If you’re looking for your next hit of double experience in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, you’re not alone. While developer Treyarch frequently runs double XP weekends for the most recent Call of Duty game, not every player can take advantage of the full event.

When the weekend is over, players are often left looking for ways to keep the speedy XP gain they grew accustomed to. The solution is double XP tokens, which can help gamers level up their player level, weapon levels and battle pass tiers twice as fast.

Many players have an ample supply of Black Ops 7 double XP tokens, thanks to the carryover from previous Call of Duty games. But if you’re a new player, you might feel like you’re falling behind on leveling during Black Ops 7 Season 1 Reloaded. If you know where to look, there are giveaways and promotions that will help you get a head start in the latest Call of Duty game.

With more unlockable guns and melee weapons to catch up on than ever before, and the introduction of the new XP-based Warzone Armory, players will be benefiting from double weapon XP across their entire Call of Duty account.

If you don’t know how to get more double XP tokens to keep leveling up quickly after double XP weekends, we’re here to help. Here’s every way you can use double XP tokens in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 right now.

Can you use double XP tokens on Double XP Weekend?

Black Ops 7 and Warzone players aren’t able to activate double XP tokens during a double XP weekend. When attempting to open the double XP token menu to activate your tokens, they’ll be grayed out and unable to be interacted with for the duration of the event.

Any double XP time that players had activated before the double XP weekend will be frozen and will reactivate once the universal double XP boost comes to an end.

How to earn free XP tokens in Black Ops 7

Most of the ways to earn Black Ops 7’s double XP tokens involve microtransactions or external marketing campaigns, but there are still some ways to earn the boosts without spending a single cent.

Multiplayer prestige

While there are no double XP tokens available for reaching new prestiges in Black Ops 7, there’s still a roundabout way to earn double XP tokens by prestiging your Black Ops 6 account.

Reaching max rank and choosing to prestige your account is the most reliable way to earn double XP tokens in Black Ops 6. Each time you enter a new prestige level, you’ll be rewarded with a 1-hour token for double player XP. Since there are 10 player prestige levels, you can gain a maximum of 10 hours’ worth of double XP tokens through the prestige system — these tokens are automatically carried forward to Black Ops 7, where you can use them in the multiplayer, zombies and Endgame modes.

Seasonal battle pass

As Black Ops 7 enters Season 1 Reloaded, we know that the battle pass will offer double player XP and double weapon XP tokens on multiple unlockable tiers. The premium battle pass requires a Call of Duty point investment from players, but there are double XP tokens on free battle pass tiers that anyone can earn by just playing the game.

Giveaways through official channels

Occasionally, codes for double XP tokens are shared on official Call of Duty communication channels. The best social media account to watch is the Call of Duty X account, which usually runs giveaways before big Black Ops 7 update announcements. It’s worth keeping an eye on Call of Duty’s social media pages to spot future double XP token giveaways.

Paying for XP tokens in Black Ops 7

Opening your wallet and shelling out some cash is the quickest way to nab some double XP tokens to level up your Call of Duty gameplay. These are the most reliable ways to secure some tokens for your account.

Microtransactions

Double XP tokens are included in certain purchasable bundles in Black Ops 7. Bundles contain player and weapon skins, but also include a variety of double player XP and double weapon XP tokens that you can activate as you play Black Ops 7 game modes.

External promotions

Call of Duty is partnered with external brands, including Monster Energy and Little Caesars, which can bring special campaigns to Black Ops 7 players. Buying products from these brands and redeeming reward codes allows gamers to earn Call of Duty Points, exclusive operator skins, weapon skins, weapon blueprints, weapon vinyls, calling cards and emblems. Most importantly, you’ll have a chance to earn double XP tokens to use in the multiplayer and zombies modes in Black Ops 7. There’s currently a Monster Energy promotion running for Black Ops 7 — we’ve included the details below.

How to earn Black Ops 7 double XP tokens now

Monster Energy has partnered with Call of Duty to put together a promotion that will look very familiar to Black Ops 6 fans. Specially marked cans of Monster Energy include codes that unlock Black Ops 7 rewards, including operator skins, weapon blueprints, decals and sweet, sweet double XP tokens. Here’s the order in which you’ll earn Call of Duty Black Ops 7 rewards by redeeming Monster Energy codes.

• Energy Flash decal and 15-minute double XP token unlocked with the first code.

• Peacekeeper MK1 Hyper Green weapon blueprint and 15-minute double XP token unlocked with the second code.
• Green Fury operator skin and 15-minute double XP token unlocked with the third code.
• VS Recon Green Thunder weapon blueprint and 15-minute double XP token unlocked with the fourth code.
• Daylight Ripper operator skin and 15-minute double XP token unlocked with the fifth code.

There are no unique cosmetic rewards to be gained after redeeming the first five codes, but that doesn’t mean you’re out of luck. Every subsequent code redemption unlocks an additional 15-minute double XP token to use on your Black Ops 7 account. These promotional codes must be used by March 31 in order to provide the rewards listed above.

When in doubt, use your Black Ops 6 double XP tokens

Black Ops 7 players are able to use any double XP tokens and GobbleGums they kept from Black Ops 6 — so take advantage of that carry forward and utilize these tokens now.

Double XP tokens don’t necessarily carry over forever — Modern Warfare 3 double XP tokens never properly carried over to Black Ops 6 and were only accessible through a Warzone activation loophole. No skins and cosmetics carried over from Black Ops 6 to Black Ops 7. It’s entirely up to Activision whether you’ll keep your double XP tokens for the next Call of Duty game that comes out.

It might be worth using your hoard of Black Ops 6 and Black Ops 7 double XP tokens early and often, just in case they don’t carry over to the next game in the series.

Black Ops 7 double XP token FAQs

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is a tough one. The blue group is a bit funny, once you recognize the connection. If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Leading the pack.

Green group hint: Football division.

Blue group hint: Like Bridges or Goldblum.

Purple group hint: Blast off.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: In No. 1 position.

Green group: AFC East teams.

Blue group: Jeffs.

Purple group: Rockets.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is in No. 1 position. The four answers are first, front, lead and pole.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is AFC East teams. The four answers are Buffalo, Miami, New England and New York.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is Jeffs. The four answers are Bagwell, Kent, Saturday and Van Gundy.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is Rockets. The four answers are Clemens, Houston, Richard and Toledo.

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

After Verizon suffered a widespread, all-day outage this week that affected potentially 2 million customers, the cause still remains elusive. The company is offering a $20 credit to impacted customers, which appears to be trickling out via text message and in the myVerizon app.

Verizon hasn’t responded to a request for clarity about what happened. It did say that the problem was a «software issue» and that there was no indication of a «cybersecurity issue» in a statement to Mashable Thursday morning.

The loss in service was unique for its longevity. Unlike previous cellular outages, this one wasn’t region-specific and affected users across the US. When natural disasters take down cellular towers or hardware failures happen, the effects are felt in specific cities or areas. We saw reports (and CNET staffers chimed in) of service being down in New York, New Jersey, Florida, Hawaii, California and other spots.

Until Verizon shares more information, we can piece together some possibilities.

Analyst Roger Entner of Recon Analytics, a telecommunications research firm, suspects that a feature update went awry, based on how devices were affected. «It looks like their 5G SA (Standalone) core went down during a minor feature change,» he wrote to CNET.

Entner noted that the outage was limited to new high-end devices in selected markets where Verizon’s 5G SA core is deployed, which is why the outage wasn’t felt everywhere. The term 5G SA core refers to a network that uses only 5G technology and doesn’t rely on older 4G LTE infrastructure.

Entner also suggested the outage’s timing was unusual. «When carriers do massive upgrades, they do that between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. in the morning,» he said, suggesting that it could be due to an input error or automatic failure. «A noon start for the crash indicates ‘fat fingers’ for a smaller change that cascaded through the system.»

Lee W. McKnight, an Associate Professor at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies, believes the problem originated with a failed update to a Virtual Network Function (VNF), leading to «data overflows/cascading failures of other VNFs that were collateral damage from the first failure,» he wrote in an email exchange.

That also explains, McKnight theorizes, why many customers reported that their service resumed temporarily, only to fail again. «Like an engine stalling out, if all Verizon VNFs are not in sync [or] well orchestrated, the network is off-key,» he said.

A VNF is a virtualized service running on cloud platforms, versus on dedicated hardware. For this reason, McKnight’s proposed solution moving forward is that the big carriers need to provide more paid training for its technical staff «in what they are now: cloud software engineers,» he said.

Although we can’t confirm a specific cause for this outage, many Reddit commenters (some who claim to have worked at Verizon) lay some of the blame on Verizon’s recent layoffs that removed roughly 13,000 employees, many of them highly technical engineers with years of experience. Some discussions online speculate on what are frequent causes for network outages, like infrastructure damage, technical glitches or server failures, among others. 

This is a developing story. Follow all of CNET’s Verizon news for more about the network outage.