Addons

Addons provide an avenue to tweak and improve the experience of playing Rift by filling UI and features that are not available in the default game.

In general, you can find Addons in a variety of databases. I recommend you browse through both CurseForge and RiftUI to check out the variety of addons available.

Note: As a general rule, for a lot of these addons you will want to check the download pages for their most recent version, especially on addons which are constantly updated to remain relevant to new game content updates.

Below is a list of addons that I would recommend using:

General

Gadgets
Gadgets is not so much a single addon, but a collection of addons and a hub, like the ‘Widgets’ concept for individual addons. The base Gadgets addon includes a large variety of ‘gadgets’ including a Cast Bar, Charge Meter, Combo Points, CPU Monitor, replacement Raid Frames, FPS Monitor, DPS meter, Range Finder and replacement Unit Frames.
There’s also a lot of individual authors who have created other Gadgets on top of the ones provided in the base addon.
You should definitely check this addon out as it adds quite a variety of useful UI addons and replacement addons.

Gadgets: Outfitter
With the introduction of F2P, Trion has made the total number of roles/specs you can have on your character at 20. That’s a lot when you start including loadequip # + role # macros and things start to look a little crazy. Will you have enough macro slots for each? What about hotkey bars? Luckily, Gadgets: Outfitter allows you to place additional button bars which will load up your role and equipment for each role. It is highly customisable and equipment can even be retrieved from your Wardrobe slots, saving a ton of space in your inventory bags!

Note: Requires Gadgets.

Gadgets: Currency
If you’re the type who constantly checks how much of any currency you have as you work your way towards a new upgrade, it can be annoying clicking on the Currency button every time you wish to check and end up overwhelmed by the huge amount of currency listed. Gadgets: Currency makes things easier by providing a small transparent icon of your currency plus its amount in small font. You can move each individual currency UI frame and can choose which currencies you wish to display.

Note: Requires Gadgets.

Carnage Book
Rift introduced Carnages with the Storm Legion expansion, adding in achievements for each zone for completing all Carnages. If you are a completionist looking to complete all Carnages but just can’t seem to find which carnages you are missing, than this is the addon for you! Carnage Book provides a list of all missing carnage quests based on your current zone in your chat window with a simple “/carnage” command to put you on the correct path.

Quest Finder
Quest Finder provides a list of all missing quests in your current zone so that you can make sure you’re completing all your quests and working towards those zone-quest-completion achievements!

RareDar
Are you an avid Rare Mob hunter, looking to complete those huge meta-achieves? RareDar is an addon that provides you with a list of all rares in any particular zone – their known spawn locations are shown and the ‘radar’ icon turns green with a number next to it to indicate any rares nearby. Very useful.

Combat (DPS) Meter

Combat/DPS/HPS Meters are a staple of MMORPGs. If you want to know how much damage per second or healing per second you are doing, you’ll want a dps meter. There are some really advanced and detailed trackers that will detail down to the second how many times you’ve used a particular ability and at one time, to more simpler meters that – for the most part – simply displays your dps/hps. Which one will suite you will depend on your playing style, the content you are playing and whether you are a min/maxer or just someone looking to kill that open world mob a little faster.

Simple Meter Continued
Simple Meter Continued is a continuation of Simple Meter by Joraster. The meter provides a UI window on your screen that displays the DPS and HPS of yourself and players around you who are actively in combat as well as from enemy mobs. As the name suggests, it is a very simple meter. It can toggle between showing top 5, yourself only, total only and all players and mobs and hovering over a number will show a % breakdown of abilities contributing to a person’s dps/hps. It is simple meter perfect for someone just getting started in Rift who is just looking for a quick comparison between players. It is not as useful for a min/maxer looking to elk out as much dps/hps as possible, although some people will use this in tandem with ACT (Advanced Combat Tracker).

Super Meter
Super Meter is another dps/hps meter but that provides a lot more detail than what Simple Meter does. Session times can be managed and combined, and the meter also tracks shield absorbs and full pet tracking.
If you’re looking for a more beefier in-game combat meter without the complexity of ACT, this addon will do the job.

Rift Meter
Rift Meter is another dps/hps meter, but provides more detail than both Simple Meter and Super Meter. If you just check this image that shows how to navigate through the combat meter in-game, you’ll see how detailed it can be in such a small window. You can save and cycle through different fight encounters, which provides a quick way to compare different instances of different fights with damage and percentage breakdowns of each ability used. You can check everything from damage done to overkill done for each individual player or mob and can even show the damage done by a player for a particular target. It even has a death log that will show you the damage/healing taken for the last 10 seconds before a person dies as a record of what possibly killed them.

If you want something beefy without touching the combat log or an external program/website – this is your best bet.

Advanced Combat Tracker (ACT)
Although not an addon because this is an external program, if you’re going to talk about combat meters/parsing, you’ll have to include Advanced Combat Tracker (ACT). This combat log parser is used in a variety of MMORPGs including Rift and provides extremely detailed information on pretty much everything your combat log tracks. DPS and HPS information, individual breakdowns of ability use and percentages including the exact times they are used, crit percentages, number of crits per ability, damage done to each target by a player, the percentage of damage done based on ability, buff uptime, buff time starts and finishes. Pretty much everything.

Make sure to follow the instructions on the website in order to properly set things up, including downloading not only the main program but also the Rift Parsing Plugin on the download page.

Hypatia Combat Log Viewer
Hypatia Combat Log viewer provides tables with damage breakdowns including crit %s, no. of crits, damage percentages by ability and other features for each player in a group or raid, including mobs. It will also show you a breakdown of damage and healing taken.
There are charts which map out damage at any point in time for each target, and you can pick and choose which players to compare. This can be very useful in comparing players using the same specs with the same responsibilities in a boss encounter and seeing at what points in the fight they differ in their dps. It can also give you a good indication of when buffs start and drop off so you can better time your hardest-hitting abilities for that particular boss encounter.

Hypatia also has other features, like a ‘Fail tracker’ which shows for some boss encounters who has been hit by certain boss abilities. This can help you keep track of who has failed an ability that needs to be avoided and who needs to improve on their raid awareness.

Although it has less features than ACT, Hypatia does have the benefit of being viewable by either the public, or private access with viewing permissions given to people (such as your raid/guild) without the requirement of a program (besides an internet browser!). Some guilds may look at using both Hypatia and ACT. ACT for themselves, and Hypatia for the rest of the guild, especially those who don’t know how to use ACT.

Raiding

When you start to get into running expert dungeons and progressing through Rift’s extensive raid content, you may see yourself looking for some more beefier addons.

King Boss Mods (KBM)
King Boss Mods (commonly referred to as “KBM”) is the main dungeon/raiding addon that the vast majority of raiders use. It provides timers, on-screen flashing alerts, mechanic spy, health monitors, tank swap monitors and other useful UI mods for each dungeon and raid boss encounter in the game.

KBM’s alerts, timers and other mechanic-related UI mods are highly customisable and you can adjust colors, UI layout, size and other features across the board or even on an individual boss encounter level.

KBM also brings with it a Rez Master that lists those with battle resurrection skills and their cooldown timers, as well as ReadyCheck, which provides a list detailing each party/raid members’ raid consumables, ready status, soul vitality, planar protection and feast use. It even gives a flashing icon warning for raid members who have less than 10min left on their consumes.

As well as the base KBM addon, KBM also includes two Plug-Ins, KBM MarkIt and KBM Add Watch.

>>KBM Mark-It
KBM MarkIt is a Plug-In that provides a UI mod that adds a list of all marked targets. You can customise this list as you see fit in terms of which Mark Numbers and Mark Icons you choose to display.
With this addon you can easily check the names and health of all targets marked by your raid leader or by a raid assistant and can interact with this list by clicking on a marked target’s name on this list in order to target them.
I.e., instead of using a macro to target a marked target, or having to manually click on the target (who could be behind a bunch of other targets, making manually targeting difficult), you can instead click on the target on this list to target them.

>>KBM AddWatch
KBM AddWatch is another Plug-in for KBM that adds small frames on your screen that will show the name, health and cast bars of any hostile mobs currently targeted by yourself or a party/raid member. This addon is useful on fights where you need to pay attention to the health of multiple mobs.

KaruulAlert
If you’re finding keeping track of raid buffs, tank debuffs and specific debuffs is becoming a little difficult let alone your own buffs and cooldowns, than KaruulAlert is for you! The UI addon tracks cooldowns, buffs and debuffs on yourself, your target, focus target, enemies and allies alike and is highly customisable in terms of font, size, placement and what abilities it tracks and on who it tracks. You can set the addon up so that it tracks different things based on the role/spec you are in, and you can arrange it so that it automatically switches ‘sets’ to match your role/spec.

This addon can be invaluable in ensuring you maximise your dps and hps, especially when you are using a spec with tons of different cooldowns or dots/hots to keep track of.

Class-Specific

There are a select few class or role-specific addons that you may be interested in.

Click Box Healer
Click Box Healer overwrites the default raid frames in the game and instead replaces it with one that allows for automatic mouseover ability use as well as a better view of debuffs and the aggro status of party/raid members.
You’ll quickly find that the default raid frames are limited in how many debuffs it can show at once. Your tanks will often have more debuffs on them than can be shown on their raid frame, and this can cause issues if a boss encounter has certain abilities that must be dispelled.

The mouseover use of abilities/macros on the frames is a godsend for saving up on the limited macro space in the game as you won’t have to create a mouseover macro for all your heals, cooldowns and cleanses.

DefilerFG
DefilerFG is a UI addon for Defilers (a Cleric soul) that displays in a small transparent box the 4 different Defiler Links, their target’s names, a health bar for each and a Foul Growth icon for each Foul Growth stack on the linked target. This addon is invaluable for a Defiler to ensure that you know exactly how many stacks of Foul Growth you have on each of your linked targets, as well as who those targets are. You’re just making it harder for yourself without this addon.
Would love to see the author add a timer to see how long before a target’s Foul Growth stacks disappear/is triggered – but that can be added later.

SynthesisSpy
SynthesisSpy is a UI addon that adds a small UI frame which shows both the name of the mage that casts the skill Synthesis as well as the target player (generally a tank). This addon can be very useful to Chloromancers (a Mage soul) when switching Synthesis on tank-swaps.

The above addons are the main ones I see people using (as well as ones I use or would recommend using). There are quite a few addons out there and you should spend some time browsing through them to see if any pique your interest.

CurseForge and RiftUI are the main Rift addon databases.