For the toughest battles in World of Light and Spirit Board, you’re going to need the best Spirit team for any situation. Spirits can grant all sorts of different buffs and bonuses to your fighter, such as starting off the fight with a baseball bat, or even extra jumps.
You may want to use your favorite character’s Spirit, but sometimes you need the perfect team for those extra tough challenges. Here’s our picks for the 10 best Spirit Teams in Smash Ultimate for the hardest challenges Ultimate has to offer.
1: Team “There is no Challenge. Only F-Smash”
- Primary: Medusa
- Support: Walhart
Spirit battle requiring a bit too much thinking? Tired of taking knockback in this platform fighting game? Simply use this combo on a character with a large F-Smash, like Ike, Sephiroth, or especially Ganondorf, and you not only won’t take any knockback from attacks, but you’ll also defeat your target in 2 or 3 attacks.
- Medusa starts you off with the Giant condition, both increasing your range is well as increasing your damage and knockback by more than 50%
- Medusa also boasts one of the highest attack stats of any primary Spirit, so you’re already guaranteed an increase on the damage you deal
- Thanks to Walhart’s ability, you won’t start taking knockback from any attacks until around 80%. Even smash attacks!
- Though your movement speed is slowed by Walhart, you can mitigate this by rolling or using a dash attack, which are unaffected in their range.
2: Team “If It Ain’t Broke”
- Primary: Metal Face
- Support: Weapon Attack Up (i.e Robobot Armor, Hard Man, ect.)
Sort of a diet version of the previous team if you haven’t unlocked Medusa yet, this combo also starts you off not only with the Giant condition, but also the Metal condition. Using this team alongside any fighter with a long range F-Smash and a weapon will give you exactly what you’re looking for; a win in 4 or less attacks
- Starting off with the Giant effect instantly makes any build into a top tier, with your extended reach and increased damage output.
- Though not as powerful as Super Armor, being metal means that you’ll be taking little to no knockback up until about 80%, even if it may knock you out of charging your F-Smash.
- The added bonus of increased weapon damage combines with the damage multiplier of being giant for some explosive results.
3: Team “The Double Jump 0-to-Death”
- Primary: Shaymin (Sky Forme)
- Support: Light Weight (i.e Dancer, Boo Mario), Screw-Attack Equipped (i.e Sandshrew, Top Man)
It’s kind of incredible that this combo was even left in the game. By training your Shaymin Spirit in one of the dojo’s that increases jump height or movement, this team allows you to beat pretty much any Spirit with two consecutive Screw-Attack jumps. So long as they take knockback, this one kinda feels like cheating.
- The combination of an upgraded and trained Shaymin with the Light Weight buff means that, with most characters, your double jump will be reaching the top blast zone.
- The Screw-Attack badge gives each of your first two jumps a hit-box, dragging your opponent up with you as you jump.
- Given that they take damage and receive knockback with every jump, the combination of these two traits means that, as long as both Screw-Attack jumps connect, the opponent will be knocked out of the top blast zone almost every time.
- The only major setback of this team is that some Spirits come equipped with Super Armor at first, holding back this team’s potential.
4: Team “You Coming Down From There?”
- Primary: Additional Mid-Air Jump (i.e Devil Jin, Queen Elincia)
- Support: Instadrop (i.e Moosh, Rocky)
This one is less broken for getting you wins in World of Light, and better for stalling out the timer when fighting your friends or beating certain Spirits on the Spirit Board. But in this regard, it is second to none. By specifically using Mega Man and jumping to the top blast zone, the combination of Mega Man’s unique recovery and Instadrop make it semi-impossible for anything to hit you, especially in the hands of a good player.
- The Additional Mid-Air Jump is important to helping you escape your foe as soon as possible, getting you up to the top blast zone before they have a chance to damage you.
- Mega Man’s recovery has him jump off his robot dog Rush, but by using Instadrop you are able to immediately bounce off of Rush, refreshing your jumps and ability to use Rush again.
- By repeatedly bouncing on Rush only to instadrop back onto his back, you can stay up in the air infinitely, to the fury of both your friends and CPU’s alike.
5: Team “Knockback Who?”
- Primary: Soma Cruz
- Support: Gold Mario
This team combination takes advantage of the fact that Neutral Spirits have, as you would guess, neutral matchups against every kind of Spirit. Soma Cruz is the strongest of the Neutral Primary Spirits, and combined with the Super Armor granted by Gold Mario you will quickly find yourself dealing unstoppable damage with whatever fighter you choose to use.
- Soma Cruz grants not only the best stats of any Neutral Primary Spirit, but also the Giant Killer trait for some tougher matchups against Spirits with the Giant condition
- As explained earlier with Medusa and Walhart, having Super Armor means that you are pretty much safe against any attack up until the later percents so long as it isn’t a grab.
- With these traits combined, you can throw caution to the wind with this team combo. So long as the opponent isn’t too gimmicky, this is the build that’s best for people who actually want to play the game as they defeat Spirits.
6: Team “The Ultimate Lifeform”
- Primary: Hades (Final Form)
- Support: Support: Trade off Ability (i.e Majora’s Mask, Garon, ect) Physical Attacks Up (i.e Sonic the Werehog, Warrior)
This team combo may seem bad at first, starting you off with 60% at the beginning of the match. However, the benefits more than make up for this, as pretty much every attribute of your character is vastly improved thanks to the Trade off Ability of your Primary and Support Spirits. With any added buffs you can get from your other Support slot, you are going to be dishing out some insane damage with this team build.
- Hades is already a great Defensive Spirit should you need that for a matchup, and the incredible buff he gives your abilities is well worth the damage you take.
- While stacking Support buffs lead to diminishing returns, having the Trade off Ability effect on both your Primary and 1 of your Support Spirits brings your damage and knockback to even crazier levels without seeing the effect lessened too much.
- While pretty much any buff on this build is helpful to have, Physical Attacks Up is good for any fighter who doesn’t use a weapon, giving some extra oomph to an already powerful team.
7: Team “Ladder Combo 2.0”
- Primary: Additional Mid-Air Jump (i.e Devil Jin, Queen Elincia)
- Support: Ho-oh
This team works best with characters who have a consistent ladder combo, that being a chain of Up-Airs that often end in an Up Special to claim a stock. With this team combo, you will no longer be limited by how many platforms you have to refresh your jumps. Instead, the ladder combo ends when you decide it does.
- With this team combo, you will have four total jumps before you have to touch the ground again, and even more if you pick a character with a multi jump
- Though this combo isn’t as game breaking as the one’s above it, getting your opponent into an Up-Air loop can still do some great damage in a Versus Match.
- Plus, the added benefits of increased jumps doesn’t end there. Your off-stage and disadvantage game will get a huge boost thanks to the added jumps.
8: Team “Aerial City”
- Primary: Queen Metroid
- Support: 3 Landing Lag Down Spirits (i.e Swooping Snitchbug, Pidgey, Ingrid)
You may be surprised by your lack of air time when using this Spirit team, but don’t let that fool you. Thanks to how small your jumps are, any character with a quick forward or neutral air can suddenly throw out aerials at incredible speed, allowing you to drag your opponent all across the stage.
- While stacking multiple Support Spirits with the same effect is normally a bad idea thanks to diminishing returns, with this combo they are vital to reducing your landing lag by as much as possible.
- The power and defense that Queen Metroid grants makes this build not only powerful, but also keeps you relatively safer from damage.
- By reducing both your jump height and landing lag by this much, the time difference between aerials is vastly decreased, making aerial chains previously impossible suddenly all the more possible.
9: Team “Akuma’s Day Out”
- Primary: Akuma
- Support: None
The ultimate Spirit when it comes to pure power, Akuma is a very straightforward Spirit. No extra abilities or advantages, just the best possible stats one could ask for from a Primary Spirit. And while that might not make it the best Spirit Team, using Akuma is still more than worth the trouble.
- Oftentimes, what’s required to beat a Spirit is less a specific effect, and more the stats to deal enough damage or avoid enough knockback.
- Akuma is by far the strongest Attack Primary Spirit, meaning any Grab Primary Spirit is going to stand no chance against you.
- Akuma is lower on the list due to being a bit less flexible than those above him, but sometimes the simplest option is the best for a job.
10: Team “Rigging the Dice”
- Primary: Lyn (Blade Lord)
- Support: Mythra
This one is less top tier and more of a personal favorite, as this team is much more about fun rather than consistency. Still, if you’ve ever played a match as Hero, then you know how much fun it can be to fish for Critical Hits. So why not add two more 12% chances to the pile?
- While pairing two Spirits with Critical Hit Up+ does diminish their returns, you will still be seeing Critical Hits on about 20% of your attacks.
- While not boasting the same consistency as Akuma, this build has much higher highs, especially in a more casual setting.
- This Spirit team is the perfect sleeper hit, as while your opponent may be confident in their invincibility, they might not be after your rapid jab does upwards of 40%.
