Warframe is the definition of a power fantasy shooter. Players get to wield powerful Warframes that can annihilate entire armies of genetically mutated humans, machines, and infected lifeforms. As you carve a path through the game's various planets, you'll constantly be grinding to unlock new weapons, frames, and cosmetics.

Each Warframe comes with four unique abilities, quirks, and some even have detailed backstories. There are dozens to choose from, which can make it hard to tell which are the strongest. Every Warframe in this game is perfectly viable for nearly all content, but we'll be looking at a handful of Warframes that shine above the rest.

Updated March 14, 2024, by Charles Burgar: We have made sweeping changes to every entry on this list. Each Warframe now has a table explaining where its parts originate, what features it has, and why we've added it to the list. All Warframe entries have also been tweaked to better explain why they're considered powerful. Titania was also added to the list.

10 Xaku

A Walking Gun Turret With Void Powers

Xaku is an amalgamation of multiple Warframes, all creating a cohesive kit that's surprisingly powerful. Xaku's kit involves manipulating the Void and your foes to empower Xaku's powers. Arguably the strongest ability is Grasp of Lohk, allowing Xaku to steal enemy firearms and morph them into floating turrets. With enough range and strength, Xaku becomes a walking gun turret that melts everything in its path.

Enemies are further weakened through Xaku's third ability, The Lost. Enemies can have their defenses stripped or turned into allies for Xaku. You can even extend the duration of these effects through Xaku's ultimate, a massive explosion that doubles as a powerful tool for finding Ayatan Sculptures and Syndicate Medallions. Subsume a defensive ability onto them, and Xaku easily becomes a powerhouse in all content.

9 Protea

The Ideal Tech Marine

It's difficult to talk about strong Warframes without mentioning Protea, a time-manipulating prodigy with an affinity for gadgets. Most agree that her fourth ability, Temporal Anchor, isn't the greatest, but you can easily fix this with the Helminth system. Place another Warfarme's ability over Temporal Rift, and you have a near-perfect ability kit.

Protea becomes a devastating Warframe when you subsume Nidus' Larva ability, replacing her fourth ability with this devastating CC power. Deploy a Larva near a group of enemies, then summon three Blaze Artillery turrets. The turrets will scale their damage so quickly that they'll be able to one-shot Steel Path enemies after a brief period of continuous fire.

If that sounds boring, Protea can also generate an infinite amount of energy orbs and Archgun ammo for herself and nearby allies. If you've ever wanted to use the Mausolon or Grattler as a primary weapon, then Protea has you covered.

8 Octavia

A Bard With Lethal Beats

Octavia is the closest thing Warframe has to a bard class. Through the power of music, Octavia can empower her allies with plenty of buffs while reflecting enemy damage through her Mallets. These Mallets reflect a portion of the damage they receive, allowing Octavia to outright kill Steel Path enemies at extremely high levels solely through her first ability.

As for buffs, Octavia can give her allies invisibility, extra multishot, movement speed, and general damage. Invisibility is the real powerhouse here, giving her team great survivability and great stealth capabilities. You could even argue Octavia is one of Warframe's better stealth characters.

Compared to other Warfarmes, Ash's invisibility is shorter, Loki's kit is lackluster, and Ivara can't parkour while invisible.

Octavia is somewhat boring to play, but if you get used to her playstyle, she's easily one of the strongest Warframes you can use. The only thing keeping Octavia in check is her low usage rate, which is mostly due to her passive kit. Activate your ultimate, third ability, throw down a Mallet, and watch the carnage unfold. No further input is required. That makes her undeniably powerful, but that does lead to a much more passive playstyle.

7 Nezha

An Excellent Early-Game Warframe That Excels Everywhere

Speed and survivability are Nezha's core strengths. Available right after joining a clan, Nezha is effectively a faster version of Rhino that scales exceptionally well. Nezha can use their unique chakram as a defensive tool with Warding Halo, a debuffing tool through Blazing Chakram, or even a teleport device by recasting Blazing Chakram.

You can then further boost your mobility through Fire Walker to speedrun most mission types. While Nezha's ultimate is somewhat lacking, you can use Helminth to subsume a damage buff, survivability tool, or virtually anything that interests you. Nezha is the ultimate Warframe for beginners that scales well into endgame activities.

6 Titania

The Galaxy's Deadliest Pixie

Titania is a pixie-inspired Warframe that can fly at the speed of sound. Her ultimate ability, Razorwing, turns Titania into a small butterfly that's armed to the teeth with a set of powerful pistols. Throw on some speed mods or the Razorwing Blitz augment, and Titania can break the sound barrier with ease. Anything that poses an immediate threat can be turned into a red mist with the Dex Pixia's blistering fire rate.

Arcane Pistoleer

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You can give the Dex Pixia infinite ammo by using Arcane Pistoleer. Pistol headshot kills, including those from Dex Pixia, have a chance of activating this Arcane, granting infinite ammo for 12 seconds.

In Warframe, the faster you can clear missions, the more rewards you can earn during your play session. It's important to be fast for missions like Capture and Exterminate, and no Warframe does that better than Titania. Subsume Gauss' Thermal Sunder on her kit, and you can turn an entire map into a nuclear wasteland in a few seconds. She also scales well in Steel Path content with the right build, making TItania an easy S-tier pick.

5 Wisp

The Motes With The Most

Wisp's bread and butter is her first ability: Motes. Allies that pluck these motes will gain increased health, health regeneration, fire rate, movement speed, reload speed, and stun nearby enemies. It's the holy trinity of buffs, and that's all from a single ability. You can even use your second ability to gain invincibility frames (i-frames) whenever you see fit.

Wisp also packs quite the punch with her third ability, causing affected targets to spawn wisps of energy that deal immense damage. This ability also makes afflicted targets more susceptible to incoming damage. While her fourth ability isn't great, you can subsume it with a group-wide damage buff like Roar to make Wisp the strongest support Warframe in the game. She has tons of mobility, buffs, debuffs, and makes great use of the Helminth system.

4 Khora

The Ideal Loot Warframe

Khora is an amazing Warframe for farming items and dealing tons of damage. She is one of few Warframes that can directly boost loot drops through her Pilfering Strangledome augment, forcing enemies CCed by her ultimate to drop more loot on death. This immediately makes Khora an S-tier pick for any loot farms in Warframe, and that's just one aspect of Khora.

Whipclaw is easily one of Khora's strongest abilities, allowing her to whip targets for millions of damage with the right build. You can then use your Whipclaw to damage every target caught in your Strangledome, allowing you to clear hordes of enemies with a single attack. Khora can do it all, even in endurance Steel Path content.

3 Mesa

Warframe's Iconic Gunslinger

While Mesa might not be the best Warframe in any particular category, she is always a good choice for any activity. Mesa can destroy entire hordes with her Peacekeeper pistols, automatically shooting targets within your enlarged aiming reticle. As the reticle dwindles with each shot, your damage ramps up to ensure nothing survives.

In the odd event that Mesa can't shoot something to death, her Shooting Gallery and Shatter Shield abilities give her more than enough survivability to take on most enemies. Her strengths become even better if you take Helminth into account, allowing you to replace her mediocre first ability for Rhino's Roar, Hildryn's Pillage, or any other useful ability. Regardless of the activity, Mesa is always a great pick.

2 Saryn

The Ultimate Weapon's Platform And Plaguebearer

Topping the damage charts is incredibly easy for Saryn. This poison-themed Warframe spreads corrosive spores onto her targets that spread when popped, gaining damage the longer they linger. A good Saryn player can ramp up these spores to deal hundreds of thousands of damage per second, killing just about every enemy that isn't immune to Warframe powers. This makes her the ideal Warframe for Sanctuary Onslaught.

Stripping Armor As Saryn

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You can use Corrosive procs to fully strip armor as Saryn. Install two Emerald Archon Shards on her and select the "+2 to maximum Corrosive stacks" modifier. Her Spores can now fully strip enemy armor.

Weapons modded for Corrosive also benefit from Emerald Archon Shards.

That alone is fantastic, but Saryn is also an amazing weapons platform. Thanks to Toxic Lash, Saryn can add forced Toxin damage to all her weapons, technically counting as a second hit. This can be boosted with Helminth abilities and certain mods to make Saryn's weapons one-shot just about everything in the game.

1 Revenant

The Undying Eidolon

If you want to become virtually unkillable while siphoning the life force of your enemies, look no further than Revenant. This Warframe has arguably the strongest defensive skill in the entire game through Mesmer Skin, making you immune to a set number of attacks. Each stack guarantees one second of invulnerability as well, so a good Revenant build can become invincible for 20 seconds or longer through a single ability cast.

Invincibility isn't the only thing Revenant has. You can also turn enemies into allies through Enthrall. That alone isn't particularly useful, but your Enthralled targets take quadruple damage from Reave, allowing you to one-shot Enthralled targets if you have enough Ability Strength. This works regardless of the target's defenses, giving Revenant infinite damage scaling. Not many Warframes have a way to scale this well, let alone this efficiently.