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Best Borderlands 4 Harlowe build and strongest Gravitar abilities
Jasmine Mannan
15 September 2025
Harlowe’s Creative Bursts Gravitar tree allows for such high damage that her survivability barely matters
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(Image credit: 2K)
The best Borderlands 4 Harlowe build makes you an absolute Gravitar burst machine, taking out enemies in one fell swoop. This build turns your Action Skill into a deadly bomb which not only damages on impact but leaves behind deadly radiation damage too, making this a perfect build for a Borderlands 4 solo-run.
Activating Harlowe’s Creative Burst tree gives you access to her CHROMA Accelerator Action Skill, which fires out an Unstable Energy Pocket. Not only does it deal damage as it passes through enemies, but it also violently explodes with a radioactive blast, allowing you to easily wipe out flocks of Psychos with massive burst damage. If that sounds like the sort of direction your want to take your Gravitar, I’ve laid out everything you need for this excellent Borderlands 4 Harlowe build below.
Borderlands 4 best Harlowe skills and build suggestions
(Image credit: 2K)
One of the best builds for Harlowe for a consistently high damage output is by utilising her Creative Bursts tree which easily makes her one of the best Borderlands 4 characters. Pair this build with high damage, bursty guns and a good grenade and you can easily solo hordes of rippers or destroy even the hardest of bosses. You don’t get a whole lot of survivability with this build so ensuring you have a good shield and a Repkit with charges could also be useful.
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Action Skill: CHROMA Accelerator
Augment: Special Purpose Magnets
Capstone: Demon Core
Below are the best skills to activate for Harlowe. However, it’s worth noting that you’re better off unlocking skills in later branches of the Creative Burst tree as soon as you’re able to and then coming back to unlock extras when you can. This is because later skills tend to be much more powerful buffs rather than just small stat changes.
Fuzzy Math x5: Harlowe gains increased status effect chance.
Field-Ready Prototype x5: Harlowe gains increased Action Skill damage.
Elementary x5: Harlowe gains increased Elemental Damage and Status Effect damage.
Test Subjects x5: Whenever Harlowe applies a Status Effect to an enemy she gains increased Action Skill Cooldown Rate.
Great Red Dot x3: Harlowe gains increased Status Effect Duration.
Enriched x3: Harlowe gains increased Radiation Damage.
Practical Applications x5: Harlowe gains increased Skill Damage.
Poisoned Sun x5: Harlowe gains increased Radiation Damage and Irradiation Chance.
Glow up x3: Harlowe gains Critical Hit Chance with Guns against Irradiated enemies.
Mechanical Brilliance x5: Whenever Harlowe damages an enemy with a Skill, she gains increased Skill Damage. This effect can stack.
Chain Reactor x3: Harlowe deals Bonus Radiation Damage to Entangled enemies.
Eureka! x1: Whenever Harlowe enters Fight For Your Life, she throws a free Unstable Energy Pocket at a nearby enemy – if there are any.
Dirty Bomb x1: Whenever Harlowe Irradiates an enemy, create a Radiation Explosion on that enemy.
While you can divide your skill points between different skills, maxing them out gives you some of the best buffs. However, if you want to round Harlowe out a bit more in the early game then you can pop points into other abilities and then perform a Borderlands 4 respec later.
Start out by putting points into Field-Ready Prototype so your Unstable Energy Pocket applies amazing burst damage, allowing you to destroy large groups of enemies at once. Then max out Elementary too which, again, increases your damage output.
Go for the Neutron Capture Augment here, which I would then recommend switching out later on. This allows you to apply more radiation damage over time to finish off enemies that aren’t taken out by your burst damage.
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(Image credit: 2K)
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Next max out Test Subjects and Enriched which allows you to throw out your Unstable Energy Pocket much more frequently and again apply even more radiation damage over time – making your guns even more powerful.
If you’re finding that you want more burst then you can swap your augment over to Special Purpose Magnets Augment which will help group enemies together more. This also lets you get off more burst if you’ve got a good grenade or a high fire rate SMG.
You can then max out Practical Applications which again will create an even higher burst damage when you throw your skill out and then Poisoned Sun will help finish off any enemies that weren’t blown away with more radiation damage.
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Picking up Chain Reactor will also buff radiation damage, perfect as you get to those hard to tackle late game bosses and higher level Badasses. Then go back and stick 3 points into Glow Up to allow you to get into the next level where you then want to grab Dirty Bomb. This will create chain explosions each time you use your skill making for major damage especially when you’re surrounded by hordes.
Once getting to this level, you can then go back and fill out the rest of the skills as outlined above. I would recommend doing this from bottom to top, so that way you have access to the better skills first.
Maxing out Mechanical Brilliance so you have access to Eureka! is a priority, especially if you find yourself going down quite often. This gives you more sustain as the burst of your Unstable Energy Pocket is bound to kill an enemy and give you Second Wind.
Building your tree like this means you are very reliant on your skill to do high levels of damage. This means that in order to put out high damage in between your skills, you’ll want to ensure you have a high damage grenade and good guns too. However, you can easily throw out your Unstable Energy Pocket and destroy bosses or groups of enemies alike, clearing entire areas with one button push (or two if you detonate early).
Be sure to take a look at the available Borderlands 4 Shift Codes which could buff up your loadout with powerful weapons. You might want to check out our Borderlands 4 tips to help with your vault hunting too.
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Currently a Hardware Editor at GamesRadar+ and in charge of all things PC after graduating from University with a degree in Politics and International Relations in 2022. During my time at University I managed to obtain a platform on social media – specifically TikTok – where I reviewed tech and gaming hardware and produced creative and innovative gaming content. My platform allowed me to be an advocate for females in gaming and within the tech industry as a whole. I’m primarily a PC gamer and have been for over 8 years now and with no specific genre I enjoy, I have been able to play and love many titles from the past decade. I would label myself as a Nintendo Fanatic and also am extremely interested in VR and hoping to follow it closely in upcoming years.
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