Hydralisk	Zerg		0.59	0.59
Infested Terran	Zerg		0.61	1.14
Locust	Zerg		0.43	—
Lurker	Zerg		1.43	—
Mutalisk	Zerg		1.09	1.09
Queen	Zerg		0.71	0.71
Ravager	Zerg		1.14	—
Roach	Zerg		1.43	—
Spine Crawler	Zerg		1.32	—
Spore Crawler	Zerg		—	0.61
Ultralisk	Zerg		0.61	—
Zergling	Zerg	Adrenal Glands	0.5 (0.35)	—

Abilities With Cooldown

The following table shows the abilities which have cooldown periods. Note that abilities with durations, such as Ignite Afterburners, are often notated with their durations subtracted from their cooldowns.

Ability	Unit	Race	Cooldown
Psionic Transfer	Adept	Protoss	11.43
Launch Interceptor	Carrier	Protoss	0.36
Shadow Stride	Dark Templar	Protoss	14.29
Psionic Storm	High Templar	Protoss	1.43
Barrier	Immortal	Protoss	32
Strategic Recall	Nexus	Protoss	130
Pulsar Beam (Activation Cooldown)	Oracle	Protoss	2.86
Revelation	Oracle	Protoss	1.79
Guardian Shield	Sentry	Protoss	10.86
Blink	Stalker	Protoss	7.14
Prismatic Alignment	Void Ray	Protoss	43
Charge	Zealot	Protoss	7.14
Tactical Jump	Battlecruiser	Terran	71
Yamato Cannon	Battlecruiser	Terran	71
Lock On	Cyclone	Terran	4.29
Ignite Afterburners (Rapid Reignition System)	Medivac	Terran	14.29 (9.29)
KD8 Charge	Reaper	Terran	14.29
Caustic Spray	Corruptor	Zerg	32.14
Spawn Creep Tumor	Creep Tumor	Zerg	10.71
Summon Nydus Worm	Nydus Network	Zerg	14
Transfusion	Queen	Zerg	0.71
Corrosive Bile	Ravager	Zerg	7.14
Spawn Locusts	Swarm Hosts	Zerg	42.86
Consume	Viper	Zerg	0.71