An inhibitor has 4000 health, 20 armor and no magic resist at all, and breaking a second one buys you minions rather than access. Here's how ending a game actually works.
League of Legends Guide
Inhibitors
How Games EndInhibitors are the least examined buildings in the game, which is odd, because everything about closing out a win runs through them.
They have unusual stats, they change what your damage type is worth, they gate the Nexus in a way most players get wrong, and they heal back on a clock that doesn't line up with the pressure they created.
4000 health, 20 armor, no magic resist at all
It also regenerates 15 health a second, which is the number nobody accounts for. Half-killing an inhibitor and walking away achieves almost nothing, and the walk back is longer than the regeneration takes.
The zero magic resist is the more useful half. A team with real ability power in it kills inhibitors far faster than the health bar suggests, before anybody spends a single point on penetration.
Your build decides what your autos count as
An unmodified basic attack against a structure counts your base attack damage, your bonus attack damage and 60% of your ability power. If that ability power share is bigger than your bonus attack damage, the entire hit lands as magic damage instead of physical.
Against a building with no magic resist, that's the same rule paying you twice. It's why a mage who has been auto attacking an inhibitor takes it down surprisingly quickly.
Penetration, meanwhile, does nothing here. Armor penetration has no effect on an inhibitor's armor, so the 20 is 20 no matter what you built. Turrets are the exception and do read penetration, which catches people who learned the rule on one and applied it to the other. The champion who melts frontline in a teamfight is often not the champion who should be leading the siege.
One inhibitor is enough to open the Nexus
The gating runs in a chain, and each link is absolute rather than a matter of durability:
| What's standing | What that protects |
|---|---|
| An inhibitor turret | Its inhibitor is invulnerable. Kill the turret and the inhibitor is immediately open, with nothing else in the way |
| Either Nexus turret | The Nexus itself |
| All three inhibitors | The Nexus turrets, and therefore the Nexus |
Break a single inhibitor and the Nexus turrets become killable, then the Nexus follows. Teams routinely take two or three when one would have done, which costs time they didn't have to spend.
An inhibitor turret is therefore not just another tower. It's the last gate, and losing one is a much bigger event than losing the tower in front of it was.
The second and third are about minions
A broken inhibitor replaces that lane's siege minion with a super minion. Break all three and every lane gets two super minions per wave, which is the point where the defending team stops being able to leave their base at all.
That escalation is the actual argument for taking more than one. Not access to the Nexus, which you already had, but the fact that the enemy can no longer send anybody anywhere.
Two clocks that don't line up
A broken inhibitor spawns a super minion for the next eight waves and heals itself back after five minutes. Those numbers don't match, so the last couple of waves before it returns usually arrive with nothing special in them.
That gap belongs to the defending team. The pressure ends slightly before the building does, and that's the window where a base gets cleaned up.
The announcer's respawn warning is a fixed fifteen-second countdown, with a glowing gauge running around the destroyed base for the duration. Both teams hear it. Attacking, it's your cue to commit or leave. Defending, it's exactly how long you have to survive.
All three inhibitors standing is itself enough to protect the Nexus. So if you broke exactly one and it heals back while you're mid-swing on the Nexus, the building becomes invulnerable underneath you. Check the gauge before you commit to the last hit.
One last oddity: whoever lands the killing blow on an inhibitor takes 50 gold and everybody else who helped gets nothing. It's a strange payout for the most important building on the map, and worth remembering the next time somebody gets flamed for stealing one. There was nothing there to steal.
Frequently asked questions
How much health does an inhibitor have?
4000, plus 15 per second of regeneration, 20 armor and no magic resist.
How many inhibitors do you need to break?
One, to expose the Nexus turrets and the Nexus. The other two are for the extra super minions.
How long until an inhibitor comes back?
Five minutes, with a fifteen-second announcer warning and a visible gauge before it returns.
Does armor penetration work on an inhibitor?
No, an inhibitor's 20 armor ignores it completely. Turrets are different and do factor penetration in.
How much gold is an inhibitor worth?
50 gold, to the last hitter only.
The short version
One inhibitor opens the Nexus, the second and third are a minion problem for the other team, and none of it survives five minutes of you being somewhere else. If your team has ability power in it, the buildings are softer than they look.
For the towers standing between you and any of this, our turrets guide covers why they refuse to fall, and our Baron guide covers the buff that makes sieging them realistic.
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