Super Smash Bros Ultimate - Top Tier Best and Worst Fighters

There are over 70+ characters to choose from in Super Smash Bros Ultimate but which ones are actually the best? In this guide you'll find details highlighting the best fighters (S and A tiers), average characters and a mention of the worst characters (bottom tier).

Unlocking characters in the Switch version of Smash Bros is fairly straight forward - which is great if you want to experiment with some of the best fighters. This guide will focus on the base characters themselves, with Spirits not included in the decisions.

Like previous Smash games, the key to choosing a good character is to balance speed, power, recovery and combos. Some of the games worst characters, such as Ripley and Kirby, are simply too slow with poor recovery - it's easy to slot these into the bottom tier category. Conversely, there are a handful of great characters such as Young Link and King K Rool that instantly catch your eye thanks to their brutal power or speed, deserving their place in the top tier category.

With the release of Smash Bros on the Switch, Nintendo have buffed and nerfed many of the characters from Smash 4, shifting previous good characters to the bottom and promoting others up the list. For example, Shulk and Pikachu have had massive improvements but both Samus and Bowser have been nerfed enough to push them down to the bottom tier.

This guide was written just a week before launch and it's worth stressing that Nintendo may issue patches to fix the games most broken characters. This may move characters in and out of the tiers mentioned below. If/when a character is substantially improved or degraded, I will aim to add comments below but otherwise the guide is a great starting point for assessing the best and worst characters.

Best to Worst

Best Fighters (Top Tier)

These are the very best fighters in Ultimate. You should be using one of these if you're serious about beating opponents and maintaining your combat record. They all typically have powerful moves, quick speed, minimal lag and solid recovery.

	Name	Comments
	Sonic	Nerfed Sonic's camp features from Smash 4 but still a great character because recovery and speed are excellent. Ariel is good and smash is fulfilling
	Inkling	Solid dash, does tonnes of damage with ink, good arrows
	Young Link	Possibly the best character in the game, no lag on any of his moves
	Cloud	Edge guard is very good, pretty much the same from Smash 4 but some moves have slightly less range
	Roy	Massively buffed, better range and feels like all your moves will land
	Ike	A buffed cloud, upper is amazing, all arrows buffed and recovery is decent
	Zelda	Not the best top tier character, but her throw setup is good
	Sheik	Frame set is ridiculously good, easy tier 1
	Ryu / Ken	Changed neutral which is broken, good choice of combos and fast
	King K Rool	Ridiculous hitboxes, power, projectiles, probably the best heavy character
	Shulk	Massive improvement to all arrows, much faster, slightly better recovery
	Richter	Best zoner in the whole game, amazing projectiles
	Mewtwo	Got buffed in many ways, dash better, one of the few characters with good recovery, utility good
	Marth / Lucinda	Lucina looks very consistent, all arrows buffed
	Diddy Kong	Nerfed throws, but bananas buffed so they remain after throw, solid character
	Bayonetta	Great character with great moves, nerfed kill options but still deadly
	Olimar	Sleeper pick, recovery good, good camper
	Pikachu	Benefited the most from all changes, can camp, very versatile and great recovery

Good Fighters (Upper Tier)

There's nothing wrong with these fighters; they're above average but not stand out fighters compared to the top tier above. I've included them anyway if you want to experiment.

Mii Gunner - sleeper pick, upper looks amazing, quick
Ganondorf - faster compared to Smash 4, improved
Ness - recovery terrible but good otherwise
Snake - good until he's thrown off the level then explodes
Daisy / Peach - final smash appears broken (i.e too good) but nerfed downer and can't edge guard too well
Falkin - nerfed upper now more sideways, otherwise still solid, almost top tier
Donkey Kong - really strong, but still big
Rosalina - nerfed in Ultimate but still a good character
Fox - fast, good at juggles
Wolf - pretty good but not broken, like melee fox now
Meta Knight - tornado quicker now, solid choice
Toon Link - almost identical to Smash 4
ROB - can juggle upper, projectile can be thrown in air, plays well with recovery
Villager - can edge guard very well
Isabelle - good camper - fishing rope and trap options
Lucario - base power buffed, better across the board
Pokemon Trainer - good but not broken
Mario - still good but likely to get out-ranged by top tier characters
Link - good against slow characters but not Pikachu fast, bombs are good and grab improved
Pichu - nerfed version of Pikachu, but no reason to play this character over Pikachu

Average Fighters (Mid Tier)

Nothing special about these guys really - they're often outmatched and offer little in the way of outstanding attributes. They are by no means terrible but being one category above bottom tier signifies their weakness.

Mega Man - slightly improved but his best combos nerfed
Wario - not great, just feels like he's been nerfed too far
Lucas - nerfed a bunch of things including down throw
Falco - slightly better than 4, but still not great because throw combos have changed.
Incineroar - really slow, bad run speed, bad ariel drift
Jigglypuff - like Kirby - is often outmatched, nothing special
Greninja - throw combos nerfed, ok ish
Robin - faster than Smash 4, probably high mid tier but still not hype tier
Luigi - nerfed cyclone and grab, average character compared to Smash 4
Pits - still feels like he lacks range
Mr Game & Watch - got a buff from Smash 4 but still around the mid tier level

Worst Fighters (Bottom Tier)

These are currently the worst characters in the game. Slow, weak and poor recovery are common traits amongst most of them.

Chrom / Little Mac - good moves but throw them off the level and he's dead, very poor recovery
Samus / Dark Samus - all the good things have been removed from Smash 4
Ripley - very vulnerable, heavy and gets hit by everything, no options to escape
King Dedede - removed combos
Bowser Junior - nerfed in too many ways, too slow and similar to Smash 4
Pac-Man - like Smash 4, jump gimmick nerfed in Ultimate
Bowser - combo throw nerfed (only good thing he had in Smash 4), slow
Yoshi - no game plan, predictable neutral, very mediocre
Kirby - outpaced by almost every character, too slow
Dr Mario - like Mario but slower, very vulnerable, slow recovery