Hollow Knight Boss Ranking & Analysis 

"Markoth, Fun Factor: 4" I disagree, sir

My top boss list: 10. Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 9. Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 8. Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 7. Vigorous, Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 6. Enchanting, Vigorous, Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 5. Mysterious, Enchanting, Vigorous, Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 4. Sensual, Mysterious, Enchanting, Vigorous, Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 3. Fearless, Sensual, Mysterious, Enchanting, Vigorous, Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 2. Invincible, Fearless, Sensual, Mysterious, Enchanting, Vigorous, Diligent, Overwhelming, Gorgeous, Passionate, Terrifying, Beautiful, Powerful, Grey Prince Zote 1. Zote the Migthy (can't beat the real deal)

Grey Prince Zote is basically the embodiment of “If I don’t know where I’m going you sure as hell don’t”

Mantis Lords was the moment I knew this game was special. The music, the flow of the fight, the length of it.... One of my favorite boss fights ever

"lol hey vengefly king can i copy your homework" god winged nosk was so annoying

For some reason Marmu moves a fuck ton faster when I'm fighting her than when I'm watching the fight.

smh, you forgot about the most important one: original Zote duel

Markoth in the base game was my favorite dream warrior because he seemed more fun than the others, and a little less "literally only one attack". Then Team Cherry realized platforms and the floor weren't great for a fight, and he became the LAST radiant boss I had to complete.

The most underrated Hollow Knight creator I've seen, I'm just salty about not putting False Knight higher

I honestly love the lore behind each of the "Pale Siblings" battles, like Broken Vessel, Hornet, and Hollow Knight. You're basically being set against your own family one way or another, whether it's to save your older brothers or gain your half-sister's trust and respect.

Mossbag brought me here This seems good

Beating Mantis Lords was the first time I felt like I had actually gotten GOOD at a difficult video game instead of giving up, like with so many difficult games before. You can't help but fall into this very zen state at the end where both remaining Mantis' are launching themselves at you from all angles and you dodge them perfectly. Such a satisfying boss in a game of very satisfying bosses!

I agree that the sisters of battle would benefit from a shared healthpool. If I were to think on my top 3 bosses I think I would have gone with: 1. Pure Vessel 2. Nightmare King Grimm 3. Sisters of Battle Theyre all just so much fun!

My main complaint with AbsRad is that it kind of loses some of its majesty. Radiance is a difficult boss despite having fairly slow attacks. Because of this, its attacks feel sweeping and majestic, and it feels like it doesn’t need to concern itself with you. Then AbsRad just ups the speed a ridiculous amount and wipes the floor with your face.

Came because of mossbags tweet, im gonna enjoy the content now :D

god, the hollow knight is such a masterpiece of a fight. sure, most people don't find it terribly difficult (except me who accidentally beat them with the minion build because I was practicing dodging) but I think that's on purpose. after all, you gotta face the radiance after beating hollow knight but from a non-combat angle, the fight is so very good. if you've snooped around enough to understand at least some of the lord, facing thk feels both like your meeting a famous hero, and tragic because said hero has fell so far and you can obviously tell they're in immense pain and are desperate. the stabbing of themselves is shocking and sad, but also this small action adds so much emotion to the fight. your sibling, the one who had one of the most tragic upbringings one can go through, the one whose entire life has been nothing but suffering, the one who was an unwilling and unconsenting hero even if they couldn't hold the radiance in forever. this sibling is doing all their falling apart, exhausted self can do to help their sibling out and save hallownest once again and the last phase is absolutely pitifully heartbreaking. they are literally being unwillingly flung around by presumably the radiance. if you look at the animation closeup you can see that not only is the hollow knight a completely limp ragdoll, but that when the infection goes down it slams hollow knight into the ground, body first as the infection crushes their body between it and the ground. then there's the very pitiful attempts at slashing, such strong storytelling. this part of the fight is very easy and you feel horrible for how easy it is to kill them. once I saw this phase I just avoided them because I didn't wanna kill this suffering, pitiful creature. the hollow knight just gives me so many feelings. also the character design is fantastic and the music made me fuckin cry

Me who died at Massive Moss Charger for a multiple time: ༎ຶ‿༎ຶ

"Impending release of Silksong" this fanbase has fallen apart now.

I don’t agree with everything, but the world would be boring if everyone thought the same. Cool list and very fun to watch!

Markoth Difficulty: 100 Fun Factor: -100000

As someone who's faced and defeated every boss in the game except Abs Rad, Soul Tyrant is still my favorite fight. There's just something I love about facing a boss that prefers to keep their distance and takes evasive manoeuvres that actually forces you to match their speed if you want to get any damage in whatsoever.

5. Nailsage Sly 4. Radiance (regular) 3. Nightmare King Grimm 2. Sisters of Battle 1. Pure Vessel Updated top 5 a year later: 5. Nightmare King Grimm 4. Watcher Knights 3. Sisters of Battle 2. Pure Vessel 1. Absolute Radiance Updated top 5 two years later: 5. Sisters of Battle 4. Grey Prince Zote 3. Watcher Knight 2. Pure Vessel 1. Absolute Radiance

1:15 "A version that makes you die in 1 hit, no exceptions." Well... With the exception Carefree Melody..... I considered using that charm to beat Markoth on Radiant (the last one I had left), but I just got gud instead. Btw, after watching the entire video, I think I agree with everything that you said. Except that I would place Sly above Zote, just because I REALLY enjoy his Yoda-like movement. I can tell that you put a LOT of effort into this video, it's very high quality! (And every single alliteration you've thrown in is very much appreciated)

Everyone talks about how it's borderline impossible to die to MMC. Cut to me dying repeatedly because I can never get a rhythm down

I actually really like false knight, imo it should be higher on the list, genuinely one of my favorite fights because it's such a great introduction to the fighting you'll be doing later on in the game

Sisters of Battle is such an insane WOW moment. I think everyone that played Hollow Knight loved the Mantis Lords and then they made the fight even better. Just take my money already Team Cherry

This is an insanely quality video.

Very thorough analysis and without "meme" placements, definitely should have more views. Good job.

Some bosses like the massive moss are good for the stage you fight them at. You get the dash from hornet and now you’re forced to use that skill to dash under the massive moss charger in when he jumps. So they’re not an entirely bad boss

Grey Prince Zote holds a dear place in my heart as the boss that encouraged me to not just get good, but get GOOD, at Hollow Knight. Making the boss do up to eight masks of damage seems like fake difficulty at first glance, if not incredibly funny for multiple reasons, but the beauty of it lies in its execution. As said, Zote’s moveset is small and easily memorized to go along with the frenetic pace of battle, and if you’re gunning to finish Bretta’s questline- or unlock the golden Zote statue -you have to go toe-to-toe with him four times before things ramp up. From that point on, the game stops pulling its punches. It’s essentially saying “You’ve worked hard to get to this point, congratulations. Now put on your dancing shoes and show us what that hard work amounts to.” You don’t just get good at Grey Prince Zote; you MASTER Grey Prince Zote, and the knowledge you’ve accrued from fighting him all those times serve as the bedrock to do that. And if you’re like me, who didn’t have many mask shards, you had to beat him hitless. Twice. His moveset is fun as is, but having to avoid getting hit as much as possible adds a whole new layer of intensity to the fight as you soar and shadow dash through the air, swinging wildly as your mind goes a mile a minute trying to keep on top of how much is going on while trying to anticipate Zote’s next attack. It really did change the way I played the game, and I honestly can’t fathom fighting him without the copious amounts of damage nowadays. The atmosphere is top notch also. Being able to knock the old codger down at the height of both his arrogance and strength is an electrifying feeling after all the shit he gives you and the pathetic showing that was his fight at the coliseum. Plus, the scene of two gallant knights fighting for the eye of their fair maiden just reeks of the melodramatic old-timey chivalrous romance tale vibe that Bretta’s tales take after. The encounter is tense, blood-pumping, cathartic and hilarious all at once; it made Zote one of, if not my favourite character in Hollow Knight after an entire game of wishing I left him to die in Greenpath. I still have a few bosses to take on before I can say I’ve TRULY beat the game. Hive Knight and the remaining dream warriors notwithstanding, they’re regarded as the creme de la creme and I can’t wait to see whether they surpass the Grey Prince. An honourable mention goes to Soul Tyrant, who was the boss who got me into the game in the first place.

The "oh shit" moment when the Lords cracked their knuckles and u realized what's up is probably one of the best moments I've had in this game. Beating abs rad after so many attempts in p5 was such a satisfying and relieving moment too

One thing i have to say: Harder fights seem more frustrating when you are trying it then when you do it again, i absolutely hated NKG after i beat it for the first time, but after doing it and regular Grimm on radiant, yea i like NKG more Exeptions: Marmu, Markoth, Galien, GPZ, sly(at least for me, the second phase eliminates me almost always), i didnt do absolute radiance yet because of sly but i will include it here, marmu, markoth

I personally thinl its okay to put an achivement behind the pantheon of hallownest. It gives a reason to get through the literally hell that is tht thing. (I also think the ending cutscene is also okay but I understand the complains). On an tangent, Sister of battle destroyed Mantis lords for me, cause now I find the latter too slow. Excellent video dude

11:14 that’s a theory I’ve never actually thought about, yet it’s extremely possible

Yeah I hated the boss fights in hollow knight. Just wasn't my thing. I loved the exploration and lore and I liked the bosses as more obstacles to exploration rather than actual gameplay. So when I found God home in my playthrough I explored it, got the God tuner fought vengefly and left. I would only fight for exploration or lore. There is very little lore there and no exploration. So I left and experienced the rest of the game. I am also very VERY bad at boss fights and get frustrated easily. I really loved the game btw 10/10 HOWEVER, THEN I WENT ONLINE, AND LEARNED TWO CANON ENDINGS ARE BEHIND THE HARDEST THING EVER. I was like: "no." And I still have never beaten God home. I didnt even do path of pain I'm so bad. How in the universe would I beat all of that. So I just looked up the ending cutscenes on RU-vid, watched them. Was hyped. Done.

I think the best part of both Radiance fights is that Radiance herself doesn't have a hitbox, so you're basically free to roam the arena with relative ease as long as you're not hit. It's probably the one thing keeping the fight from being impossible.

As someone who's absolutely horrible at this game, the words "It's not hard in he slightest" made me mad with the Soul Warrior lmfao I'm officially a hate account for this guy. I absolutely hated him. Had no fun at all, especially because the way the shade is placed was awful. Couldn't get it's attention without starting the encounter. I could go on about how much I Don't Like this guy but. Nobody really seems to share my opinion haha Side note about Xero since I didn't finish the whole video before writing the comment. Another semi consistent 'safe' spot it right at the edge of the platform you fight him on. If he's a decent amount away from you, then the spears just fly right over your head and don't even hit you on the way back. Found it accidentally and whenever I ran over to heal, it didn't hit me, but I can't imagine this happens every single time.

17:31 Listen buddy, if you think I use descending dark in a SMART way, you have not seen me fight god tamer.

Appreciate your fantastic segment on the hollow knight. Mechanically he may not be the best, but the music and visual design makes him one of the best for me. I also appreciate you still reading comments :)

I love how u used the correct boss fights music in each one of the rankings what a great touch

I'm very glad that mossbag made a tweet about this video. You can tell that a lot of time and effort went into it and I, being about 1/4-1/3 in, am loving it so far

I just love the regular Grimm fight... it's so balanced, not very easy and not very hard. Grimm himself is a very badass character and has a cool mysterious lore. The soundtrack is epic and I love the fact that it is ominous and dark during the fight but it gets very intense and blood boiling during his fireball attack. You could say NKG is way better because he has all of Grimm's positive with much more added fun and difficulty, yes... but for me he is the best boss fight in Hollow Knight and one of the best boss fights in all the games I've played.

Walking in the top ten not seeing PV NKG or Sisters. This is gonna be a good top ten .

“Impending release of silksong”

I actually don't find Zote that difficult. I figured out what the AI was doing pretty early on by just anticipating where you were going to be rather than attacking a set point. So the easiest way to defeat him is to just randomly change your vector and you'll trick the AI into going to completely the wrong spot. Once you've figured this out as long as his bombs don't trap you in a way where you can't dodge a jump he was one of the easier ones for me to Radiant.

"With the impending release of silksong", huh...

In my opinion, the PV fight is a tale of finally putting your brother's spirit to rest and the PV itself is meant to be him trying to carry on despite his restlessness

Number 1 for me will always be Sisters of Battle. I knew the moment I faced off against the Mantis Lords that that fight would be my favourite out of the base game, I was wrong however in this assessment, but the moment Sisters of Battle came on... I had everything I wanted. I am also one of those insane people that put Absolute Radiance in top 5, because i actually like the challenge that lasts just that bit longer. But I do perfectly understand why you deduct points, especially since it blocks out an ending to the game. But I do think that that is rather fair overall as the ending itself is the reward for doing such an absurd challenge, and you have a similar reward for doing White Castle. #1: Sisters of Battle - Perfect fight. The pace was never a problem for me as with full upgrades and the right charms the pacing is fast with no brakes. You die fast, they die fast. Perfection. #2: Nightmare King Grimm - Very difficult but also beautiful. #3: Pure Vessel - Significant and beautiful. Lore stuff. #4: Paintmaster Sheo - Beautiful fight. #5: Absolute Radiance - Ultimate challenge. #6: Dung Defender - Hilarious! He keeps saying something that sounds like the Danish word for dumber, and I love mechanics where I can volley ball the boss around, Marmu is in my top 15 for this reason. #7: Mantis Lords - What can I say? Sisters of Battle, but slower pace with ever so slightly worse music. #8: Hornet (OG) - Beautiful, and the first test for a new player. If I didn't suffer from snowblindness, I might have put Sentinel here, but I can hardly see shit in that fight because of all the white particle effects on the screen covering up other things. #9: Radiance - Semi-ultimate challenge. Pace is slower than Absolute so it's not quite the same ball breaking opposition that makes me love Absolute. #10: White Defender - Dung Defender, but no beach ball mechanic, still love the fight.

My literall reaction to seeing soul warrior in the hall of gods was: "bro thinks hes on the team"

great analysis, well thought out also love the alliteration

Hearing "with the impending release of Silksong" from a video released in 2020 makes me wince lmao. Been loving your videos though, very cozy stuff

your use of alliteration is great! makes for an energetic and engaging script that's fun to listen to :)

This is a really well made video, I really appreciate the in-depth analysis and just the overall quality of this! I'm surprised you haven't gotten more attention by now :/ Thank you for making this :)

Great vid! Worth the full watch. I never was able to make it through the final pantheon to try absrad, and not for lack of trying. maybe one day team cherry.

I love this list❤. I think it's close to perfect. You introduced every boss so accuracly and even gave some useful fighting advice at the same time. Great job!

Your video was a great help for which bosses I should be more careful on because I just got hollow knight yesterday. Keep up the good work!

"Impending release of Silksong" 3 years ago. :(

You know what would have been a cool fakeout with tiso? If the brooding mawlek falls on him but then he slowly lifts him up and throws him.

Had a ton of disagreements about the list but it was super fun and thought provoking to hear you make your case for each. You analyze and articulate the experience of battling each boss very very well. Love the video!

I saw this recommended from mossbag and can I just say really well made video. I still haven't finished P2 and attempted P3 and onwards so I'm really looking forward to dying over and over again to Sly and Big Bro Pure Vessel and all these other top notch bosses I haven't fought. Attempting Radiant Mantis Lords a while ago was quite a challenge but was so much fun I really cannot wait to encounter Sisters of Battle honestly. Great video and you deserve more recognition :DD

"with the impending release of Silksong" 3 years ago ....yeah

Can we talk about NKG having arguably, but not really arguably and I will not be swayed, the best boss track on this list? The music alone made dying to his faster and harder hitting move set very enjoyable!

Why have I never seen this channel before today. This is such good quality. I love this content, so I decided to be subscriber 900. Keep up the great work!

BRUH hearing you had 500 subs at the time of making this made my jaw drop! If you sat me down and showed me this video with no context, I'd guess you had a minimum of 200K subs, and a max of like 5M. Seriously man. Even now you have 11K. I just found your channel so I don't know what and how much you upload, but regardless, this video alone is worth a bunch more subs. Amazing job!

The amount of alliteration in this video is absolutely beautiful, great video

My ultimate nightmare is that Silksong won't be able to live up to the hype that it produced. :(

Very high quality for such a "small" channel. Great video man!

This is my favorite hollow knight video. The wordplay, comedy, and presentation is so good! My favorite boss is NKG, But I haven't beaten pantheon 3 so I haven't fought tour top 2. Liked and Subscribed!

As someone who loves alliterations, you used so many that were executed exquisitely. I’m very much impressed. Also, the rest of the video was amazing as well

1:11:21 "A whole entire cocian" I died hahahahaha

I'm doing the trial of the fool and you said desolate dive and I immediately realized that doing that was perfect for what I needed to do. Thank you

Great vid, lots of work behind it I bet! Keep it up mate, your content is amazing

This deserves way more views

Markoth: fun factor 0, difficulty 5

I think this is the greatest HK bosses ranking I've seen on RU-vid, so congrats, very on point. I still need to reach Pure Vessel on the fourth pantheon, so that's the only review I didn't watch because I wanna discover how that fight is on my own (I have no interest in doing the Pantheon of Hallownest so that's why i don't really care for Abs Radiance). Great, great vid!

One of my personal favorites is Lost Kin. Something about that fight's movement is so satisfying and smooth to me.

I remember when I first joined this community which was like 1 month ago I spent 1 whole day on hornet protector and now she is one of the easiest bosses

I thought you were a known and big hollow knight channel cause of the quality of the video, then looked at your views and subs and... why

This video is a very good ranking of the bosses, considering both fun and story elements is extremely important, and other videos I’ve seen have ignored those aspects, and definitely undercut how good the bosses in this game are

Rlly good content, couple jokes seem similar to rusty's boss ranking vid but still fun to watch!

Silk songs imminent release 💀 that didn't age well lol

My own favorite: Pure vessel (yes that silent scream is 90% the reason he is on top) Traveling troupe master Grim (this guy has the far superior music to NKG) Sisters of battle (the music stopping when the third lord stood up was epic) Yes, the music plays a larger part than the actual boss for me.

This is the most high quality hollow knight video for such an underrated channel

I love your aliterations! :D

Moss has sent me, I shall be watching it all twice

After finishing most of the game, but not starting godhome challenges yet, I agree with ranking here in 80-90%! Will see after challenging godhome.

This is an awesome video, really impressive if you to make it. I just recently played this game and I still learned a lot more-wise and gameplay-wise by watching your video. I personally believe that watcher knights are easier than most people think, but that is only my opinion. I only thinks his after beating them in godhome many times. I thought they were annoying as all hell the first time I stood against them. And also….SCREW grey prince zote, lol. That boss just gets on my nerves. Overall an amazing list and video, thank you for your hard work and passion that obviously went into it :)

Thanks for the list. Very useful. I have beaten 27 of these and I am looking for 28. I was thinking of either Markoth or Lost Kin because I am near getting the 2400 essence achievement. Then I was thinking of tackling the Hive knight. Anyway these breakdowns are good preparation. They ought to speed my progress through the savage combat gauntlet ahead of me in the endgame considerably.

God I love the Nightmare King. Haven’t fought pure vessel yet, but I’m excited. Also, I fought the watcher knights after nkg so it was very underwhelming. I do agree with fighting thk being annoying before every radiance attempt, but both fights are so good I really can’t complain.

rip tiso

seeing that you had 500 subs at time of posting this video is awesome to see now

I am happy you ended up getting more subscribers. Your video was important in the long run :)

1:06:44 Something that deserves to be pointed out, and for which I would put the Sealed Vessel even higher, is that almost all its attacks are taken from or inspired by other bosses. The animation for the basic charge attack closely resembles that found in the Mantis Lords fight. The parry and follow-up are taken directly from the second battle with Hornet. The dive attack combines Broken Vessel/Lost Kin's dive with the cloak spike attack from Troupe Master/Nightmare King Grimm. The body slam attack is very much like the main attack of Galien or Marmu. The hovering infection spew attack is an inverse of the infection spew attack that Broken Vessel uses. And this pattern continues with The Radiance, as well: The orbs are taken from the homing fireball attack Soul Master and Soul Tyrant use. The radiant pillar attack behaves like the Traitor Lord's full screen shockwave. The face sword attack is taken from Gorb's main attack. The lasers she shoots in the climb phase are from Crystal/Enraged Guardian, or just Crystal Peaks in general.

you deserve way more subs and views! great job on the video

This was very well made and it deserves more attention

Nice vid man keep it up!

Great video!!!! I can't wait for more! Subscribed

sisters of battle is my favorite, pure vessel is amazing but an enchanced version of the mantis lords makes the music in the sisters of battle fight sooooooooo amazing, it so good D:

One of the best Hollow Knight videos I have ever seen!

wow this was only a 500 sub special? It was amazing