Free Fire has brought back its NARUTO SHIPPUDEN collaboration with Chapter One: Nine Tails Strikes, which runs from September 16 to October 15, 2026, and the headline addition to the returning Hidden Leaf Village is the Ninja Academy. This guide explains where to find the Ninja Academy, how to use Naruto’s swing for its movement speed boost, what is inside the classrooms, and how to turn your short time in the village into a better landing and loot plan.

What Is the Ninja Academy in Free Fire

The Ninja Academy is a new landmark that Garena added to the Hidden Leaf Village in the OB55 update. In the NARUTO series, it is the school where generations of ninjas, including Naruto Uzumaki, Sasuke Uchiha, and Sakura Haruno, began their training, and Garena built the Free Fire version around that history. According to the official collaboration announcement, players can explore the academy’s classrooms, visit the Chunin Written Exam Room, and use Naruto’s iconic swing, which grants a gameplay buff.

The Hidden Leaf Village itself first arrived in Free Fire during the January 2025 collaboration, when it was rebuilt on Bermuda in place of Rim Nam Village. The 2026 return keeps the familiar village setting and expands it with the academy, making the academy the main new location of this chapter. Because it is tied to the collaboration, the Ninja Academy should be treated as limited-time content that is available until October 15, 2026, rather than a permanent part of the game.

Where to Find the Ninja Academy

The Ninja Academy is located inside the Hidden Leaf Village, and in OB55 the Hidden Leaf Village serves as the default cabin on all maps. The cabin is the pre-match area where you load in with your squad before boarding the plane, so every Battle Royale match during the event starts in the village. To reach the academy, start a Battle Royale match and explore the village before the countdown ends. Garena’s patch notes describe this space as the place to meet up with teammates before the match starts, have a bowl of ramen, or hop on the swing at the Ninja Academy.

You can confirm you are in the right place by the Nine Tails Strikes label under the minimap in the top-left corner of the screen. The minimap shows the Battle Royale map and the plane’s flight path rather than the village, so use your camera and the village streets to navigate. The swing is the easiest landmark to look for, since Garena places it directly in front of the academy at the school gate. No official or reliable third-party source pinpoints where the academy sits relative to the cabin spawn point, so expect your first few visits to involve some exploring.

How Long You Get in the Cabin

The biggest challenge with the Ninja Academy is time. The cabin shows a countdown at the top of the screen, and once the lobby fills up, the match moves to the plane within seconds. If you load in while the lobby is still filling, the timer gives you noticeably longer to explore, while a full lobby can leave you with only a few seconds. Since you cannot pause the countdown, the best approach is to decide what you want from the village before you queue. If you are relatively new to the Battle Royale experience and want to understand the foundational mechanics before jumping out of the plane, we highly recommend reading this Free Fire Beginner’s Guide and Tips to help you survive your first few drops.

• Head straight for the swing first, since it is the only confirmed gameplay reward in the academy area.
• Use any remaining time to open the full map, where Revival Points and Vending Machines are now displayed while you are in the cabin.
• Explore the classrooms and the Chunin Written Exam Room only when the countdown still has plenty of time left.
• Group up with your squad near the academy so you can agree on a landing spot before the plane departs.

How to Use Naruto’s Swing for a Movement Speed Boost

Naruto’s swing is an interactable object in front of the Ninja Academy, at the school gate. In the anime, it is the swing a young Naruto sits on alone outside the academy, which is why Garena’s store description frames it as a way to relive iconic anime moments. In gameplay terms, interacting with the swing grants a permanent 5% movement speed boost, according to the OB55 patch notes.

Garena does not explain exactly what permanent covers. Because the cabin leads directly into the match, the most reasonable reading, and the one third-party guides use, is that the boost lasts for the whole of that match rather than being an account-wide upgrade. This means you need to use the swing again in each new match to get the bonus.

A 5% increase sounds small, but movement speed affects almost everything in Free Fire, from how quickly you reach cover after landing to how fast you rotate toward the safe zone and how easily you escape a losing fight. It costs only a few seconds in the cabin, so it is worth grabbing whenever the countdown allows.

Classroom Secrets: Inside the Classrooms and the Chunin Written Exam Room

Beyond the swing, the Ninja Academy contains two interior areas that Garena highlights: the classrooms and the Chunin Written Exam Room. The classrooms recreate the place where Naruto and his classmates trained as academy students. The Chunin Written Exam Room references the first stage of the Chunin Exams in the series, the written test that Naruto and his team sat early in the original NARUTO story.

It is worth being clear about what these rooms offer. Garena’s announcement and patch notes describe them as areas to explore, and neither source lists any loot, buff, collectible, or hidden interaction inside them. No reliable guide has documented an Easter egg in the classrooms either. In practical terms, the real secret of the academy is that the swing outside is the only part of the building with a confirmed gameplay effect.

One genuine hidden interaction does exist in this collaboration, but it is not in the academy. Garena added a hidden interaction to the event interface inspired by Hinata’s Twin Lion Fists technique and the Byakugan, so if you are hunting for secrets, the event page is where Garena has confirmed one. To see how you can maximize the unique abilities of the game’s diverse roster alongside your ninja training, take a look at our Garena Free Fire Complete Character Guide to find the perfect skill synergy for your playstyle.

Best Loot Spots: Planning Your Drop From the Hidden Leaf Village

The Ninja Academy is not a looting location, because the Hidden Leaf Village cabin comes before the match and no loot has been confirmed there. Where the academy does help is planning. OB55 made the Battle Royale map more useful while you wait in the cabin, as Revival Points and Vending Machines are now displayed on the map before you board, and recommended drop points for areas outside the plane’s direct flight path are shown more clearly. Checking these while you stand near the academy lets you land with a plan instead of choosing a spot mid-air.

The Nine Tails Strikes event also changes where the best loot appears in each match. At the start of a match, Nine Tails can trigger one of several events, and two of them create strong loot opportunities on Bermuda. The table below summarizes the event-related and OB55 loot sources worth planning around.

The Arsenal and crater events depend on which event Nine Tails triggers, so watch the start of each match before committing to a route. If Nine Tails sets the plane on fire instead, all players are forced to eject once the countdown ends, which can cut a planned flight short. Midway through the match, Sharingan: Control also appears on the map. Capturing it lets you choose an area for Nine Tails to hit with a Tailed Beast Bomb, which deals 60 explosive damage within a 100m radius after a five-second warning, making it a strong way to clear enemies away from a loot area you want to take.

The Ramen Shop and Other Hidden Leaf Village Sights

The Ninja Academy shares the cabin with the rest of the Hidden Leaf Village, including a ramen shop marked by a large ramen bowl sign. Garena’s patch notes invite players to enjoy a steaming bowl of ramen before the match. In the January 2025 version of the collaboration, eating at Ichiraku Ramen Shop gave an EP auto-grow buff that lasted throughout the match. The OB55 patch notes do not list a ramen buff for this chapter, however, so treat the ramen shop as part of the scenery unless the game shows you otherwise when you interact with it.

The collaboration also changes the soundtrack around the village. Blue Bird plays during the parachuting phase, and the NARUTO Main Theme serves as the collaboration lobby music.

The Hidden Leaf Village in Clash Squad

The Hidden Leaf Village is not limited to the cabin. OB55 also brings it into Clash Squad, alongside a set of ninja-themed changes to the mode.

• The Hidden Leaf Village joins the Clash Squad map pool.
• Ninjutsu and kunai can be bought in the CS Store.
• Pistols are replaced by shurikens in the first round.
• Cyber Airdrops are replaced by Ninjutsu Scroll Airdrops.

Garena has not confirmed whether the Ninja Academy building appears in the Clash Squad version of the village, and one third-party guide notes that the map presentation is not identical across modes. If you land on the Hidden Leaf Village in Clash Squad, it is worth checking, because a full CS match gives you far more time in the village than the cabin countdown does.

The Ninja Academy is the standout addition to the Hidden Leaf Village in the Nine Tails Strikes chapter of Free Fire, but it rewards players who know what to look for. It sits in the pre-match cabin, its swing gives a 5% movement speed boost, and its classrooms and Chunin Written Exam Room are there for fans to explore rather than to loot. Use your cabin time to grab the swing buff, check Revival Points and Vending Machines on the map, and plan around Nine Tails events for your loot, and the academy becomes a small but real advantage before every match until the event ends on October 15. For the best gaming experience, play Free Fire on BlueStacks!