Top 10 MCU Characters Ranked by Power Level
If you put every hero and villain from the Marvel Cinematic Universe in a room together, who emerges victorious? That’s what we’re finding out in this feature.
OK, it would have to be a pretty big room because some of these characters transcend literal space and time, but still, their power is quantifiable. From vast deities that defy comprehension to a big purple man, here are the ten strongest characters we’ve ever seen in the MCU.
Imagine them all sharing a screen. It could happen. As Avengers 5 closes in on director, it will feature over 60 MCU characters. But anyway, on with the feature!
Top 10 MCU characters
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Placing Thor at ten in a list of the most powerful MCU characters is controversial given he’s one of the all-time most powerful Avengers, but the universe is bigger than it was when that team first got together in 2012. While he’s survived being blasted by a star in Avengers: Infinity War, and defeated Hela the Asgardian Goddess of Death by finding a deep reserve of power within himself, Thor would struggle up against some of the later entries on this list.
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Based on the fire giant from Norse mythology, Surtur made his live-action MCU debut in Thor: Ragnarok. A native to the extra-dimensional plane of Muspelheim, he’s essentially indestructible. In fact, Thor doesn’t even try to stop his arrival near the end of the film, because he knows he can’t. Instead, he uses Surtur to kill his sister Hela, which also results in the complete obliteration of Asgard.
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Merely flesh and blood, Doctor Strange could be killed in a car crash, which he very nearly is in his 2016 first film. It speaks to his skills as a wizard, then, that he’s able to go toe-to-toe against Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War using his array of masterful spells. Doctor Strange is also a brilliant tactician. In fact, if it wasn’t for him glimpsing into the future using the time stone later in the film, Thanos would have wiped out the entire universe.
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Captain Marvel is a cosmic force so powerful, writers have to invent reasons to reign her in. For instance, in The Marvels, every time she uses her powers she swaps places with Ms. Marvel and Monica Rambeu. Previously, in Avengers: Endgame, she only shows up at the end of the climatic battle because she was busy 'helping out other words'. When she does appear, however, a fully powered Captain Marvel can comfortably handle most characters. She makes a dramatic entrance by flying directly through Thanos’ spaceship and crashing it, then has him on the backfoot in a 1v1.
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Scarlet Witch is another rare character able to take on Thanos alone. During her brief scuffle with the Mad Titan during Avengers: Endgame, she causes a flicker of distress across his face when she uses her telekinetic powers to crush him with a pile of rocks. And that’s before she gains the power to travel between universes and easily murder alternate versions of superheros in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
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Dormammu makes his debut in 2016’s Doctor Strange, and it’s a force to be reckoned with. As a villain who transcends time and space, it makes Mads Mikkelsen’s dark sorcerer Kaecilius look like a cheap magician. The inter-dimensional being rules over the Dark Dimension, with aims of snuffing out entire realities. Doctor Strange only beats Dormammu by trapping it inside a time loop and making it give up out of sheer frustration..
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Even without the Infinity Stones, Thanos is a force to be reckoned with. He capably handles Hulk in a fist fight during the opening of Avengers: Infinity War, and later in Avengers: Endgame he demonstrates the ability to fight off three fully powered Avengers leaders in Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man, no stones required. Once he uses his unique genius to gather all five stones, however, Thanos is practically unstoppable, able to rewind time, change reality, teleport instantly, and throw planets at people.
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What’s more powerful than Thanos with the Infinity Stones? Ultron with the Infinity Stones, who kills Thanos by splitting him with a laser in episode eight of What If…?. When this advanced, self-replicating robot uploads himself into the body of Vision (who’s already incredibly powerful himself) and gets his hand on the stones, he’s able to actually achieve Thanos’ goal and destroy all life in the universe. He bites into a galaxy at one point. After which he breaks out of his universe and accesses the multiverse, only stopped by the Guardians of the Multiverse.
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Neither hero nor villain, Eternity is nonetheless one of the most powerful beings in the entire MCU. Introduced in Thor: Love and Thunder, Eternity has the power to grant any wish, which it does for Christian Bale’s Gorr the God Butcher at the end of the film. Thankfully, it’s a wish to resurrect Gorr’s daughter and not to butcher all the gods, otherwise the MCU would be in trouble. Eternity is so powerful it doesn’t have a moral compass - good and evil don’t exist when you can change reality on a whim.
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Arishem the Judge is bigger than most planets, and that’s just the start. This prime Celestial kickstarted the universe by creating the sun. After which, a few billion years later, Arishem birthed the Deviants in order to help make more Celestials. Those Deviants went rogue, however, so Arishem created a superpowered race of beings called the Eternals to fight them. Arishem the Judge demonstrates incredible power, but is kept off the top spot through poor decision-making.
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OK, it’s the 11th entry, but then again, Kang defies time and space. Ant-Man might have defeated Kang by using the help of some large ants in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, but underestimate him at your peril. By this point, Kang had already beaten countless Avengers, something he alludes to when he tells Ant-Man, “Have I killed you before?”
So dangerous is Kang, a Council of Kangs teamed up to banish him to the Quantum Realm. With mastery of time, inter-dimensional travel, and an infinite amount of variants waiting in the wings, Kang is an existential threat, and the most frightening figure in the MCU because he's clearly a dude with bad intentions, which you can't say for Eternity or Arishem. Ants can only keep him down for so long.
