If you’ve ever spent weeks farming Stellar Jades for a limited 5-star character in Honkai Star Rail, only to hit 72 pulls without a drop right as the banner is about to end, you’ve probably wondered how the pity system works, and specifically does pity carry over in Honkai Star Rail between different banners and reruns. I’ve been there too: last year I saved 78 pulls for Blade, only to miss him by 3 pulls when I ran out of Jades right before his banner ended. I spent the next week panicking that all my progress would be wasted, until I dug into the official gacha rules and tested them across multiple reruns. In this post, we’ll break down every part of HSR’s pity carry over policy, so you never waste a pull or miss out on your favorite character again.
Does Pity Carry Over in Honkai Star Rail Across Different Banner Types?
First, if you’re new to HoYoverse games, pity is a built-in gacha guarantee that you will get a rare drop after a set number of pulls, no matter how unlucky you are. For 5-star characters and light cones in HSR, soft pity starts at 75 pulls, where your chance of getting a 5-star increases with every pull until you hit hard pity at 90 pulls, which gives you a guaranteed 5-star. 4-star characters and light cones have a hard pity of 10 pulls, so you’ll never go more than 10 pulls without a 4-star or higher drop.
Pity carry over rules vary widely depending on what type of banner you’re pulling on, and it’s easy to mix them up if you don’t pay attention. Limited character event banners share pity across all reruns of the same banner type. That means if you pull 70 times on Seele’s first run and don’t get her, that 70-pity progress will still be there when she reruns 6 or 8 months later. Even 4-star pity carries over across all limited character banners, so if you pull 8 times without a 4-star on one limited character banner, that progress will count toward the next limited character banner you pull on.
Limited light cone event banners have their own separate pity pool that does not carry over to character banners. Pulls on a limited light cone banner only count toward pity for that specific light cone banner type, and they will never apply to character banner pity. The permanent standard warp banner also has its own completely separate pity pool that never carries over to any limited banner, no matter how many pulls you put into it. The beginner’s warp banner, which is only available for new players for the first 30 days of their account, has pity that resets entirely once you use all 50 allowed pulls or get your guaranteed 5-star, and it never carries over to any other banner.
Common Misconceptions About HSR Pity Carry Over Rules
There are a lot of viral myths about HSR’s pity system floating around social media, and most of them come from players mixing up rules from other gacha games or misreading patch notes. A lot of new players reach out to me asking does pity carry over in Honkai Star Rail if they lose the 50/50, or if their pity expires after a certain amount of time, and most of these fears are completely unfounded. Here are the most common myths you can ignore:
You don’t have to worry about losing your pity progress if you can’t afford to pull for a character during their first run. I tested this myself when I missed Kafka on her first run with 78 pity built up. When she reran 8 months later, my 78 pity was still there, and I got her on the second pull of her rerun banner without any issues.
How to Track Your Pity Count to Avoid Wasting Pulls
The biggest downside of HSR’s in-game pull history is that it only shows the last 6 months of pulls, so if you’re waiting a year for a character to rerun, you won’t be able to check your old pity count directly in the game. That means you need to track your pity separately if you want to plan your pulls effectively long-term.
The only way to track long-term pity across reruns is to use a reputable third-party pity tracker, or keep a manual log of your pulls after every banner. Most third-party trackers use the official HoYoverse API to pull your pull history automatically, so you don’t have to enter every pull manually, and they store your data forever so you can check your pity for any rerun at any time. Just make sure you only use widely trusted trackers to avoid risking your account security.
If you don’t want to use a third-party tool, keeping a simple note on your phone with your pity count for each banner type works just as well. If you’re 10 or fewer pulls away from pity, it’s almost always worth saving enough Jades to hit that pity before the banner ends, even if you’re also interested in an upcoming character. You’re far more likely to get a 5-star in those last 10 pulls than you are to get a 5-star early on a new banner, so you’ll usually come out ahead by finishing the pity you already started.
Smart Pulling Strategies That Use Pity Carry Over Rules to Your Advantage
Once you understand how pity carry over works, you can use those rules to get way more of the characters you want, even if you’re a completely free-to-play player. The biggest mistake new players make is pulling on every new banner that comes out, which spreads their pulls too thin and means they rarely hit pity on any character they actually want.
Prioritize saving for characters you want most, instead of pulling on every new banner that comes out. Since pity carries over across reruns, you don’t have to rush to pull for a character during their first run if you don’t have enough Jades saved. You can wait until their rerun, and all the pulls you put in during their first run will still count toward your pity. This is especially useful if you’re a low-spender or F2P, since you only get around 60-70 pulls per patch for free.
If you lose the 50/50 on a character banner, you can safely stop pulling until their rerun, since your guaranteed rate-up status will carry over. That means the next 5-star you get on that character’s banner type will 100% be the rate-up character, no matter how long you wait between pulls. You don’t have to scramble to get enough Jades before the banner ends, because that guaranteed status will stay with you until the character reruns.
You should also avoid pulling on the permanent standard banner with paid or farmed Stellar Jades entirely. Its pity is completely separate from limited banners, and you can get all the standard 5-star characters from 50/50 losses on limited character banners anyway. Save all your Jades for limited character banners, where your pity progress carries over and you can target the specific characters you actually want to add to your team.
At the end of the day, getting a clear answer to does pity carry over in Honkai Star Rail is one of the easiest ways to get more of the characters you love without spending extra money. You don’t have to stress about missing a character’s first run, or wasting pulls because you didn’t know your pity was already close to a 5-star. Just track your pulls regularly, plan ahead for your favorite characters’ reruns, and you’ll build your dream team in no time, no luck required.
