Valheim Weapons Tier List: Every Weapon Ranked

Every Valheim weapon, ranked. Before you read a single tier: I pulled the damage numbers from the wiki and read several other tier lists to see where they agree and where they argue, and the rankings below are my own conclusions from all of it. Where the community genuinely disagrees, I say so and explain my call.

How this list was made

• Damage numbers come from the wiki, so they are the live values, not guesses.
• A weapon ranks on what it does across the whole game, not just its own biome. Something you outgrow in two hours cannot be S tier.
• Utility counts. Slows, stagger, crowd control and secondary damage types matter as much as raw numbers.

S tier: the ones that define the game

Frostner is the closest thing Valheim has to a forever weapon. On paper 35 blunt, 40 frost and 20 spirit looks modest next to a big sword, but every hit slows the target, blunt is the type the undead hate, and spirit burns them on top. Every list I read puts it at or near the top, and they are right.

Blackmetal atgeir is the crowd control king. The secondary spin attack staggers everything in a circle around you, which turns fuling camps and greydwarf swarms from a panic into a rhythm. Atgeirs are the class serious players quietly consider the strongest in the game.

Mistwalker carries 75 slash and 40 frost with the same slow effect as Frostner, on a fast one handed sword in the tier where enemies are at their scariest. Krom, its two handed cousin, swings 150 slash, the biggest pure blade number in the game, and does not even need a shield hand.

Draugr fang is the best bow for most of the game. 47 pierce plus poison that keeps ticking while you reposition, and you get it back in the Mountains. Staff of Embers earns its slot as the weapon that makes magic real: 120 fire on a staff that turns crowds into bonfires.

A tier: excellent, with one catch each

• Porcupine deals 45 pierce and 50 blunt at once, which means almost nothing resists all of it. The catch: it arrives in the Plains, where black metal competes for the same slot.
• Himmin Afl and Skoll and Hati are superb Mistlands and Ashlands weapons. The dual knives have the fastest effective attack speed in the game.
• Demolisher hits 145 blunt in a shockwave. Gloriously fun, slightly niche.
• Silver sword is the undead deleter: 75 slash plus 30 spirit exactly when the game throws undead at you.
• Spinesnap is a genuine Draugr fang rival with 72 pierce, and Arbalest hits 200 pierce per bolt but reloads slowly enough that you feel every miss.
• Iron mace is boring, cheap and correct. It is the answer to the Swamp and to Bonemass, and nothing else at that stage comes close.
• Jotun Bane pairs 80 slash with 40 poison and doubles as a top logging axe.

B tier: solid tools, honest limits

Blackmetal sword swings 95 slash and nothing else. Huge number, no utility, so Frostner and Mistwalker walk past it. Iron atgeir gives you the sacred spin one age early. Crystal battleaxe, Iron sledge and the bows fill their roles fine without headlining anything.

The Blackmetal knife argument

This one splits the community properly. One list I read buries Blackmetal knife in the bottom tier, another calls it dominant. Both are describing the same weapon: knives have the highest damage per stamina in the game and monstrous backstab multipliers, but only if your knife skill is levelled and you play the parry and dodge game. In practised hands it is A tier or better. Picked up cold, it feels terrible. B is where a ranking for normal humans puts it.

C tier: situational, not hopeless

Battleaxe is slow for what it gives. Bronze mace, Bronze sword and Iron sword are stepping stones that do their job for exactly one biome. Fang spear is the best of a class that never quite works, and Abyssal harpoon is not really a weapon at all, it is a fishing rod for serpents and bosses, and a genuinely funny one.

Stagbreaker deserves its own sentence: mediocre in a fight, but its ground slam hits through terrain, which makes it a legendary tool for clearing burial chambers and finding buried treasure by feel.

Skip tier: outgrown before lunch

Club, Flint spear and the Crude bow are your first hour, and they are fine at that job. Replace them the moment you can. The genuine oddity is Bronze atgeir: 45 pierce for a painful amount of early bronze is a bad trade, and the class only comes alive at iron. Skip it and put the bronze into an axe and a mace instead.

Best weapon at each stage

• Meadows: Club for skeletons in the chambers, Crude bow for deer and Eikthyr.
• Black Forest: a bronze mace and a Finewood bow. Skip the bronze atgeir.
• Swamp: Iron mace, no debate. See the Bonemass fight for why.
• Mountains: Frostner and Draugr fang. Both stay relevant for the rest of the game.
• Plains: Blackmetal atgeir or Porcupine, with the black metal to make them.
• Mistlands: Mistwalker in one hand, or Krom in both, or a staff if you are going magic.
• Ashlands: Skoll and Hati for speed, Demolisher for crowds.

If you are still working toward any of these, the progression guide shows the road, and the food guide matters more than any weapon on this board. Happy hunting!