HSR Tier List – Best Honkai Star Rail Characters Ranked (January 2026)

Update: Honkai Star Rail Tier List was last updated on January 6, 2026

Your success in Honkai Star Rail largely depends on the characters you pick and the teams you build with them. With the game having a huge number of characters, it is common to be perplexed about who to pick and build in the game. To help you understand which characters are better and should be prioritized, we have created an Honkai Star Rail tier list. Follow this tier list to learn about the best characters in Honkai Star Rail for the current meta.

Honkai Star Rail Character Tier List – Overall

Tier	Characters
SS	Phainon, Castorice, The Herta, Feixiao, Sunday, Robin, Tribbie, Hyacine, Huohuo, Gallagher, Aventurine, Dan Heng Permansor Terrae, Fu Xuan
S	The Dahlia, Cyrene, Evernight, Anaxa, Cipher, Lingsha, Hysilens, Saber, Archer, Acheron, Mydei, Ruan Mei, Remembrance Trailblazer, Sparkle, Firefly, Fugue, Aglaea, Bronya, Luocha, Kafka, Silver Wolf
A	Cerydra, Harmony Trailblazer, Jiaoqiu, Topaz & Numby, Pela, Tingyun, Jingliu, Dan Heng Imbibitor Lunae, Hunt March 7th, Boothill, Rappa, Jade, Clara, Seele, Argenti, Black Swan, Blade, Jing Yuan, Yunli, Welt
B	Moze, Serval, Asta, Qingque, Dr. Ratio, Gepard, Lynx, Bailu, Himeko, Guinaifen, Xueyi, Herta, Sampo
C	Preservation Trailblazer, Preservation March 7th, Yukong, Misha, Hanya, Natasha, Luka, Yanqing, Dan Heng
D	Sushang, Hook, Arlan, Destruction Trailblazer

Current HSR Meta in January 2026

The current Honkai Star Rail meta is largely situated around Chrysos Heir teams. The Phainon team is currently the strongest in the game and can destroy any enemy, irrespective of their weakness type. Alongside him, the health-draining teams led by Castorice are also very strong for the current meta.

When it comes to teams outside the Chrysos Heirs, Follow-Up ATK teams have consistently kept their place in the top order. This team is led by Feixiao, who is the best Follow-up ATK DPS at the moment. Other than that, with the introduction of The Dahlia, Break teams have also received a boost in the meta and have become worthwhile to build.

In the future, as the Astral Express heads into Planarcadia, we are going to have characters of the path of Elation. This will likely bring back the DPS units who spam Skill points back into the forefront of meta, like Dan Heng Imbibitor Lunae and Archer.

Best HSR SS Tier Characters

The SS Tier characters in Honkai Star Rail are the absolute best characters in the game. These characters can single-handedly carry you through the hardest challenges and bring immense value to any team they are part of.

Phainon

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Destruction

Phainon is currently the strongest DPS character in Honkai Star Rail. His Ultimate form gives him increased HP and multiple turns. All you have to do is buff him with support characters and let him use his Ultimate to become almost indestructible. Pull for Phainon, and you will breeze through the hardest challenges in the game.

Castorice

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Remembrance

Castorice is one of the most broken characters in Honkai Star Rail. She is the only character that has a global passive ability, which alone is enough to make her S-tier. Adding her sustaining and high DPS capabilities on top of that, she is easily fit for the second DPS SS-tier spot on our Honkai Star Rail tier list.

The Herta

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Erudition

The Herta is the original version of the Erudition genius. As the Erudition Emanator, it was no surprise to see her become the strongest Erudition DPS upon her release. She applies stacks on enemies based on the attacks of her allies and herself, and after she uses her Ultimate, her next Enhanced Skill attack deals increased damage based on the stacks applied to each enemy. In the correct team, she can deal outrageously high damage.

Feixiao

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Hunt

Feixiao is currently one of the strongest DPS units in the game and has single-handedly kept the Follow-up attack teams in the meta. She is a Follow-up Attack DPS with massive damage output capabilities. Her Ultimate is devastatingly strong and reduces enemy toughness by ignoring their weakness type.

Sunday

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Harmony

Sunday is arguably one of the strongest Harmony units in the game, with the capability of action-forwarding allies by 100% alongside their summons and memosprites. Sunday also increases the Crit Damage of the select ally of his Skill, and his action forwarding ability is perfect for almost all hyper carry teams. His Ultimate can also recharge energy for allies, making him the perfect support for teams that love spamming ultimate abilities.

Robin

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Harmony

Robin has been one of the best supports in Honkai Star Rail ever since her debut. She can buff the damage of the entire team with her Skill, while her Ultimate action forwards all allies by 100%. But that’s not all, as she can further buff Follow-up Attack damage with her Ascension ability, and deals additional damage to every enemy hit while she is in her Ultimate state. Overall, Robin has absolutely zero downsides and is one of the strongest supports in the game.

Tribbie

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Harmony

Tribbie shot up to the SS-tier support slot on her release in our Honkai Star Rail tier list. She is a sub-DPS hidden in the guise of a support. Tribbie can massively increase the entire damage output of the team through her Follow-up attacks and Ultimate. Furthermore, her Skill gives a passive damage buff for the entire team, which is also highly useful.

Hyacine

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Remembrance

Hyacine is the best Healer spot in Honkai Star Rail. Even though Hyacine is a Remembrance unit, she is better than every other Abundance unit when it comes to healing. Her AoE heals, and incremental healing is extremely overpowered. Furthermore, she can also deal a ton of damage with her Ultimate and memosprite attacks.

Huohuo

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Abundance

Huohuo continues to be one of the best healers in Honkai Star Rail. She has a diverse healing kit with added supporting capabilities from Ultimate. With strong multi-target and on-turn heals, Huohuo can keep your entire team up and running without a sweat. All of her heals can also cleanse, making your team almost immune to crowd-control attacks. The cherry on top is her Ultimate, which increases the ATK of all allies, while also regenerating energy for them.

Gallagher

• Rarity: 4-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Abundance

Gallagher is currently the best F2P sustain in Honkai Star Rail and is one of the best healers in the game at E6. He has very strong heals and can deal a fair amount of damage by himself. Gallagher’s Ultimate applies a debuff on enemies that heals allies when they attack them. Furthermore, his Ultimate action forwards him by 100%, allowing him to reflex heal allies whenever they are low on health. Another great thing about Gallagher is that he can make enemies take increased break damage, making him the perfect f2p sustain for Break teams.

Aventurine

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Preservation

Aventurine took the HSR community by storm during the Penacony arc, stealing the show in his gambling fashion. His kit makes him one of the strongest shielders in the game. He can provide AoE shields with his Skill and Talent-triggered Follow-up attacks. The shields stack, so your allies would barely take any damage if Aventurine is played correctly. Furthermore, his Ultimate increases damage taken by the affected enemy, which is a nice ability to have on a sustain.

Dan Heng Permansor Terrae

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Preservation

Dan Heng Permansor Terrae was given for free in Honkai Star Rail, and he has quickly established himself as the best shielder in the game. He is capable of everything Aventurine can do, only better, and with higher damage output. This form of Dan Heng can also summon a dragon that not only deals damage, but also gives shields when attacking.

Fu Xuan

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Preservation

Fu Xuan is one of the strongest sustains in Honkai Star Rail. Her kit is unique, as she doesn’t focus on healing or providing shields but on Damage mitigation. Her Skill allows Fu Xuan to receive 65% of the damage taken by her allies for 3 turns. The skill buffs the Max HP of her allies by a portion of her Max HP and also increases the Crit Rate of all allies, making it a powerful offensive and defensive skill.

Best HSR S Tier Characters

The S-tier characters in our Honkai Star Rail tier list are also incredibly strong units, but are either dependent on their specific teams to dominate the game or have less damage to be considered in the SS tier. These characters can easily compete and replace characters from the SS tier as alternatives.

The Dahlia

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Nihility

The Dahlia has single-handedly brought back the Break meta in the game. She is an incredible support that allows allies to deal Super Break DMG without actually breaking the enemy’s Toughness bar first. She can also apply weaknesses on enemies and can buff the Break Effect and Weakness Break efficiency of allies.

Cyrene

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Remembrance

Cyrene is an incredibly strong character, but she often feels like a double-edged sword. She is limited to Chrysos Heir teams, and her Ultimate recharge time is painfully slow. Without her Ultimate, she is basically a burden on the team. However, once Cyrene gets her Ultimate charged, she instantly becomes the best support in the game, recharging the Ultimate for all allies and giving insane buffs.

Evernight

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Remembrance

Evernight is one of the best Remembrance units in the game that can act as both a Sub-DPS and main DPS. She is one of the cornerstones of the Castorice teams and would keep her in the meta for a long while. Evernight only slightly misses out on an SS-tier spot in our Honkai Star Rail tier list, but she is still a solid character to pick in the game.

Anaxa

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Erudition

Anaxa is primarily an Erudition support, but he can bring a ton of value to any team due to his unique abilities. Anaxa can apply all weakness types to an enemy using their Ultimate and Skill. This makes him particularly useful for players who don’t have a build DPS unit for all weakness types in the game. With Anaxa, you can basically clear every challenge with one team composition as long as you have Anaxa in the team.

Cipher

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Nihility

Cipher is a sub-DPS with good supporting abilities that is perfect for Feixiao teams. She can follow-up attack multiple times on allies turn. The best part of her kit is her Ultimate, which increases its damage output for every hit on the enemy. Additionally, her Ultimate deals True Damage, making it deal a massive chunk of damage irrespective of the enemy’s elemental resistances. Due to her versatile nature and sub-dps damage output, Cipher easily takes an S-tier spot in our tier list.

Lingsha

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Abundance

Lingsha is one of the best healers and can give AoE heals with all her actions. She is also being an offensive asset to her team. Her Skill, Ultimate, and summons deals damages to enemies while also healing allies. She also increases break damage received by enemies with her Ultimate.

Hysilens

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Nihility

Hysilens is the new DoT queen of Honkai Star Rail. She is an omni-DoT character, meaning that she applies every DoT in the game to enemies. This makes her extremely strong and useful against almost all enemy types in the game. However, one shortcoming of Hysilens is that you need Kafka in her team to make her deal consistent damage. If you love DoT teams, then Hysilens would be a must-pull for you.

Saber

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Destruction

Saber is one of the strongest Wind DPS in the game. Although she is a collab character, she is surprisingly strong with a kit geared towards her Ultimate damage. Having one of the highest Ultimate energy requirements, Saber’s Ultimate deals devastating damage to all enemies. There is a chance that she may not appear on the banners once the collab ends, so grab her now if you want a strong Wind DPS.

Archer

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Hunt

Archer is the other collab character in Honkai Star Rail, and he was given for free to players. However, unlike how typical free characters perform, Archer is one of the strongest DPS in the game. He can take multiple turns, deal devastating damage with each attack, and get a damage buff for every Skill point he consumes. Additionally, Archer’s passive increases the Skill Point threshold of the team.

Acheron

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Lightning
• Path: Nihility

Acheron has lost her SS-tier spot to Castorice, but she continues to be one of the strongest DPS characters in Honkai Star Rail. She can deal outrageously high damage numbers with barely any investment. Acheron’s Ultimate can deal AoE Toughness damage regardless of enemy weakness type, making her strong against any enemy type in the game. But with recent meta changes, she is slightly dependent on Jiaoqiu for her damage output, which is why she has dropped to S-tier.

Mydei

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Destruction

Mydei is one of the most unique characters in Honkai Star Rail as he is the only character that can self revive unlimited number of times as long as the requirements are met. Mydei can be easily made into an unkillable monster with his correct build, making him act as a DPS and a sustain at the same time. This character completely scales on HP, and hitting the 15k HP mark, with the proper build, can even allow him to clear some of the hardest MoC stages alone.

Ruan Mei

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Harmony

Ruan Mei is easily one of the best Support characters in Honkai Star Rail. Her kit is stacked with team-wide buffs, which mostly scale on allies’ stats instead of her stat. She gives allies massive damage and speed buffs. Additionally, with her ability of increasing team wide Break damage, she is a must-pick for most Break teams in the game. All of this makes her an easy pick for the S-tier support spot in the Honkai Star Rail character tier list.

Remembrance Trailblazer

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Remembrance

Remembrance Trailblazer is the first Remembrance unit added to Honkai Star Rail, and they are a great f2p Support unit. The trailblazers themselves are more of a support to the memosprite. Mem, memosprite of Remembrance Trailblazer, has a charge buildup, which can advance forward one designated ally by 100%. Furthermore, Remembrance Trailblazer can also deal True damage, which is damage that circumvents all elemental resistances, making them a very strong sub-dps option as well.

Sparkle

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Harmony

Sparkle is one of the strongest Harmony characters in Honkai Star Rail. She is perfect for DPS units that are Skill point negative or increase their damage output based on the Skill points consumed. She can also action forward an ally by 50% and increase their damage output. Her Ultimate is also very strong, giving five additional Skill points and increasing the Skill points limit to seven. Overall, she is a very strong support unit and only slightly misses out on her position in the SS tier.

Firefly

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Destruction

Hoyoverse didn’t disappoint us with Firefly, as she is currently the best Break DPS in the game. Her damage output can be on par with Acheron and Feixiao with the correct team compositions. She is among the strongest S-tier characters, due to her incredibly high damage potential and self-sustaining abilities. However, with recent meta changes going away from Break teams, Firefly has slightly stepped out of the spotlight. She is also very dependent on The Dahlia at the moment.

Fugue

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Nihility

Fugue is another very strong Nihility debuffer, and she can double the damage output of any break team. Although she isn’t as important to a break team’s viability as Ruan Mei is, Fugue’s ability to apply an exo-skeleton on enemies, allowing allies to deal break damage twice on one enemy, basically doubles the damage output. Furthermore, she can enable one character in the team to apply defense-reducing debuffs on enemies by attacking them, making her a very strong asset in any team.

Aglaea

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Lightning
• Path: Remembrance

Aglaea can dish out a ton of damage with her high-speed attacks. Aglaea’s main damage output comes from her memosprite, while she acts as a support and sub-DPS herself. She is a very strong DPS unit and her attacks can constantly increase her speed, allowing her to constantly take turns. However, currently, only Sunday is a dedicated support for Aglaea, which means she is only useful in very specific teams.

Bronya

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Harmony

Bronya was the most important character in Honkai Star Rail at one time, even considered an absolute must-pull. However, she has lost her place in the SS tier with the release of very strong Support units that are simply better than her. Still, she provides a ton of value to any team. Her Skill and Ultimate provide insane damage and a Crit rate buff to your main DPS. Bronya’s Skill also allows a 100% action forward to an ally, allowing your main DPS to take action twice in a cycle, but with a more significant attack buff the second time.

Luocha

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Abundance

Luocha is one of the best healers in Honkai Star Rail. He doesn’t have a multi-target heal, but his reactive heals are insane and more than make up for it. His Skill does a high single-target heal, but it also has a reactive heal function. When an ally’s HP drops to 50% or lower, this Skill is automatically triggered, and the character is healed. The reactive heal can trigger once every 2 turns. Luocha is a very solid healer to have in your team, and his reactive heals can save your characters during a bad enemy damage RNG.

Kafka

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Lightning
• Path: Nihility

Kafka has received new buffs to her kit, making her the best DoT enabler in the game. She now makes DoT teams viable, being the only consistent character for triggering DoTs. Playing a good DoT applier with her can let her deal massive DoT to any enemy. She has become stronger with the release of Hysilens, and together they can destroy every enemy in the game with ease. This is why she is in the S-tier of Honkai Star Rail character tier list.

Silver Wolf

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Nihility

Silver Wolf in Honkai Star Rail is a cheat code for its in-game mechanics. The game heavily relies on the weakness system to make the combat challenging and forces players to pull for different characters. If you have Silver Wolf, you no longer need to worry about having DPS of the same weakness type, as she can apply weaknesses to enemies using her Skill. After the buffs to her kit, she can now apply Defense reduction to all enemies with her Ultimate, which has made her regain her position in the S-tier.

Best HSR A Tier Characters

The A-tier characters in Honkai Star Rail are only good in specific teams or as alternatives to the above characters. These characters are still really good and can be an asset against the hardest challenges in the game.

Cerydra

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Harmony

Cerydra is a unique support in Honkai Star Rail who allows main DPS units to use their abilities twice at the same time. This ability makes Cerydra an insanely strong support for Phainon, allowing him to use his Meteor Shower twice. Other than that, she also buffs the allies’ damage, whom she targets with her Skill.

Harmony Trailblazer

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Harmony

Harmony Trailblazer is easily one of the best support units in the game, and they are completely free to play. This path of the Trailblazer can increase the break damage taken by enemies while also enabling them to take Super Break damage. With Break teams becoming the meta, Harmony Trailblazer quickly became a massive F2P support unit on their release in Penacony. There is not much else to talk about Harmony Trailblazer, other than that they are a solid support unit that can almost double the damage output of a break DPS.

Jiaoqiu

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Nihility

Jiaoqiu was a mixed bag for me initially, as Hoyoverse broke my heart by not giving us a Nihility sustain and instead creating another debuffing kit. However, over time, I have seen how useful Jiaoqiu’s kit can be in Honkai Star Rail, especially in Acheron teams. He is one of the best debuff appliers in the game, with the ability to constantly apply defense reduction debuffs on all enemies.

Topaz and Numby

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Fire
• Path: Hunt

Topaz is a very strong character and acts as both a Follow-up attack support and sub-DPS. Her kit revolves around using Numby to deal high Follow-up Single Target and Blast damage. She also buffs all Follow-up attack damage, and with Follow-up attack teams becoming the meta in Honkai Star Rail, the value of Topaz has skyrocketed. However, with recent support characters being more useful than Topaz, she has dropped down to the A-tier.

Pela

• Rarity: 4-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Nihility

Pela is another amazing 4-star Harmony character and one of the most powerful A-tier characters in Honkai Star Rail. Her kit mainly revolves around using her Ultimate, which does AoE damage and has a 100% chance to reduce all enemy defenses. Her skill also removes enemy buffs (except buffs that cannot be removed) and is very useful at stopping an enemy from doing massive enhanced attacks. She is also very Skill point positive.

Tingyun

• Rarity: 4-star
• Element: Lightning
• Path: Harmony

Tingyun is one of the strongestbuffers in the game, perfect for Hypercarry teams, and an amazing alternative for Bronya or Sunday. Her Skill buffs an ally’s ATK, while her Ultimate additionally buffs an ally’s Damage while regenerating 50 energy. She is also very Skill point positive, as her Skill has a long uptime. She is a 4-star character, so pulling for her and even getting her E6 is comparatively much easier.

Jingliu

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Ice
• Path: Destruction

Jingliu’s kit received new buffs recently, bringing her back into importance in Honkai Star Rail. The recent kit changes made her completely scale off HP, while also giving her an additional Transmigration stack. She now continues to be one of the strongest Ice DPS units in the game.

Dan Heng Imbibitor Lunae

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Destruction

Dan Heng Imbibitor Lunae, aka Dan Heng IL, deals a crazy amount of damage. His skill doesn’t deal any damage by itself; instead, it amplifies his basic attacks. Using his Skill doesn’t end his turn and can be used 3 times consecutively. The effect of his Enhanced Basic Attack changes based on the number of Skills used, dealing a 7-hit Blast attack at the 3rd Skill usage. With each hit of his attack, Dan Heng IL’s Talent further increases his Attack and damage output. However, he is very Skill Point negative and needs Sparkle in his team to consistently deal his full damage potential every turn.

Hunt March 7th

• Rarity: 4-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Hunt

Hunt March 7th was one of the unexpected turnarounds to the normal Hoyoverse meta, where only the protagonist gets new paths or playstyles. Instead, Honkai Star Rail decided to also give March 7th, one of the most popular characters in the game, another free-to-play path, and surprisingly, she is very good. Hunt March 7th is a really good F2P Sub-DPS unit, especially for characters that like doing a ton of attacks. She excels in Follow-up attack teams and can even replace Robin or Topaz in Feixiao teams without losing a ton of damage.

Boothill

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Hunt

Boothill is a dedicated Break DPS with a ton of damage potential to the extent of two-shotting bosses with his best build. However, Boothill requires a ton of investment and very specific teams to get the best out of him. His kit is also fairly tricky to play and is only for single-target scenarios. Boothill can excel in Apocalyptic Shadow but might struggle in the other game modes if you don’t have his best build and teams. Overall, Boothill is a solid A-tier DPS in Honkai Star Rail.

Rappa

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Erudition

Rappa is the third dedicated Break DPS added to the game, and she can deal really strong AoE break damage with her kit. As she is from the Erudition path, her damage output is mainly catered for AoE scenarios; however, she can still deal a consistent amount of single-target damage with her Ultimate. Many of Rappa’s attacks ignore the toughness of enemies, allowing her to effectively deal break damage against almost every enemy she comes across.

Jade

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Erudition

Jade is currently the only 5-star Erudition support character in the game, and her importance has increased after the release of The Herta. She can be very strong in Pure Fiction, constantly dishing out AoE attacks. Jade excels alongside The Herta and Argenti, providing the necessary support while also dealing a fair amount of damage herself. She also does Blast damage with her basic attack, making her very Skill Point positive. Overall, Jade is a really good character deserving of the A-tier spot, and she may enter the S-tier in the future if the Erudition characters see a return in the upcoming metas.

Clara

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Destruction

Clara is a very strong DPS unit who can also act as a Sustain due to her high damage reduction and aggro capabilities. She excels at drawing enemy attacks to herself and doing strong Follow-up blast attacks. Her counter-attacking play style can be a bit hard for starting players to fully grasp, but once correctly built, she can hyper carry through all the hardest content in the game.

Seele

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Quantum
• Path: Hunt

Seele reigned as the strongest DPS character in Honkai Star Rail until she was terribly power creeped. She is a DPS unit, but her use cases have diminished greatly over the versions. As a single-target damage dealer in the game, and having the Quantum damage, she is still a great DPS option against Swarm enemies. We have placed Seele in A-tier as she can still clear most of the challenges in the game.

Argenti

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Erudition

Argenti is one of the strongest Erudition DPS in Honkai Star Rail. Argenti’s Ultimate is layered twice, with one charge filling at 90 energy and another more substantial charge filling at 180. His 90-charge Ultimate is not noteworthy and only deals a good amount of AoE damage. However, after doing a stronger AoE damage, his 180-charge Ultimate adds 6 additional attacks to a single enemy. When facing a single elite enemy, the randomness no longer matters, and Argenti basically nukes the single target for insane damage.

Black Swan

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Nihility

Black Swan is a strong DoT DPS character who can be broken with the correct team composition in Genshin Impact. Her build relies on implementing stacks of Arcana, which depend on the number of DoT procs on an enemy. Black Swan synergizes extremely well with Kafka, and together, both of them can destroy any challenges in the game. However, she is still very niche to the DoT builds, which is why we have placed her in the A tier in our Honkai Star Rail tier list.

Blade

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Wind
• Path: Destruction

Blade is a very strong DPS unit who has received new buffs to his abilities. We would have placed him in the S-tier in our HSR character tier list if his playstyle weren’t highly reliant on having a good healer in the team. Blade’s damage scales are based on his Max HP and the HP loss during combat. His Skill basically converts his HP into Damage. Because of this, you need a strong healer in the team to play Blade viably.

Jing Yuan

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Lightning
• Path: Erudition

Jing Yuan is an Erudition DPS character with Follow-up attacks in Honkai Star Rail. His main strength is his Talent, which summons the Lightning Lord at the start of the battle. Lightning Lord has its own turn and can deal up to 10 hits (at max stack) of Bounce lightning damage, considered a Follow-up attack. Other than that, his Skill and Ultimate deals high AoE damage. Overall, a very strong unit for clearing multi-target and enemies that are weak to Lightning damage.

Yunli

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Physical
• Path: Destruction

Yunli is a counter-attacking menace and a slightly better version of Clara. She can sustain pretty effectively, but is slightly behind Clara. However, she deals blast counterattack damage, making her damage output consistently higher. If you like the counter-attack style of play, then Yunli is a great option to have on the team. Although she is still one of the best DPS units in Honkai Star Rail, the changing meta has forced her into the A-tier.

Welt

• Rarity: 5-star
• Element: Imaginary
• Path: Nihility

Welt is a great character and someone I really like playing. However, with the release of better support characters, Welt has become more of an afterthought. Welt’s kit is very unique as he applies Slow on enemies with his Skill, forcing them to delay their turns, while his Ultimate imprisons enemies, making them skip turns completely. Building Welt properly can stop enemies from taking any action and is a genuinely fun way to play. Welt is easily an A-tier character in Honkai Star Rail, as he has strong debuffing and sub DPS capabilities.

Best HSR B Tier Characters

The B-tier characters in Honkai Star Rail are made up of characters who are only good as second alternatives. These characters don’t have enough value alone to affect a team fight and rely on other strong characters to make an impact. However, characters in this tier are still good and can be effective in very specific scenarios in end game.

This tier is filled with characters like Moze, Serval, Asta, Gepard, Herta, Himeko, and more such characters. Characters like Herta, Serval, and Himeko are extremely good for Pure Fiction, but fail terribly in other game modes. Other than that, Gepard and Baily are also good sustains that can keep your team alive well into end-game content.

You should not prioritize pulling for these characters and only build them if you have already finished spending resources on your main characters.

Best HSR C Tier Characters

The Honkai Star Rail C-tier characters are only good for early to mid-game content. These characters are not even worth as second alternatives. The only time you may play them in end-game content is when you want a mono-comp team and are running short on characters.

This tier is filled with characters like Yukong, Misha, Hanya, Luka, and Yanqing. The only standout character on this tier is Yanqing, who is a 5-star character. He is actually a good damage dealer, but requires a good shielder to be effective.

Other than that, characters like Natasha and Preservation on March 7th are great for boosting your early game progress.

Best HSR D Tier Characters

The D-tier characters in our Honkai Star Rail tier list are the absolute worst characters in Honkai Star Rail. These characters bring no value to any team, and you should not spend one dime on them. Every resource spent on these characters will be outright wasted.

The characters that make up this list are Sushang, Destruction Trailblazer, Hook, and Arlan. These characters are not even good up to mid-game content. The best you can get out of them is early on, but even the other free characters you get would be a better option than these.

So, this is our Honkai Star Rail tier list. This list was created after carefully analyzing each character and their kit for early, mid, and late-game content. We would love to know your thoughts about our tier list and your favorite characters. Share your opinion with us in the comment section.