You’re hitting shots. You’re finally on a heater in Warzone or ranked play, and suddenly, the game just breaks. Not a crash—something weirder. Your matchmaking takes ten minutes. When you finally get a match, the ping is hovering around 200ms. Everyone in the lobby is either a blatant "spin-botting" cheater or they’re screaming at each other in the text chat about being "shadowed." This is the Activision underworld. It sucks.
If you’re wondering how to do a call of duty shadow ban check, you’ve probably already realized that the game doesn't send you a polite little notification. No pop-up says "Hey, we think you're suspicious." Instead, you're tossed into a purgatory where the matchmaking system isolates you from the general population while a manual review happens in the background. It’s frustrating because it often hits legitimate players who just happened to have a high-kill game that triggered a wave of salty reports from the losing team.
The Official Activision Appeal Portal
Honestly, the only way to know for sure—and I mean 100% for sure—is to go straight to the source. Don't trust third-party websites that claim they can "scan" your account for a fee. Those are scams. Every single one of them.
You need to head over to the Activision Support "Appeal a Ban" page. This is the one-stop-shop for a call of duty shadow ban check. Log in with your Battle.net, Steam, or console credentials. Once you’re in, you’ll see a button to "Agree and Continue." Don't worry, you aren't actually appealing a permanent ban yet. You’re just looking at your account status.
If it says "Under Review," you are officially shadow-banned.
It’s a specific status. It means your account is being looked at by the Ricochet Anti-Cheat team. Usually, this happens because of a high volume of "Malicious Reporting." If you’re a good player, you’ve probably been threatened with reports by someone you tucked in a building. Unfortunately, if enough people do it in a short window, the automated system flags you. Your status might also show as "No Ban Detected," which means your lag issues might actually just be your crappy router or your ISP having a meltdown.
Why Ricochet Thinks You’re Cheating
The system isn't perfect. We know this. Activision’s Ricochet anti-cheat uses a mix of kernel-level drivers and server-side heuristics. Basically, it’s looking for software like Wallhacks or Aimbots, but it’s also looking for patterns. If your accuracy jumps from 15% to 45% overnight, the "Mitigation" systems kick in.
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Sometimes, it isn't even about how you play. It's about what is on your PC.
Software like DS4Windows, certain RGB lighting controllers, or even high-polling rate mouse software has been known to trigger flags. I’ve seen people get shadowed just for having a virtual machine (VM) open for work in the background. The system sees something "hooking" into the game’s memory and panics. It doesn’t instantly ban you—because it isn't sure—so it puts you in the shadow realm instead.
There is also the "Trust Score" factor. Newer accounts are way more likely to get hit with a shadow ban than an account that has been active since the original Modern Warfare 2019. If you’re on a fresh "smurf" account and you’re dropping 20 kills in a lobby of casuals, Ricochet is going to pull the fire alarm.
How Long Does the Shadow Ban Last?
The waiting is the worst part.
Most shadow bans last exactly seven days. Some get cleared in 48 hours, while others can stretch to two weeks if there’s a major update or a holiday weekend slowing down the review team. There is no way to speed this up. Submitting a support ticket won't help. The support agents you talk to via chat or email don't actually have access to the security team's tools. They will give you a scripted response about "security protocols."
Just stop playing on that account for a week.
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Some people try to play through it. I wouldn't. The lobbies you get into while under review are filled with actual, rage-hacking cheaters. If you’re in those lobbies and you accidentally end up on the same team as a cheater, or you get reported again while in that state, it could potentially complicate the review process. Go play something else. Catch up on your Steam backlog. Let the system do its thing.
Clearing the Confusion: Shadow vs. Permanent
Let's be clear about the terminology because it gets messy in the forums.
A shadow ban is "Under Review." You can still open the game. You can still look at your skins. You just can't find a match with a normal ping. A permanent ban is the "Game Over" screen. That’s when you log in and see a message saying you’ve been "Permanently Banned" for unauthorized software or data manipulation. If you see that, a call of duty shadow ban check is pointless. You’re already cooked.
What about "Limited Matchmaking"?
This is the newer term Activision uses. It’s effectively the same thing. They’ve moved away from the community-coined "shadow ban" and started using "Limited Matchmaking" in their internal dashboards. It’s a softer way of saying you’re in the timeout corner.
Steps to Fix Your Account Status
If you’ve checked the portal and you are under review, you have to do some digital house-cleaning while you wait for the timer to expire. You want to make sure that when you do get un-shadowed, you don't immediately bounce back in.
- Check for "Bloatware": Uninstall anything that messes with game files. This includes "performance boosters," skin changers (which are an instant perma-ban anyway), and certain macro software for your keyboard.
- Verify Game Files: Whether you are on Steam or Battle.net, run a repair. Sometimes a corrupted file can look like a modified file to the anti-cheat.
- Two-Factor Authentication (2FA): Enable this. Sometimes accounts get shadowed because they were compromised. If someone in another country logged into your account and tried to cheat, Activision might have flagged the IP jump and the "sus" gameplay.
- Stop "Geofencing": If you use a Netduma router or specific VPN settings to try and get "bot lobbies" in certain regions, turn them off. Manipulating matchmaking is a gray area that can lead to account flags.
The Loop: Why Some People Get Shadowed Constantly
There is a subset of players stuck in a "Shadow Ban Loop." It’s a nightmare.
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You wait seven days, you get cleared, you play three games, you get a 5-on-1 clutch, and—boom—disconnected from server, back under review. This happens because your account's "Trust Factor" is bottomed out. The system has decided you are a high-risk user.
The only way out of the loop is usually to play "legit" and "quiet" for a few weeks. This means avoiding high-kill games (crazy, I know), not talking in chat to avoid reports, and staying away from any controversial playstyles. It’s a miserable way to play a shooter, but it’s the only way to convince the automated system that you aren't a threat.
Final Realities of the Check
Don't panic. If you haven't cheated, 99% of shadow bans end with the account being cleared. It’s a flawed system designed to protect the majority of the player base at the expense of a few high-skill outliers and some unlucky innocents.
Check the portal once a day. If it’s been more than 14 days and you’re still "Under Review," then you might have a bigger issue, but for the vast majority of people, you’re just sitting in a digital waiting room.
Actionable Next Steps
- Visit the official Activision Ban Appeal page immediately to verify your account status.
- Document the date the review started so you can track the typical 7-day window.
- Audit your background processes and disable any overlays or peripheral software that might be interacting with the game memory.
- Switch to a console if you are a PC player constantly getting shadowed; the "Trust Factor" on PlayStation and Xbox is significantly higher than on PC.