Elden Ring has a massive selection of weapons. Even if most of them are at least good, belong some clearly among the best weapons in the game. MeinMMO sorts all weapons for you in a tier list. We also tell you in detail which ones are currently at the top of the meta and why.
There are currently 309 weapons in the Elden Ring. Most of these have their own unique playstyle and can be further customized with the Ashes of War. So the perfect weapon choice can be tricky.
We will therefore tell you which weapons are currently meta and for which you should use forging stones. The selection was made based on the Souls-experienced editorial staff’s own assessments as well as the opinions gathered from the social media community and the comments on the Fextralife wiki.
This tier list is also updated regularly.
updated: This article was last updated on August 29, 2023. The rankings have not changed, but the Sword of Night and Flame has been nerfed. In addition, as of Patch 1.10 you do more damage with all weapons when you attack your opponent from behind. The bleed damage has also been nerfed but only in PvP.
3 of the best weapons in Elden Ring you get right at the beginning – Here’s how to find them
On page 1 we introduce you to the absolute weapon highlights in Elden Ring. Here is a selection of weapons in the different tiers:
We present the 3 best weapons currently in detail on this page. From page 2 we sort all known weapons for you in several tier lists, sorted by weapon type.
Here you can find the rankings by weapon category:
A notice: Not all German names of the weapons are currently known. We give the translated weapon names as far as we know them, otherwise use the English name as a proxy. We’ll update this article as soon as we know more. If you know the German name of a weapon, please let us know in the comments. Thank you!
The 3 best weapons in Elden Ring currently
Rivers of Blood – The best endgame weapon since patch 1.03
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Elden Ring: Rivers of Blood is the best weapon since patch 1.03 – find it before it’s too late!
Why is this weapon so powerful? Since patch 1.03 fixed the broken attribute scaling of some weapons, one weapon in particular has blossomed into a new star almost overnight. The katana Bloody Streams is now at the top of the meta in both PvE and PvP.
This is mainly due to 3 major strengths:
The weapon is a katana, making it one of the strongest and most flexible weapon classes in the game.
But the weapon talent “Bloody Butcher” is the real star of this show. This launches a combo of fast attacks that spray blood spatters at long range. They do damage, and they do it properly. And several great types of damage at once: high physical damage, a lot of blood loss and very high posture damage.
You can even extend this strong combo with further activations of the weapon talent. With this you do pretty much the best damage in the game in a large radius and at a considerable distance. It’s even awesome as an AoE attack and the perfect counter for even the fastest individual opponents.
While the talent’s FP consumption is quite high, the versatility and dominance of this attack is easy to overlook.
In our build guide we tell you exactly how to get the most out of this outstanding weapon:
Elden Ring: New Blood Build Dominates Every Boss And PvP – How To Play It Right
Moonveil (Moonveil) – The best weapon for the overall strongest builds
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Elden Ring: How to find the Moonveil Katana, one of the best weapons in the game
Why is this weapon so powerful? The Moonveil Katana scales with Dexterity and Intelligence. Builds that also specialize in these 2 attributes are currently among the strongest builds in the Elden Ring.
Because skill weapons, such as katanas in particular, are currently seen in the community as the best weapons in the game, and a high wisdom attribute gives you the opportunity to react flexibly to any type of opponent with powerful magic.
Essentially, the Moon Veil Katana plays like the awesome Uchigatana with magic damage. This is strong in itself, but the katana is really outstanding thanks to its weapon talent.
The Volatile Moonlight talent basically combines the strengths of the Uchigatana’s talent, Iaido, and the powerful Cinders of War: Bloody Slash. As a result, this is one of the strongest maneuvers in the game.
With the talent you change, like with the Iaido, into a special position from which an incredibly fast horizontal or vertical blow can follow. The moon veil also fires a powerful magic beam. It has long range, is fast, and destroys your opponent’s stance while dealing magic and bleed damage at the same time.
We’ll tell you the best way to create a strong magic samurai build with this weapon:
Elden Ring: The Best Build In Patch 1.03 – How To Play It
This makes the moon veil a better and more versatile version of the already great uchigatana. In addition, it scales very well and requires what is probably the strongest current build in the Elden Ring. This clearly makes the weapon one of the absolute best in the game. And if you want, you can even find the katana early in the game.
Sword of Night and Flame
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Elden Ring: How to find the Sword of Night and Flame before it gets nerfed
Why is this weapon so powerful? There are some good arguments for the Sword of Night and Flame being the most powerful weapon in Elden Ring. Their main disadvantage is the attribute requirements. Very few spells and weapons in the game use both Wisdom and Faith. That’s why builds with a combination of both are very rare and only conditionally practicable.
But the Sword of Night and Flame is so good that it single-handedly makes this niche build a meta. This is mainly due to the weapon talent, the night & flame attitude. The fact that the talent is so good probably has something to do with a bug.
With the talent you take a stance from which you can fire 2 powerful spells. A light attack from a stance creates a magical laser beam affectionately dubbed “Kamehameha” by fans. A heavy attack results in a powerful blast of flame that chars everything horizontally in front of you.
Both of these attacks consume comparatively little FP and deal massive damage. You are well prepared for this at a distance and in close combat, both against individual opponents and groups.
The sword was far too powerful a weapon when it was released and was nerfed. In a good build, however, you can still get powerful damage.
In this video you can see the weapon and action along with detailed build recommendations:
If you want to use this powerful sword, you will probably have to create your build specifically around this weapon. Fortunately, this is very easy to do with the reskill.
10 more weapons that are among the best in the game
The 3 weapons that we have presented in detail are currently the strongest in the game. But there are a few other weapons that are insanely strong. We list them briefly here for you and, if possible, also link the location in the interactive map.
These 10 weapons are sorted randomly and in no particular order:
You can find other weapons of similar quality in the ranking table on the next few pages under the S rank.
We won’t classify torches because they aren’t really used as weapons.
On page 2 we start with the tabular ranking.