Path of Exile 2 tier list for best classes
Who is the best at staying alive in Path of Exile 2.
In Path of Exile 2, by picking one of the best classes in the game, you're sure to have all the needed tools regardless of the challenge you face.
When you create a character in Path of Exile 2, you must choose one of the available classes, which imposes certain limitations and playstyles - at least for the initial portion of the game.
Deciding which class you're going to play with is one of the most difficult choices for new players. To assist you, we listed the best classes in Path of Exile 2 in a tier list, and we have also put together a list of the best classes for beginners.
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Path of Exile 2 tier list for best classes
The classes are the heart of a game like Path of Exile 2 and deciding which one you should start with is not an easy task. You're going to spend a considerable number of hours leveling it up, completing the campaign and looking for the right pieces of gear to make the perfect build. So, learning which classes are the best ones in the game will make committing yourself to such an investment of time less stressful.
Unlike the tier list of best classes for beginners – which you should check out below if this is your first time playing the game – we have structured this list considering other criteria that, in our opinion, make a class better than others. First: the class damage potential. All classes in Path of Exile 2 are capable of killing difficult enemies and have access to powerful skills, but some of them are unquestionably more potent than others.
The second aspect we are considering for this list is how demanding the class is when it comes to putting a strong build together. Some classes may depend too much on gear and rare drops for you to reach their peak of power. On the other hand, others can reach the endgame with the most basic build they have access to.
The difficulty in playing the class to its full potential is the last criteria we are using to make this list. Unlike a simple discussion of whether a class is complex or not to play, we want to think about how complex it is to actually see the high numbers each class promises us.
Now, here's the tier list of best classes in Path of Exile 2:
As of right now, no class seems to be able to beat Monk when it comes to being just too strong. Despite the considerably slow beginning, Monk grows to become a fast-paced fighter that can melt any boss's health bar from the moment you get the Tempest Bell. Just place the bell and you're good to go! Monk doesn't require rare items to work. All you need is to find a quarterstaff with good stats to make this class shine.
Right after Monk we have the Witch. The master of puppets in Path of Exile 2 exceeds when it comes to damage output mostly because of how hard their small army of skeletons can hit. Building the perfect Witch becomes a problem only in terms of acquiring more Spirit points in other pieces of equipment besides the sceptre. But in general, you only need to focus on passive skills and upgrading your skeleton minions to stay strong. The Witch's damage takes a little longer than Monk hits enemies, but the advantage of this class is you can only worry about staying alive and cast one or two skills regularly while all your minions do the heavy work.
In third we have the other casting class, the Sorceress. That this is a strong class capable of making the most difficult bosses in the game feel like regular enemies as they fill the battlefield with Frost Walls is not a surprise. However, to set up all you need to cause lots of damage takes longer than the Witch, and there is still the chance of you missing one or two attacks. Pretty easy to put together a strong build, although a more intense class to play than the Witch.
Mercenary is in fourth but don't underestimate this class. With impressive numbers, it can wipe a whole screen of enemies almost instantaneously. At the same time, putting the perfect build together will take you lots of time farming items and praying to the RNG gods for perfect rolls. Unfortunately, Mercenary has only a couple of really strong builds, giving you fewer options than others. And it takes some levels until you don't need to worry about where you're shooting grenades. But when it goes boom, there are only a few who can stay alive.
The fifth class in our list is the Ranger. Don't let this class's position fool you. It can be as strong as the Mercenary, melting enemies with Lightning reactions and suffocating them with poisonous gas. When it comes to building it up, you might have a hard time finding the perfect pieces since a considerable number of builds for this class go for Unique items. Ranger is not dependent on them, but these rare items will help you reach the same high numbers previous classes do (and they don't need Unique items!) Lastly, the Ranger in general requires a lot of preparation to actually deal damage, shooting arrows around the arena to trigger reactions.
The class found in the lowest position of our tier list is the Warrior. Our big guy is slow, sturdy, and can cause lots of damage, but making this class work on the same level as the others is not easy. There are powerful build options and solid ones to finish the campaign. Even so, the real damage is usually hidden behind complicated, non-intuitive synergies between skills. In addition, Warrior always depends on some annoying preparation to cause damage to enemies, like boosting rage or breaking the enemy's armor.
Path of Exile 2 tier list for best beginners class
If you're starting the game and have no previous experience, the best beginners classes in Path of Exile 2 are:
Below, you will find an explanation on why they have been listed in this order.
Warrior
At the top of this list, we find the Warrior, one of the two melee classes available so far in the game. This is our typical tank, physical damage dealer which compensates their lack of explosive skills with consistency and a long bar of HP. Warrior is the most simple class to play in the game with skills easy to use and be effective. Most of them involve hitting enemies while slamming the ground with a large mace. Since this is one of the most resilient classes in the game, Warrior is not intensively punished by mistakes like taking a sequence of attacks from an enemy.
The Warrior's kit comes with a considerable number of single-target skills and some area-of-effect abilities. Warrior's totems, by creating decoys to call enemies' attention, make it the perfect class for beginners, who will find themselves free to hit enemies. Unfortunately, Warrior lacks more expressive skills to handle groups of enemies quickly like others, making traversing tight corridors in gloomy mansions a slow process, but nothing this strong class can't handle.
Sorceress
The second best beginners class in Path of Exile 2 is the Sorceress, a position that this class earns due to the simplicity of its kit and damage potential. By using spells of three different elements to leave no safe spots on the battlefield, the Sorceress is capable of putting enemies in a dangerous position. This is the class with the most explosive area-of-effect skills. From walls of fire, and electrical floating globes to freezing orbs, Sorceress won't let enemies escape.
The best part of this kit is that only a couple of abilities are skill shots, putting less pressure on you to aim before casting spells. You can easily place an ice wall or use Spark to hit multiple enemies without too much work. By making the attack as a Sorceress a simple process, the game gives you more room to worry about mechanics and escaping deadly attacks. Even all these positive aspects can compensate for the class's lack of mobility and fragility. You may die pretty fast if caught in the wrong place and some enemies won't give you the time to cast your spells to protect yourself. The fragile condition of the Sorceress makes it a more punitive class than the Warrior.
Monk
It's really impressive to watch the Monk, the second melee class in Path of Exile 2, fight packs of enemies using a quarterstaff and elemental abilities. The capability of this class to cause damage is phenomenal, regardless of how many enemies they are facing. Right from the start, Monk have access to skills that allow them to keep some distance and crowd-control their opponents long enough for the Monk to build up buffs and special attacks, which adds the effects to basic attacks, like shooting projectiles of wind.
Monk is a class, different from the previous two, that has a higher skill ceiling. As a melee class, Monk requires that you stay close to enemies most of the time to effectively damage them. The class benefits from keeping a high ratio of hits to pressure enemies and not losing momentum. Luckily it is a sturdier class than the next three, which improves their chance of surviving when caught by a powerful attack. After you learn how to fight against certain enemies and the best combination of skills for this class, you will have a powerful class on your hands.
Ranger
In Path of Exile 2, at least for now, there is no other class as agile and swift as Ranger. This bow user is capable of never stopping walking to shoot an arrow, kiting enemies to their deaths. This class comes with electrical arrows, poisoning arrows, ice arrows and regular - but extremely powerful - arrows. You have a multitude of attacks to use against enemies and explore different weaknesses. Besides, as a long-range fighter, Ranger is capable of staying safe and quickly responding to mechanics, giving you room to breathe.
Ranger is, however, more complicated to play with than Monk because most of this class's abilities are skill shots. In other words, you need to aim the arrow while walking and worry about hitting enemies. Thus, missing attacks is an issue that can stress out new players who are still trying to understand how to stay alive. And, although Ranger has an escape ability that performs a backward jump and freezes enemies, this is a quite squishy class.
Witch
Similar to a necromancer, the Witch is a class that focuses on using minions - cool skeleton soldiers - to fight for them while they stay from afar applying powerful curses to debuff enemies. Witch is a powerful class that is capable of overcoming obstacles with waves of minions and damage-over-time skills that spread like a disease. Since minions will most of the time call the enemy's attention, the Witch is capable of staying safe to use their skills and support their minions.
One issue players might have with this class is exactly what makes it strong, the minions. Because all of them can die if they take too much damage, the Witch becomes extremely vulnerable. The class lacks powerful skills to directly damage enemies or an escape ability to buy some time until your hellish companions put their bones together. The class also depends on corpses to make smaller minions appear, but, in situations like boss fights, this powerful tool becomes difficult to put to use. In addition, while Witch is not a melee class, you won't have the range other long-distance classes have, putting you closer to danger than you would like.
Mercenary
Have you ever thought about what it would be like to hunt demons or other fantastical creatures with a shotgun or an assault rifle? Mercenary makes your dream come true and it does so in a very fun way. Mercenary is an extremely strong class that each skill is actually a unique kind of ammo that you can load your crossbow with. You can have powerful short-distance attacks with a shotgun-like shell, a long-distance sniper-like shot, and even grenades to launch. All that is mixed with elemental damage, mobility and the capacity to stay away from danger.
Whereas the ammo mechanics make the Mercenary a fun and powerful class, they also end up turning it into the most skill-demanding class in Path of Exile 2 so far. The whole idea with this class is to create a combo of skills - which are skill shots! - to burst enemies, which forces you to preload specific ammo before committing to effectively attack enemies. The necessity of quickly using a determined sequence of skills might sound daunting for new players. And missing a combo because you couldn't aim correctly makes your life too hard, because there is a short reload time after you've used the skills, leaving you extremely vulnerable to enemies. You can still shoot from afar, keeping your distance and finding time to reload, but your damage potential decreases considerably.
Path of Exile 2 best beginners classes explained
The classes available in Path of Exile 2 vary in style and skill sets. While personal taste is a determining factor when understanding a class as good or bad, there are more objective aspects that can be considered and will allow for a more generalized conversation about them. As of the time writing this article, we only have access to the six classes released with the game's Early Access. Based on the information we have now - and not considering Ascendancy classes - we have come up with this list of best classes in Path of Exile 2 for beginners.
To put this list together, we considered the skill ceiling of playing a class and the potential of the class when it comes to causing damage. Taking into consideration only these two points to structure a tier list might seem like a simplification of the complexity each of these classes - and macro elements present in the game - has. However, we believe they are more than enough to give you a good idea of what are the best classes if you're a beginner in Path of Exile 2.
Damage is an important factor in Path of Exile 2 as it regulates how fast enemies are killed and when you are out of danger. On the other hand, the difficulty in playing a class must be put into perspective to see how demanding it is and if it pays off. If the learning curve is too high and causing consistent and effective damage is too demanding, an unfamiliar player may feel discouraged to keep playing the game. A high-skill ceiling must also compensate for its difficulty with something else beyond damage. After all, if there is an easier class to play that is capable of causing equal or higher quantities of damage, why one would pick the most difficult class?
Even so, besides how complex a class is or how high their damage per second is, you should consider picking the class you believe is going to be the most enjoyable to play. If you don't know what classes are available in the game or their Ascendancy classes, be sure to give our All Classes in Path of Exile 2 explainer a read.
Good luck in Path of Exile 2!