The 9 Most Destructive Weapons in Anime History

Poor Man’s Rose - Hunter x Hunter

The deciding factor in an anime conflict sometimes comes down to the strength of the weapons used by each side. The weapons on this list are so outrageously powerful that few could survive an encounter with them. They’re weapons that don’t just harm one person, or two – they cause destruction on a massive scale. 

What are these devastating anime weapons? One example is the Poor Man’s Rose from Hunter x Hunter, which doesn’t just rip through the landscape with its explosive power, it also unleashes a contagious poison that can dramatically increase the number of victims. There’s also the F.L.E.I.J.A from Code Geass, which once annihilated 35 million people in one shot. But even these pale in comparison to the Buster Machine 3 from Gunbuster, which was created by compressing Jupiter into a black hole, and ended up wrecking everything within 10 light years.

These destructive anime weapons were voted on by over 300 Ranker voters, so we’re presenting the list as a countdown with the #1 most voted weapon appearing last.

9. Buster Machine 3 – Gunbuster

Buster Machine 3 - Gunbuster

During the war with the Space Monsters, humankind created a weapon that was intended to destroy the Monster’s command brain, which existed somewhere in the middle of the universe. This weapon. which was nicknamed the “Black Hole Bomb” was created by compressing the planet Jupiter into a small space, a process that created a black hole. The bomb’s shell casing was the continent of Australia, and its power was jacked up even further by the addition of 3,000 slave generators. After it went off, it obliterated everything within 10,000 light years, and stayed collapsed and irretrievable within a black hole. 

8. Etherion – Fairy Tail

Etherion - Fairy Tail

The Etherion is a magic-powered Satellite that, once triggered, shoots a beam of magic so powerful that it can reduce a whole town, or even a country, to ashes. Activating it is no easy feat, however – it requires a vote from the powerful Magic Council to launch, and it’s only considered under the most dire of cirumstances. 

7. Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann – Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann - Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

The Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann might look like a mecha, but it’s actually a giant swirling mass of energy. Its height is 3.7 to 112 times the length of the known universe, and its mass is the sum of every known universe in the series. In addition to its signature move, Super Tengen Toppa Giga Drill Break, it can also do things like travel across dimensions, control probability, create matter and energy from nothing, and more. It’s hard to get more large-scale than that. 

6. The Silence Glaive – Sailor Moon

The Silence Glaive - Sailor Moon

The Silence Glaive is Sailor Saturn’s primary weapon. While it has a range of uses, its most noteworthy one is its ability to “bring about the end of all things.” While only used to its full extent in the manga, this weapon literally destroyed an entire planet without Sailor Saturn having to utter a single word. 

5. Ea – Fate

Ea - Fate

It’s hard to argue with the power of a sword that’s said to have cleaved Earth from the Heavens, contains the secrets of the universe, and is capable of wiping out everything in existence. The idea that someone uses this sword in combat is funny in a terrifying way, but it does in fact have a wielder – Gilgamesh. 

4. F.L.E.I.J.A – Code Geass

F.L.E.I.J.A - Code Geass

After Nina Einstein had a Euphemia-fueled freakout and nearly blew up Tokyo using a neophyte version of the F.L.E.I.J.A, she continued working on this superweapon. Fueled by uranium and a fictional element called sakuradite, it was so obscenely powerful that when Suzaku detonated it in the middle of Tokyo it struck down over 35 million people. When the Toromo Institute got ahold of it and took Nina’s limiters off, it became even more scary strong.

3. The Death Note – Death Note

The Death Note - Death Note

Though it appears to be an unassuming black notebook, the Death Note is capable of killing just about anyone whose name is written inside – that is, as long as the writer knows what they look like, and their real, correctly spelled name. Mostly used by Shinigami who feed off the lifespans of the people whose lives they take, it’s also used by humans like Light Yagami, who decides to use it to eliminate criminals and create his twisted vision of a more perfect world. 

2. The Tailed Beasts – Naruto

The Tailed Beasts - Naruto

The Tailed Beasts are living things, but they’re also created super-weapons. The first one was the Ten Tails, which was a fusion between Kaguya Otsutsuki and the God Tree and was created in order to take back the chakra that Kaguya had passed onto her sons. Because the Ten Tails was so dangerous, her son Hagoromo sealed the beast into what would eventually become the moon, and sealed its chakra into his own body. In order to weaken its power, he eventually split it into nine Tailed Beasts. But despite their reduced strength, each of these beasts was fully capable of devastating an entire village.

Ultimately, the beasts would be distributed to various ninja villages and sealed into human vessels – jinchuuriki. Those who could forge a relationship with their Tailed Beast could control their power and use it for their benefit, but those who couldn’t ended up losing their lives of unleashing unthinkable chaos by mistake. 

1. Poor Man’s Rose – Hunter x Hunter

Poor Man’s Rose - Hunter x Hunter

When Chairman Isaac Netero had The Poor Man’s Rose implanted into his body, he wasn’t kidding around. This weapon, though cheaply made, is capable of taking lives on a mass scale. In the ten times that it’s been used, it’s ended 5,120,000 people – and it was the only thing capable of taking down the king of the Chimera Ants.

It’s not just its explosive power that makes this weapon so dangerous. It’s the fact that it releases a contagious poison. Once infected, a person can spread the poison to others, creating a chain of devastation if not properly contained.