Best Path of Exile 2 Ascendancy classes

Looking for the best Ascendancy classes in Path of Exile 2? Choosing your character’s Ascendancy is just as important as choosing their base class. You should see Ascendancy as a class specialisation - a subclass, if you will. By unlocking an Ascendancy, you gain unique, powerful, and highly specialised abilities.

While Path of Exile 2 remains in Early Access, you can choose between two Ascendancies per class (12 in total). When you reach Act 2 of the campaign, you gain access to the first Ascendancy trial: the Trial of the Sekhemas. Complete this trial to obtain your first two Ascendancy points, which you may spend on your chosen Ascendancy’s skill tree. You’ll be able to gain more Ascendancy points in the Trial of Chaos when you reach Act 3.

Once you’ve chosen, you won’t be able to change your Ascendancy. It goes without saying that you should choose your Ascendancy carefully, as it will greatly affect your playstyle and build options. To help you make that decision, here’s an overview of the best Ascendancy classes in Path of Exile 2.

Best Ascendancy class in Path of Exile 2

In my opinion, the best Ascendancy class in Path of Exile 2 is the Infernalist, a Witch Ascendancy. The Infernalist deals phenomenal elemental damage, and although her powered-up state depletes her health, you can always back out, making her surprisingly easy to manage. The Stormweaver Sorceress Ascendancy and its shockingly high damage output are a very close second.

That said, since you can only choose the Ascendancies within your chosen base class, it’s useless to recommend the Infernalist Ascendancy to a Monk or a Ranger. We’ll therefore pick the best Path of Exile 2 Ascendancy for each of the six classes below.

Best Witch Ascendancy class

The best Witch Ascendancy is the Infernalist, which is mainly thanks to Demon Form. Transforming the Witch into a hellish entity, Demon Form is a high-risk, high-reward ability that boosts the Witch’s spell power immensely. Beware of the ever-increasing Life cost though - don’t stay in Demon Form too long! On top of that, the Infernalist can use Internal Flame to set herself on fire in return for more buffs, thereby converting some of the incoming damage to fire damage.

The Infernalist is also the best Ascendancy if you want to focus on minion gameplay, as you can summon an Infernal Hound minion to take a portion of your damage while igniting nearby enemies. It’s fairly easy to get a strong Witch build if you double-down on the fire and ignite damage.

That means the vampiric Blood Mage Ascendancy is the lesser option. While it uses a similarly risky approach to combat by placing a Life cost on spells, the rewards aren’t quite as impressive since they mainly offer everlasting Curse duration plus a critical rate/damage boost… And that’s it. No demonic-pyromaniac-hellhound powers. Having to constantly pick up Life Remnants or use leeching abilities just to stay alive, the benefits don’t outweigh the costs.

Best Sorceress Ascendancy class

The best Sorceress Ascendancy is the Stormweaver, an incredibly popular choice among ranked players in Path of Exile 2’s endgame. As a master of the elements, Stormweaver deals elemental damage and especially lightning damage like it’s nothing, inflicting Shock on any opponent who dares to come near.

Besides the extra Shock damage and improved chance of applying Shock, the Stormweaver will summon an Elemental Storm upon landing a critical hit, which could be very often - provided you’ve got a high enough critical rate stat. You don’t even need to worry about mana regeneration and shield recovery that much, as both are automatically taken care of by the Arcane Surge and Heart of the Storm abilities respectively.

I feel a bit sorry for the other Sorceress Ascendancy, the Chronomaster, since it’s by no means a bad subclass, but it just doesn’t increase the Sorceress’s damage as much. The Chronomaster’s focus is on reducing cooldowns instead, which is useful, but something you can decently achieve with a proper Sorceress build.

Best Ranger Ascendancy class

The best Ranger Ascendancy is the Deadeye, a.k.a. the ultimate ranged DPS. Maintaining high accuracy even at a significant distance, the Deadeye must avoid getting hit in return for a massive attack speed, movement speed, and evasion boost. It’ll take some practice, of course, but if you do get hit, the Wind Ward ability will mitigate the damage.

Perhaps more importantly, the Deadeye makes it far easier to stack up on Frenzy Charges, which will then be consumed to boost your most powerful attacks. You should definitely use Sniper’s Mark in your Deadeye Ranger build, as this skill can place an additional mark through the Called Shots Ascendancy ability.

The other Ranger Ascendancy, Pathfinder, is all about poison affliction and Flasks. You could use the Mana Flask to trigger elemental explosions, but although it’s fun, it’s not particularly damaging. I’d say the reduced movement speed penalty and protection against slowed movement are the best characteristics of this highly mobile class, but it’s fairly weak compared to the deadly Deadeye.

Best Monk Ascendancy class

The best Monk Ascendancy is the Invoker. One of its major advantages is the Invoker’s ability to turn evasion into physical damage reduction, which is very useful for a melee character. It’ll be easier to use persistent buffs too, as the Invoker can gain more Spirit based on his energy shield and evasion stats.

It won’t be hard to get a proper Monk build if you focus on elemental damage and ailments; as an Invoker, you can pick Cold or Lightning damage and then boost your damage output of that type. The Invoker is particularly rewarding if you also have a high critical stat, as the Elemental Expression ability deals additional elemental damage upon landing a melee critical hit.

Truthfully, it’s quite easy to appoint Invoker as the best Monk Ascendancy since the other option, Acolyte of Chayula, just isn’t very good. Yes, the extra Chaos Damage is great, but the mana leech ability isn’t reliable at all, since it only leeches with physical attacks. It’s hard to not constantly run out of mana with this Ascendancy.

Best Mercenary Ascendancy class

The best Mercenary Ascendancy is the Witch Hunter. As a highly mobile base class, choosing an Ascendancy capable of slowing the enemy’s cooldown recovery feels like a perfect fit. The same mechanic that lowers their cooldown can also boost the Mercenary’s damage, allowing you to easily gain the upper hand.

The Witch Hunter’s Culling Strike is very useful when you’re trying to clear the field of weaker enemies, as it has an insta-kill threshold, but Decimating Strike is even better since it can chop a large chunk of HP from any enemy at full Life.

Despite these amazing Witch Hunter abilities, picking the best Mercenary Ascendancy was very tough as the Gemling Legionnaire has some very unique qualities of his own. Not only is this the only Path of Exile 2 Ascendancy that can use two Support Gems of the same type, but he can use up the three additional Skill Gems and boost their quality. The reason why I prefer Witch Hunter is that I can’t see the benefits of the additional skills as much, especially before reaching endgame; it’s easier to double-down on the enemy’s cooldown increase instead of trying to create a better Mercenary build with what you already had.

Best Warrior Ascendancy class

Thanks to its defensiveness, the best Warrior Ascendancy is the Warbringer. A pre-Ascendancy Warrior build feels quite flaky as this somewhat slow melee fighter will take a ton of damage. The Warbringer will mitigate some of that damage by using Totem Life instead, casting Jade Heritage, or improving the block ability.

That’s not to say that the Warbringer can’t deal good damage, as this Warrior Ascendancy makes it very easy to constantly break the enemy’s armour while uttering Warcries to buff your attacks. It’s a straightforward but effective playstyle: break armour, get a Warcry buff, and unleash a devastating skill.

The Titan Ascendancy is a close second though. The Titan can also buff himself while weakening the enemy (through stunning, in his case), but he doesn’t have the same survivability as the Warbringer, which makes him far less reliable.

And that concludes our guide on the best Path of Exile 2 Ascendancy classes. If you're new to the game, you might want to look at our list of things to do first in Path of Exile 2, and make sure you understand the character attributes. Don't forget to use the Path of Exile 2 crafting system to get better gear, and use the gemcutting system to obtain new skills.