Genshin Genshin Impact Characters Tier List

New Characters

Odette: S tier

The character Odette could most easily be compared to is Columbina. While far from the same character, their function is similar. They enable all of their modified Reactions (Stellar for Odette and Lunar for Columbina) and offer significant personal damage while providing a strong team buff, without it being their main focus. They are similarly impactful in their present teams, with a magnitude of about 30% team DPS. Stellar teams are a bit stronger and more important due to Genshin's endgame structure. Odette's only real downside is that she has solid competition in Traveler (Cryo), although their current iteration at C2R3 is not as good as her.

Traveler (Cryo): A+ tier

The newest Traveler is an excellent unit. They're mostly a Stellar Swirl Support and Stellar-Conduct DPS, and very good at both roles. The Cryo Traveler is a selfish unit focused around their own personal DPS and some currently minimal buffing exclusive to Stellar Swirl. Due to their high field-time demands and, depending on the team, relatively weak Energy economy, they're not quite a flawless unit. They scale much worse with investment (whether in their Artifacts or Vertical Investment) than most characters due to their stat oversaturation, gaining 33% less from substats than other strong characters.

Alyosha: C tier

Alyosha is an underwhelming character without his C6, which is very difficult to acquire, and this is reflected in his placement. With his C6 he becomes one of the strongest Stellar-Conduct supports for Sandrone and Cyno, but due to the tierlist's assumptions, he won't be ranked based solely on that. Alyosha really shines for accounts without Yae Miko, becoming the generally best Electro option for Sandrone teams. He is still markedly worse than her at C6, but gets the closest out of the rest.

Old Character Shifts

Sandrone: A/A+ -> S

Sandrone has received numerous buffs in 7.0. The introduction of Odette massively buffed her Stellar-Conduct teams by numbers comparable to having Yae Miko vs not having her, the new Heart of the Furnace set was significant for every Stellar team, and the introduction of Stellar Swirl gave her an entirely new playstyle though, although usually worse than Stellar-Conduct, offers him teambuilding and gameplay flexibility she lacked beforehand. Arguably the best DPS in the game.

Yae Miko: A/A+ -> S

The buffs to Stellar-Conduct all apply to Yae Miko and her usefulness. Both Odette and Heart of the Furnace buff her and she remains the undisputed best 2nd / 3rd slot.

Other Stellar-Conduct Shifts:

Wriothesley: C -> A+

Cyno: D -> A+

Qiqi: C -> A

Diona: D -> C

Beidou: D -> C

• Wriothesley and Cyno's massive jumps are largely owning to them not having to use Sandrone teams anymore, alongside said teams receiving so many buffs. Before, there would be little reason to play either of them without Sandrone while Sandrone as a carry would be directly better than them. This gave little reason to play them in general, so they were ranked quite low despite their strength. Cyno is the worst of the Stellar-Conduct DPS units and could be argued to be in either A+ or A. Wriothesley's C1 is not yet taken into account, as he will not be able to acquire it during this patch.
• Qiqi has proven to be the most solid of Stellar supports, and due to how Odette functions, could generally be said to be BiS for every Sandrone team, thus her much higher ranking. Diona and Qiqi are solid but generally worse than her, and Qiqi is a Standard Banner character.

Stellar Swirl Shifts:

Yumemizuki Mizuki: E -> A

Faruzan: D -> C

The biggest jump yet however, belongs to Mizuki. She went from a generally pretty bad unit to a very solid Stellar Swirl DPS. By Tierlist standards, she is ranked at C2, although her C2 might be harder to acquire than most. She is in the 'Temper Thyself and Journey Far' and as a Standard Banner character will be in the upcoming anniversary selector, so she will soon be in full power.

Other Shifts:

New Tier: A+

The S/A differentiation did not offer enough nuance, and while neither does this, it offers a little bit more. With the creation of this tier and 7.0's meta developments, a few characters have shifted around to better reflect the current state of the game. Chevreuse and Citlali have 'moved up' while Nicole has 'moved down', and Mona has also moved up a tier.

Nicole is a great Support but none of the current top dog characters require her and she's not uniquely good for any of them besides arguably Wriothesley; Chevreuse occupies many of the spots she does and even a few more, owing to her great C6 and surprising flexibility. Citlali and Mona's moves should now more clearly reflect their strength in Mavuika, Skirk, and Arlecchino teams.

Character Placements

S-tier

• Columbina: The lynchpin of any Lunar setup and often necessary for their proper function. Other Hydro options offer too much less compared to her to even be considerations if she's available, regardless of vertical investment.
• Flins: Having gained real competition as the best Electro DPS with Cyno's buffs, Flins still stands tall due to the incredibly wide variety of content he's able to tackle in endgame scenarios. While dealing the least raw DPS out of the Lunar carries, his content matchup has so far made up for that.
• Ineffa: Necessary for Flins and his teams to function at the level they do, Ineffa also forms a very competent Sub-DPS core with Columbina, that can by itself deal with much of the Fearless difficulty content in Stygian.
• Lauma: Lauma gives one of the strongest support jumps around for Nefer's teams, to the tune of 30-40%, and she's outright necessary for Columbina on-field DPS and any Bloom team to function.
• Linnea: An excellent support for Zibai, although she's typically not as large of a jump for her as Ineffa and Lauma are for Flins and Nefer. Like Ineffa, she can form a Lunar-Crystallize core with Columbina that can play into Geo focused content in Stygian very well.
• Mavuika: Mavuika will oscillate significantly depending on your skill with her. At her ceiling, she could comfortably be argued to be a top 3 DPS in the game, with a solid argument for being on the higher end. This is only available through her advanced combos, which are difficult and require quite a bit of effort to pull off consistently. Still, even at her lower end, she deals with the content of this level more than fine.
• Nefer: The dedicated Lunar-Bloom DPS has one of the highest damage ceilings in the game, and it's much easier to reach for her than for someone like Mavuika. Nefer's biggest flaw is having to play sustainless in order to stand out damage wise, which is relatively easier for her compared to most of the cast; she dashes very often, giving her lots of invincibility time.
• Sucrose: The best in slot 4th unit for Flins and Nefer, one of the best 4th slots for Sandrone and every other Stellar-Conduct carry, BiS for Sandrone Stellar Swirl and Yumemizuki Mizuki Stellar Swirl, BiS for Mavuika Hexerei Vape and Arlecchino Hexerei Vape, one of the best options for Arlecchino Melt, Mualani Hexerei teams, and the list goes on.
• Zibai: Arguably the strongest overall Lunar carry under most criteria. Her damage ceiling is the highest and the easiest to reach, and she has access to strong healing in her teams while being very tanky thanks to her DEF scaling. Although Illuga's C6 is quite valuable for her teams, it's far from a make or break. Illuga was available on both her own and Linnea banner, making it easier to acquire than most 4* C6s.

Ranking Criteria

This is an Endgame Tier List. We take into account performance primarily in Stygian Onslaught and Spiral Abyss, with the former being our main vector. This is because good performance in Stygian Onslaught will almost always translate to good performance in Spiral Abyss, while the inverse is not true.

Imaginarium Theater is not considered despite its rewards, by nature of its limitations and variability. If a unit is good in the other endgame modes, they will typically be very good in IT.

A character can be powerful and useful in many ways, including but not limited to:

• Content Matchup
• DPS / Damage Contribution
• Flexibility

Other factors such as Ease of Play, Skill Ceiling, and more will also be considered to determine how valuable a unit is in endgame scenarios.

Ranking Assumptions

• Limited 5 star characters are considered to be at C0 without their Signature Weapons, aka C0R0. If a limited 5 star character is part of the 'Temper Thyself and Journey Far' event, they will be considered to be at C1R0. Standard Banner 5 star characters are considered to be at C2R0. 4 star character assumptions will be more variable and individual, depending on their time of release, availability, and importance of their Constellations.
• A 5 star character's potential for vertical investment beyond our standards will not be considered in the Tier List. However, it will be explored and explained in their Guides.
  
• Stygian Onslaught is considered at Fearless Difficulty. A character's performance in Fearless Difficulty at C0R0 will oftentimes map to their performance in Dire Difficulty with some vertical investment.
  
• Spiral Abyss is always considered to be at Floor 12 only.
  
• We don't assume a character is automatically performing at their damage ceiling or optimal conditions. If a character has significant room for growth, it will generally be considered a plus, as long as it's achievable by reasonable in-game means. Mavuika is not ranked based exclusively on her performance with Buffer Cancels; Arlecchino is not ranked based exclusively on her performance with Advanced Walk Combos; etc. However, their ability to improve their performance with advanced mechanics and good play is taken into account.
  
• Characters will be ranked based on the relative strength of their best teams in which they are key pieces of. Flins - Columbina - Ineffa - Sucrose is a Flins team; Dehya - Columbina - Ineffa - Sucrose is not a Dehya team. The more important a character is for a strong team, the higher their value. For example: the performance of a Varesa Overload team is more impactful on Varesa's ranking than the performance of a Varesa Lunar-Charged team.
  
• A character having multiple strong teams and teammates is generally a bonus. How big of a bonus it is depends on the details of their teams and flexibility.

Disclaimers

The Tier List is not meant to be indicative of the best characters in any singular endgame cycle, including the current. Characters will be ranked based on their overall proven performance, and a theoretical assessment of the potential of their future performance in some shape or form. The current endgame cycle will always favor newly released characters and the characters that are re-running. How good a character's performance is in the endgame scenarios that aren't directly meant to favor them is a major criteria for their ranking.

The Tier List is meant to be indicative of a character's current and potentially future strength; it is not meant to be a definitive measure of who to pull. Check out a character's guide for an explanation of why they are strong or not, and make informed wishing decisions.

S-Tier

The best units available. Characters in the S-tier will generally have an easy time clearing the content available in any given endgame rotation, or will be otherwise significant in doing so. Their flaws are few or unimportant, and they will be currently excellent and useful in most any account.

A-Tier

Exceptional units, but not quite as good as S-Tier units. They have a few more flaws or kinks that prevent them from always being the best available to you, but they're still presently very powerful and will be able to perform well in almost all current endgame scenarios.

B-Tier

Strong, but their flaws start being more obvious or more impactful. B-Tier units still generally be useful in many situations, but have a much higher potential of running into issues or requiring more resources to perform as well as the characters in A-Tier.

C-Tier

Still competent at clearing, but C-Tier units will have some clear struggles. They come with caveats and will not have the easy time clearing the units in the tiers above them generally should have. They might be useful for certain teams, but their usefulness is limited or conditional. There will be endgame rotations where they struggle to be useful.

D-Tier

Can clear specific endgame scenarios under the right circumstances, but will face significant difficulties outside of those circumstances. Potentially directly outclassed by units in C-Tier or higher, not very useful in currently strong teams, or their aren't very strong. They might be limited in the capacity of what they can offer, have gameplay issues, etc.

E-Tier

E-Tier units will require exceptional circumstances in order to have a decent time clearing endgame scenarios. They will require significant effort, investment of time or otherwise, and will often highly struggle regardless. Directly outclassed by several units in the same role, or their unique niches are simply not useful in the current landscape.

F-Tier

Characters in this tier are significantly and directly outclassed in every way, or will have a very difficult time clearing the vast majority endgame scenarios. There might be niche situations in which they or their mechanics are useful, but they are generally not worth using under most circumstances within our ranking criteria.