While the MCU continues to dominate all manners and sizes of screen, let's check in with the mighty roster of heroes the past decade and a half have produced and pick out the most powerful ones.
While the Avengers seem to be gone at this point in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the next generation of heroes are stepping up to the plate — like Shang-Chi, Sam Wilson, and Kate Bishop (and even 2012 Loki). But who are the pinnacle performers? Who's the almighty?
Here's a Top 10 list of the most powerful heroes in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. You may think you know most of the crusaders in this batch, but some will definitely come as a surprise. Especially since Captain America, Spider-Man, Black Widow, and other fan favorites aren't gonna place. Super-soldiers, web-slingers, and expert (former) assassins are definitely part of the MCU's lifeblood, but… the mightiest? Not really.
Read on for our picks. And when you're done here, be sure to check out the Best Marvel Heroes too.
10. Ant-Man
Okay, here's the thing. Scott Lang's adventures, aside from his participation in Avengers: Endgame, have been mostly played for chuckles. They had important stakes, but still… lighter stakes. Scott makes with the quips and flies around on ants and that's all very silly, but Pym Particles are no freaking joke. Anyone with that suit is capable of hugely powerful things. Being able to shrink that small, to even microscopic Quantum Realm size, makes one nearly unstoppable. Look at all the damage multiverse Hank Pym did in What If…? He took out all the Avengers!
And we haven't even mentioned being able to expand into a giant. Scott was the only person in the Endgame fight capable of battling those snaking Chitauri warships… with his fists. Anyhow, it's kind of a good thing Scott is a goofy goober with a sweet heart because this tech is top of the charts. God forbid he ever does decide to fly up someone's posterior.
9. Star-Lord
Coming in right ahead of Ant-Man is another delightful dope who, more or less, doesn't know the firepower he's packing. Peter Quill is half-Celestial. Holding the Power Stone did not make him instantly turn to space dust. He was capable of going toe-to-toe with his father, who was a freaking Living Planet. It might have even been a better idea for Peter to use the stones and snap his fingers in Endgame since odds are he would have survived where poor Tony Stark didn't.
But look, we just don't know Peter's full potential yet. And neither does he. But much like Wanda Maximoff was for so long, Star-Lord is still in his chrysalis stage. Part of him comes from the absolute oldest life and power of the universe, and it would be insane to not recognize his dormant dominance.
8. Druig
Had things gone a bit differently in Marvel's Eternals, Ikaris would have probably filled this spot. Designed to be the strongest of his group, and even likened to Superman (who we now know exists as a fictional character in the MCU!), Ikaris was the Eternals' main champion. But with him out of the race, that leaves — well? — Druig.
All the Eternals are capable of wildly wonderful things, but Druig's ability to control multiple minds at once made him the only character who had to rein in his own powers and resist the urge to course-correct human history whenever he saw it going down a regrettable path. Druig could place people under a spell and, in an instant, end all wars — but he was forced to keep his nose clean. Ultimately he'd wind up taking himself off the game board completely, living in a jungle village of his own mad design. Which is something the most powerful Avenger recently did, but we'll get to that later…
Oh, and Druig can make a giant Celestial take a nap too. Okay, his powers need to be amplified to do so but Celestials can be stubborn as heck when they’re being violently birthed from the core of a thriving planet.
7. Vision
Granted, we never really saw “peak Vision” in the MCU, given all he can do (and the fact that he was created and powered by an actual Infinity Stone). He vanquished an already-trashed Ultron fairly easily, but after that there were a lot of stop-starts for this vibranium-made mixtape of J.A.R.V.I.S.
He got lost in the mix in Civil War and then barely got out of the gates in Infinity War (before getting killed twice). On WandaVision, he existed in two different, yet equally-disturbing, ways… but his powers weren’t even the focus of that show.
Vision’s a heroic hodgepodge of superpowers who can, ultimately, decimate just about anyone in his path. From invulnerability to density manipulation to firing blasts from the Mind Stone stuck to his forehead (when he had it), Vision's a bastion of battle-ready brutality. We only ever scratched the surface with him though. Perhaps more Vis awaits us…
6. Iron Man
Due to the mind-blowing genius of Tony Stark, Iron Man has been an ever-evolving Avenger, shifting from welded and soldered-together parts to practically invisible nano-tech that can envelope Tony's body in seconds.
Iron Man always has a thousand tricks up his sleeve and, in the heat of battle, always seems to have an aggressive answer to every critical question. Sure, Tony's made his fair share of goofs, all in the name of trying to protect our world from cosmic invaders and the like, and when push comes to shove he's just a mortal man in a can, but his brain has practically been the MVP of the MCU since the start.
For real though, this guy cracked time-travel in couple of hours. On a whim. Others might have the strength to topple buildings or blast their bodies through spaceships, but Tony’s intellect is so off-the-charts that he can science his way out of almost everything.
5. Doctor Strange
Doctor Strange is definitely a hero whose stock has gone up since his first movie. Now it’s practically through the roof following Spider-Man: No Way Home, with the surly surgeon-turned-sorcerer heading into the Multiverse of Madness. Strange is a fantastically formidable magic-user who has the potential to wield and weaponize some truly terrifying s***. Most recently, we saw him try to seal up violent rips in the fabric of reality all by himself in an attempt to save Earth from destruction by a multiversal tidal wave.
Marvel’s What If…? continues to be a key component here when it comes to accessing powers. Much like how it showed us all the damage that could be done with Hank Pym’s tech, the series also gave us the dark and demonic Strange Supreme: a grieving and tortured version of Strange whose obsession with reversing death transformed him into a sinister spell-caster of otherworldly proportions. Like some other heroes on this list, Strange has access to limitless power, at his fingertips, but doesn’t pursue it due to his conscience.
4. Hulk
It's never actually been settled, definitively, whether Hulk is stronger than Thor, but you could make the argument, given how much of Hulk's power is tied to his rage, that he easily has the potential to be the strongest Avenger in terms of pure muscle and might. It's just that – well – Hulk's a lot. A LOT a lot. For Hulk to come out, a bunch of failsafes need to be in place. Not to mention that at one point Hulk decided that Hulk no want to come out. He's the strongest team member, but he's also, apparently, the most fickle.
If there were fewer restrictive behaviors and peculiarities of spirit, Hulk could be so much more than the wild card he is. As it stands though, he still possesses ungodly strength and, as best we can tell, an inability to die. Last we saw of Banner, at the end of Shang-Chi, he had un-Hulked himself. And this was after Endgame gave us Smart Hulk, the most balanced Banner has ever been as his alter-ego. So the future of Hulk just might be the best of both worlds.
3. Thor
Thor's had character flaws, family flaws, hair flaws, and an arc that's involved him morphing from an arrogant meathead unworthy of wielding his own hammer to a mindful warrior who sacrifices all of Asgard to save his own people. But there's also a reason why more than one MCU film has saved his introduction until the third act fight, creating a massive crowd-pleasing moment.
Thor's raw Asgardian power, durability, speed, and nifty knack for being able to create game-changing lightning charges out of thin air allow him to soar in from above and completely clear a battlefield. Dude's over a thousand years old and has bested Dark Elves, Frost Giants, galactic fire demons, and a plate of hard-earned, artery-clogging shawarma. He's also withstood the heat of a dying star. Yeah, he's a keeper.
2. Captain Marvel
Captain Marvel, who got her awesome cosmic abilities from the Space Stone itself, is so powerful that the MCU’s "solve for x" is to have her off-world most of the time. Because if she was just a champion for Earth, no bad s*** would go down ever. She literally has to be away, helping out other people elsewhere, for actual dangers to still threaten our planet from time to time.
In Endgame, she turned the tide immediately by flying through Thanos’ entire backup armada, allowing the Avengers to regain ground and triumph. Like Superman, her greatest enemy is distance, in that it actually takes her time to fly from one corner of the galaxy to the other. During that time, villains may flourish. Once she arrives though, it’s time to close up shop. Even Ronin, when confronted with Captain Marvel back in the '90s, was like, “Er, I just remembered. I have a thing. I gotta do a thing.” And then bamf’d his ship the hell out of there.
1. Scarlet Witch
Wanda was always destined to be the most powerful of the entire lot. It wasn’t until WandaVision though, where she was officially christened as the Scarlet Witch (of prophecy, apparently), that her storyline started to pay dividends and her powers began to unravel in a profoundly diabolical way. As it turns out, the HYDRA Mind Stone experiments she volunteered for only worked to awaken (and enhance?) the abilities she had inside her already, presumably from her bloodline.
Wanda can basically do anything she… can think. That’s an impossible hand to beat. She can read minds, control minds, move things, crush things, and… most importantly… create things. Wanda has control over reality itself. As a fighter on the field, she can take you out with aggressive magic — like how she would have quickly killed Thanos in Endgame, straight up, if he hadn’t weaseled his way out — but the most important power to focus on here is how she can just change. Freaking. Everything. And now, as we head deeper into Phase 4 and beyond, we’ll see if Wanda’s mastery of the Darkhold has made her even more of an unbeatable, infinite force. Because let's face it – there's no way she's actually dead after the events of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
Who do you think is the most powerful Marvel hero in the MCU? Vote in the poll above, and let's discuss in the comments! You can also take a look at our list of all upcoming Marvel movies to see what's coming down the pipeline.
Note: This story originally ran in March 2019. It was updated on September 27, 2022.
Source: IGN.com The Most Powerful Characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe: The Heroes