Genshin Impact: The 10 best characters for the Spiral Abyss

Loved by some and hated by many, the Spiral Abyss is the current endgame content for Genshin Impact, requiring you to draw the best of your favorite characters to clear the rooms in a time challenge.

While some events can be arguably harder (take the recent Legend of the Vagabond Sword for example), these can usually be done in an easier mode. The Abyss is set to a permanent, dreadful difficulty.

It is one of the best sources of Primogems for F2P players. The first 8 floors can be done while you naturally progress into the game, while the last 4 pose a much bigger challenge and reset their rewards every 15 days.

Also, their rooms are updated from time to time, so the same strategy may not work every time.

The best characters for the Abyss

The Abyss forces you to build 2 different teams, and sometimes you’ll need to build a specific character for a certain room.

While every character, from Amber to Hu Tao, has the potential to clear all 12 floors, some characters are naturally better on most (if not all) rooms. 

Here, we’ll show you the 10 best characters for the Spiral Abyss, ranked from both their utility and damage. While you should always consider things like the current Blessing or the floor’s Disorder when building a team, these characters can usually do well with or without those buffs and can fit in almost any team.

READ MORE: Genshin Impact: 5 tips to prepare for the Inazuma release

10 – Xiangling

Given for free by clearing the first 3 Abyss floors, Xiangling is a great help for any floor. She works best as a sub DPS, but can be made into a physical DPS with Crescent Pike, while still dealing considerable pyro damage.

Since her ascension stat is Elemental Mastery, she’s one of the best characters to create some powerful Reactions. Since pyro is usually a must for Abyss, she’s always a solid choice.

9 – Diona

People usually sleep on the Cat’s Tail bartender, but she’s probably the best 4-star unit to be added to the game since its release. Her damage is lacklustre, but she compensates for it with a semi-permanent Shield and some great healing capacity. 

All that she needs is HP and some Energy Recharge to work well, which makes her a cheap character to build. Her ultimate will also periodically apply cryo, being great for some pyro reactions or for physical DPS like Razor or Keqing. 

8 – Jean

The definition of a Jack of all trades in Genshin. Jean can do everything: Heal, be a main DPS, sub DPS and give lots of utility for your team if you have some constellations.

The problem is, as you imagine, she’s not the best in anything she does. But this does not mean she’s bad. 

Her ultimate has one of the best heal bursts in the game and also cleanses negative effects. She’s always a great character to fit the needs of any team, especially if you want to show off her new swimsuit look.

7 – Xingqiu

Seen as a bad character during the game’s launch, Xingqiu quickly fell into people’s flavor when they noticed his incredible utility.

He can give small heals, grant you interrupt resistance, damage reduction, apply constant hydro on enemies and deal incredible damage with his Elemental Skill (which has one of the highest multipliers in the game)

Different from Barbara, his self hydro application only happens once, so there’s no danger of being perma frozen from cryo enemies.

He’s also a great holder for the Noblesse Oblige set if you need one, and his Burst is the best friend for many DPS like Hu Tao, Diluc and Klee.

6 – Xiao

Hyped since the start of the game, Xiao lived to its expectations. The Vigilant Yaksha is one of the best DPS characters in the game, while also not being so difficult to build since he already gets Critical Rate from ascending.

His high damage combined with superior mobility can easily compensate for the fact he loses HP during his Burst.

In the last few Blessing rotations, he has been one of the best characters for the Abyss since they all favored Swirl reactions.

But even without these, he’s always a solid choice. Anemo doesn’t have a disadvantage against anything, so his damage will always be consistent.

READ MORE: Genshin Impact 2.0: All about the new weapons

5 – Hu Tao

Burying the enemies in her way, Hu Tao has the biggest damage potential in the game, rivalling Eula. Her advantage is being able to utilize elemental reactions and being more agile since she’s a polearm user.

With that said, she’s also pyro, which is naturally a strong choice for high damage.

She has a similar gameplay style to Xiao, being a “berserker” who gets stronger when she loses HP. But her Burst makes her safer, and with a good team, comp with shields and (not so many) heals, she’s not as risky as she sounds.

4 – Ganyu

Cocogoat: The legendary Adepti beast. Ganyu was on a whole new level from previous characters since her launch, and she still holds that throne.

Her charged shot has a third level that does extra AoE damage when it explodes, and both hits can benefit from Elemental Reactions. That alone makes her damage reach stupid levels.

Being even more complete, her Elemental Skill has a taunt, and her Burst has the same Cooldown and duration time, so it can be technically infinite.

While Hu Tao can deal more damage, Ganyu’s skills can be used to support other characters (like Hu Tao herself), making her a more versatile choice.

3 – Zhongli

The Geo lord was introduced in the game in a bad state. The Geo element itself was also not the best. After many complaints, Geo was reworked and Zhongli was buffed, becoming one of the strongest characters in the game.

His Burst can pack a good punch and also petrify enemies, while his shield will decrease the surrounding enemies resistance.

His shield also scales with HP, so you can just build your tankiest Zhongli ever and have an unbreakable shield with a low 10s cd.

His other skills also scale from HP, so he can still deal damage even when built defensively. A complete character in concept, looks and skill kit. 

2 – Bennett

Another initially hated character, Bennett has now one of the biggest fanbases in the game. Sadly, he’s still unlucky. He makes up for that with one of the best Bursts in the game.

With his first constellation, he’s able to simultaneously heal and buff allies and his Skill has a low cooldown. Build some ER and he’ll easily be able to spam his Burst.

He’s often considered a 5-star in disguise. You can basically build full HP to give him extra healing, use a good Sword to get more damage from his ult and you’re good to go.

Easy to get due to being 4-star, cheap to build and useful in literally every team. You could not ask him for more.

1 – Venti

The undisputed king of the Abyss since its release. Since the Abyss is basically a time challenge, Venti trivializes most of the rooms.

Gathering all enemies while also dealing lots of damage makes any team that has Venti a lot faster. Not to mention that his Skill is also useful for disrupting enemies and recharging energy.

Surely one of the best characters for the Abyss, if not the best one. Even when enemies can’t be gathered, his damage is always welcome, and since he’s usually with the Viridescent Venerer set, he’ll also buff your other characters’ damage. If you haven’t got him even on his rerun, make sure to grab him if he ever comes back.

READ MORE: Genshin Impact 2.0 Leaks: All the new enemies in Inazuma

Honorable mention – Sucrose

The good and old “budget Venti”. While they have similar functions, Sucrose is much more focused on buffing her allies and creating powerful Elemental Reactions.

Having both Venti and Sucrose on separate teams is a good idea, but she’s not the same as him, and there will be some rooms where she’s not a good choice.

1.6 Blessings favored her a lot, making her one of the most powerful characters during these phases.

She can always be used on Reaction focused teams, and will always be a good choice. But she’s not a perfect fit for every team, while many of the others on the list are.

Don’t feel bad if you don’t own some of the characters here. These are the generally good choices and not the mandatory ones.

Besides, the Spiral Abyss can be very stressful, so the best thing you can do is enjoy the run with your favorite characters. It’s always good to see some underrated character like Xinyan rocking her way through the floors.

Genshin Impact is currently at the end of its 1.6 version, “Midsummer Island Adventure”, and can be played for free on mobile devices, Playstation 4, Playstation 5 and Pcs on both miHoYo’s official launcher and Epic Games Store. A Nintendo Switch version is stated to be in development.