For our tier list, we've looked at their overall abilities and kits, their uniqueness, synergies with other heroes, and their potential to shift a game in your favour.

Let's take a look at the best heroes to use in Marvel Rivals.

Marvel Rivals tier list: Every hero ranked

Here is our complete tier list of every hero in Marvel Rivals, broken down from S-Tier to D-Tier.

S-Tier:

• Hela (Duelist)
• Mantis (Strategist)
• Doctor Strange (Vanguard)

A-Tier:

• Luna Snow (Strategist)
• Iron Fist (Duelist)
• Hawkeye (Duelist)
• Venom (Vanguard)
• Cloak & Dagger (Strategist)
• Psylocke (Duelist)
• Groot (Vanguard)

B-Tier:

• Jeff the Land Shark (Strategist)
• Punisher (Duelist)
• Winter Soldier (Duelist)
• Magneto (Vanguard)
• Adam Warlock (Strategist)
• Loki (Strategist)
• Spider-Man (Duelist)
• Scarlet Witch (Duelist)
• Peni Parker (Vanguard)
• Moon Knight (Duelist)

C-Tier:

• Captain America (Vanguard)
• Thor (Vanguard)
• Black Panther (Duelist)
• Hulk (Vanguard)
• Rocket Raccoon (Strategist)
• Starlord (Duelist)
• Squirrel Girl (Duelist)
• Magik (Duelist)
• Namor (Duelist)

D-Tier

• Storm (Duelist)
• Wolverine (Duelist)
• Black Widow (Duelist)
• Iron Man (Duelist)

Keep in mind this is still a very subjective tier list, and will likely change as we move into Season 1 and beyond, especially when NetEase inevitably releases major patches that include buffs or nerfs.

As a reminder, picking heroes from S-Tier and A-Tier won't guarantee you success in Marvel Rivals. You need to have a balanced team composition, which, in hero-shooters like this, usually means having two characters from each of the three classes - healer, tank, and DPS (or Strategist, Vanguard, and Duelist in Marvel Rivals speak).

This isn't always necessary, but we'd strongly recommend having at least one of each class, and ideally at least two healers.

Read on for a complete breakdown of every hero in Marvel Rivals, and why we've placed them into the various tiers based on the current Marvel Rivals meta.

Hela

Hela is currently the best Duelists available in Marvel Rivals, continuing this over from the Beta period.

Her normal attack can two-shot enemies quite easily thanks to a very generous hitscan for the Nightsword Thorns, and on top of that, she also has one of the most varied kits around.

The Goddess of Death can quickly escape using the Astrol Flock ability that transforms her into a crow, and the Soul Drainer stun is surprisingly useful, too.

What separates her from another OP Duelist in Hawkeye is her Ultimate Ability, Goddess of Death. Here, she soars into the sky and rains down damage on to enemies below.

Aside from Doctor Strange’s shield or a Strategist Ultimate, there isn’t much that counters this at the moment. It lasts for quite a while and gives you an extra 800HP while in use, meaning that it’s pretty difficult to take her out, even when massively exposed.

Mantis

Welcome back, Zenyatta! Mantis remains our top Strategist in Marvel Rivals mainly due to the damage buffs she grants herself and her teammates.

These can quickly turn around any fight, especially if you’re able to land critical hits – as this instantly restores your Life Orbs, allowing you to keep buffing and healing allies non-stop.

Her healing powers are also useful, but we’d always recommend running a Luna Snow or Cloak & Dagger alongside Mantis to provide more instant healing compared to Mantis.

Doctor Strange

While many players may opt for a more aggressive Vanguard like Venom, we've opted to put Doctor Strange higher in this tier list, mainly due to the protection he offers.

Doctor Strange’s Shield of Seraphim is the best method of protecting your teammates in Marvel Rivals. It can absorb a ton of damage, and regenerates quickly, too.

A well-timed portal can also be the difference between a win and a loss, allowing your team to quickly return to the point.

His damage output isn’t the best, but that’s what we have Duelists for, right?

Luna Snow

Luna Snow is the best healer in Marvel Rivals, and one of the top Strategist picks.

Her Ice Arts ability grants a solid amount of healing to your teammate, and if you attach an Idol Aura to an ally, this will also heal them when healing others – perfect for that pesky Spider-Man who runs off and is always needs healing.

Her Fate of Both Worlds Ultimate lets you switch between a 40 per cent damage boost and a 250HP/s healing mode, which negates a lot of other heroes’ Ultimates.

The combination of a Mantis and Luna Snow is putting you well on the way to victory, in our opinion.

Iron Fist

Strategists, look away now! Iron Fist is truly the greatest enemy to the backlines, being able to dive in, deal a tremendous amount of damage, and escape quickly due to his mobility.

His fists have a very generous amount of aim-assist and can easily 1v1 most other squishy Duelists and Vanguards if used correctly.

As a Strategist main, we fear him the most.

Hawkeye

A fully charged arrow from Hawkeye is a thing of terror to any Duelist or Strategist. A headshot will easily one-shot most non-tanks from long-range.

While a good Iron Fist or even a Hela will often be targeted by the opposing team, it takes a lot of effort to go into the backlines and disrupt a Hawkeye who excels at a distance.

We've opted against placing Clint in S-Tier for one main reason - you still need to have good aim to do well.

Venom

Now this is a dive tank! The Venom Swing gives Venom amazing mobility to swing in and cause a lot of chaos.

When using Venom, we've found the best strategy is to just be a distraction, as he’s really difficult to take down.

With 650HP, you can absorb a lot of hits, especially combined with the Symbiotic Resilience that gives you more Bonus Health the lower your health is.

Eddie Brock doesn’t do the most damage with his tendrils, so we’d recommend focusing on being that distraction over trying to take out too many enemies.

Cloak & Dagger

In our opinion, Cloak & Dagger is the most underrated Hero in Marvel Rivals.

Dagger is an excellent healer with three different methods of healing available, and Cloak’s Dark Teleportation is one of the best ways of protecting your whole team in a pinch outside of Mantis or Luna Snow’s Ultimate.

The real strength, though, comes in the ability to switch between the two. We’ve turned around countless fights by quickly shifting into Cloak to finish off a few weaker Strategists of Duelists, before reverting to Dagger to heal up the team before the next fight.

Don’t sleep on Cloak & Dagger.

Psylocke

Another Duelist who is pretty difficult to take down due to her mobility, Psylocke can easily disrupt the enemy backlines and deal a lot of damage before escaping using her dashes and invisibility.

Her Dance of the Butterly Ultimate also deals massive damage to enemies in a large area, really quickly. Your only chance of survival here is hoping that your fellow teammates sponge up enough of the damage to spare you.

Groot

The final Hero in A-Tier, Groot is a classic tank that can just sit and absorb a lot of hits. What separates him from some of the lower-tier Vanguards who remain pretty bulky is his walls.

While they are great at just blocking damage or creating chokepoints, they can also deal damage or heal, so long as you and your team are damaging enemies nearby.

Due to this, we’d recommend being a bit more aggressive with Groot and using these walls for more offensive reasons, as opposed to simply soaking up hits.

And finally, be wary of where you’re placing walls. Make sure you aren’t blocking off any lines of sight for your teammates, in particular any healers!

Jeff the Land Shark

We did consider placing Jeff in S-Tier for his Ultimate alone, which has been the source of many great clips on social media since Marvel Rivals launched.

However, as an actual Strategist, we’ve found less success with Jeff so far.

His main Splash Healing is solid and has a much greater range than you’d expect, but the Healing Bubbles rely too much on your teammates going out of their way to collect them for it to be a reliable strategy.

The Punisher

The Punisher is who your more Call of Duty-inclined friend will pick when you force them to play Marvel Rivals – this game’s version of Soldier 76. The difference this time around, to our surprise, is that The Punisher is quite good.

Frank Castle's kit is relatively easy to grasp, and we’ve found that switching to the shotgun at close range is a great way to surprise enemies and melt them from existence.

The Punisher’s turret was also one of our favourite abilities to use in the Marvel Rivals beta, but as players have become better, they’re able to target the Punisher and his turret much better, meaning it perhaps isn’t as deadly as it once was.

Winter Soldier

The key to playing as the Winter Soldier is to make use of the Ceaseless Charge passive, which reloads your primary weapon every time you use a Bionic Arm ability (which is all of your abilities).

Otherwise, you may find yourself in a tricky situation where you keep needing to reload. Bucky is best at a close-to-medium range, and since he has no real mobility options, you need to have this locked down to have a chance of success.

Still, his Ultimate is one of the best in the game, especially when you can chain enemies.

Magneto

Magneto’s strength is two-fold, in that he can use his Metallic Curtain and Bulwark bubbles to protect the team from the front, while his projectiles are pretty powerful from range.

However, we’ve found his shield isn’t as strong or useful as that of Doctor Strange, and he is among the slowest of characters, putting him slightly lower on this list.

But overall, he's still a strong Vanguard option, especially if paired with Scarlet Witch.

Adam Warlock

Marvel Rivals’ answer to Mercy, Adam Warlock has some good healing options to keep multiple teammates at full strength simultaneously using his Soul Bond.

His ability to revive allies via Karmic Revival is a great tool to have after losing a team fight, so long as you can stay alive to use it.

However, we’ve put him lower on the list than other healers as he does slightly lack an offensive punch if you don’t have the most accurate aim, and his healing abilities have an unforgivingly long cooldown, leading to some moments when he feels pretty redundant on the battlefield.

Loki

Fittingly for the God of Mischief, Loki’s trickery translates through into his abilities and kit, which can be quite difficult to get the hang of when first picking him up.

You’ll get the most out of Loki by using his Doppelganger Illusion, which creates a duplicate of himself wherever you choose. Not only does this give you mobility options and frustrate opponents, but they can also deploy the Regeneration Domain, giving you multiple healing points across the map for your teammates, so long as they’re aware of them.

Spider-Man

He might be higher on this list if it wasn’t for the amount of frustrating Spider-Man teammates we’ve played with.

Spider-Man goes head-to-head with Iron Fist as the best option to flank and dive into the opponent’s backlines using his web-swinging and double jumps, but as a five-star difficulty hero, this Marvel fan favourite needs to be mastered by more players before he can move any higher in the tier list.

Scarlet Witch

We loved playing Scarlet Witch in the beta, primarily because nobody knew what to do against her Ultimate. However, as time has passed, players aren’t as scared of this anymore, and she is fairly easy to take out before unleashing her Ultimate, limiting its effectiveness.

Regardless, she is still a very strong Duelist. Her auto-aiming primary makes her a solid choice for anyone struggling to hit their shots consistently. You’ll be able to win in any 1v1s against Duelists or Strategists, although in wider team battles, her effectiveness starts to fade.

A good Scarlet Witch also knows that her secondary weapon is one of the most useful tools in her kit, particularly against Vanguards.

We would like to see Wanda's Mystic Projection buffed slightly by making it last longer, as right now it does not give her enough time to escape situations.

Peni Parker

Peni Parker can have a lot of impact, but for her to compete with many of the other Vanguards on the list, you need to make the most out of her Cyber-Webs, and Spider-Nests, which takes a bit of focus to set up.

She's more useful when defending, but the need to be near your webs does limit her impact when on the offence, or in games with payloads.

Moon Knight

Moon Knight was one of the strongest, most underrated Duelists when Marvel Rivals launched, thanks in part to players not understanding how he works.

Moon Knight’s Ankhs will allow his primary and secondary attacks to bounce between them and enemies, chaining together more deadly attacks.

However, as we move further into the life of Marvel Rivals, players have become more aware of these Ankhs and at least target them, so we're not sure Marc Spector's impact is as high.

Rocket Raccoon

One of the themes you’ll see across many of the C-Tier Heroes isn’t that they are particularly bad or ineffective, it’s just that there are many better options in what they do. And unfortunately for Rocket, it’s the case for him and other Strategists.

Rocket’s healing is still OK, and his Battle Rebirth Beacon revive system is great in a pinch. But his damage output is pretty low and his Armour Packs should probably be improved.

Outside of the fact he is very small and so is harder to hit, you’d be better off going for Mantis or Luna.

Captain America

Captain America is an odd Hero in Marvel Rivals, as it sometimes feels like he can't do much.

As a melee character, he has the most impact at short range. He can do so by using his Leading Dash, Super-Soldier Slam, or Liberty Rush, but if you’re opting for this playstyle, we’ve found more success with Venom than Steve Rogers.

When he does get close, a good Captain America can quickly dispatch a couple of enemies, but often he will draw way too much attention and be taken care of by the rest of the team.

Thor

Another brawler who mainly works best at close range, Thor could probably do with an overall HP buff in a future Marvel Rivals patch to be as useful as some of the other Vanguards available.

The Thorforce Passive is an interesting system but requires a lot of maintaining and landing your Mjolnir Bashes to keep up.

As with Captain America, he’s not particularly bad, but in a wider context, there are better Vanguard options available.

Black Panther

Another Duelist focused on using that mobility to take down enemies at a close range, Black Panther’s strengths come from his Spirit Rend and Spinning Kick dashes which make him particularly difficult to target while dealing damage.

However, when we have to compare him to other super-mobile Duelists, in Spider-Man and Iron Fist, he isn’t able to cause as much damage – especially if you mess up with his dash attacks and are left vulnerable.

Hulk

Oh, Hulk. Another Vanguard focused on short-range attacks, the Hulk is not nearly strong enough to compete with the top Vanguards in Marvel Rivals.

While he does have a lot of health, he’s surprisingly easy to take down when being targeted, because he's so big. Unfortunately for his Bruce Banner mode, we don’t think we’ve ever seen a player survive long enough to re-transform back into the Hulk.

As one of the flagship characters for Marvel, we’d be surprised if we didn’t see a giant buff for the Hulk in the future.

Star-Lord

Star-Lord certainly feels like Tracer did when Overwatch first launched in 2016.

The dual-wield guns fail to pack enough of a punch to do enough damage for a top-tier Duelist, and while Peter Quill's mobility options are pretty good, they fall short when compared to other dive options in the category.

We do like his Ultimate, however, which gives you auto-lock aim for a period while flying in the air. While it feels like it should be easy to counter, it’s surprisingly effective compared to some other Duelist Ultimates.

Squirrel Girl

As one of our favourite Marvel characters, we were pleasantly surprised to see Squirrel Girl added to the Marvel Rivals roster, although we did expect her to be a Strategist.

Sadly, her Junkrat-esque Burst Acorn projectile is only effective if you’re playing from quite deep, which only works well if your team is set up for that. Outside of that, Doreen Green's abilities don't offer her much compared to other Duelists.

When you also combine this with one of the worst Ultimates in Marvel Rivals, Squirrel Girl and Tippy Toe have to sit in C-Tier for now.

Magik

Another melee character who we’ve put in C-Tier! Overall, melee and brawler characters are struggling in Marvel Rivals, and Magik is no exception.

Magik has a really high rate of damage and is pretty tanky, but her mobility options don’t give her the escapes she needs.

Namor

On his own, Namor isn’t the strongest Duelist out there, but if you make sure his Monstro Spawn (his octopus friends) work hard as turrets, he can be effective in defending.

They don’t have the most health but can contribute towards chipping away enemy health quite nicely.

His most underrated ability is the Blessing of the Deep, which gives him a protective barrier as he jumps into the air – great for diverting attention, but not really as useful for someone trying to play as a pure Duelist.

Storm

Aerial characters like Storm and Iron Man are struggling in the current Marvel Rivals meta as they can be easily picked off by other Duelists with good aim. Storm in particular is quite slow, making her even more vulnerable.

Outside of this, her attacks don’t hold up compared to many of the other Duelists – even those in the C-Tier – making Ororo among the worst options in Marvel Rivals currently.

Iron Man

Another flying character just waiting to be sniped by Hawkeye, Iron Man does have some strong attacks and a powerful Ultimate, but he is just too vulnerable to attacks to be considered a good choice in the existing Marvel Rivals meta.

Similarly to the Hulk, we wouldn’t be surprised if we see another buff for Tony Stark in the future.

Black Widow

It would be easy to say Black Widow is a worse version of Hawkeye. Which is what we're saying. There is very little reason to pick her over Hawkeye.

Widow’s sniper rifle, while certainly powerful, cannot one-shot any hero – even with a headshot.

Her counters against other short-range Duelists, in the Fleet Foot dash and Edge Dancer kick, really struggle to make any real impact.

Wolverine

Wolverine’s Savage Claw primary can be quite effective against Vanguards as it scales up with an enemy's HP, but that’s about the only positive we can say about Logan.

His overall damage does not feel like enough for a Duelist, and as another melee character, he’s struggling against anyone with range.

The Regenerative Healing Factor has a lot of potential, but with a 90s cooldown, it’s nowhere near reliable enough to rely on aside from the occasional KO.

Read more on Marvel Rivals:

• Marvel Rivals codes: All free skins
• Marvel Rivals trophy guide: Full list of achievements
• Marvel Rivals player count: How many have picked it up?
• Will Marvel Rivals come to Switch: Director comments on handheld options

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