Destiny 2 Exotic Tier List: Best Exotics for PvE & PvP

It’s easy to get lost with the many exotics available in Destiny 2. You’re probably wondering which ones are worth grinding for and how good the newest ones are.

This Tier list covers every single Destiny 2 Exotic in detail, including their Exotic Traits, perks, source, and more.

Updated as of Episode 1: Echoes. See Updates.

Destiny 2 Best Exotic Weapons: Ranked

Exotics are the highest-quality items in Destiny 2. Rare and hard to acquire, Exotics are extremely powerful weapons that offer game-changing perks and generally amazing aesthetics. 

These are the 120+ Exotic weapons currently available as of Episode 1, including the brand-new Ergo Sum Sword.

Primary Exotics

ℹ️ Did you know that Primary ammo Exotics deal +40% more damage to Minor (red bar) enemies than their Legendary counterparts?

Special Exotics

ℹ️ Note that only one Exotic weapon can be equipped at once.

Heavy Exotics

These are the different Tier levels used for these tier lists:

• S+ Tier – Meta: Weapons so good they singlehandedly shifted the current meta
• S Tier – Best: Highest ranking weapons.
• A Tier – Strong: Very strong weapons, but not on the same level as S Tier Choices.
• B Tier – Average: Either decent weapons or weapons that fit a very specific niche/use case.
• C Tier – Weak: Mediocre weapons that are easily outclassed by the competition.
• D Tier – Worst: Weapons that don’t have much to offer and don’t deserve your attention.

How to get Exotics in Destiny 2

There are several ways you can find Exotic weapons in Destiny 2. Some Exotics require you to complete a specific quest or challenge, while others can be randomly found in the wild. This post covers all the new Exotics and explains how to easily get them. But if you’re looking for older Exotics, this is how you can acquire them all:

1. Decrypting Exotic engrams

Exotic engrams can randomly drop when playing the game. Your luck will certainly play a role here, but the more you play, the more chances you’ll have to find an Exotic in the wild. Random Exotic engrams can drop either from defeated enemies or when completing activities.

If you want to increase your odds, you’ll want to tackle more specific, difficult activities. Most Year 1 Exotics, such as Merciless and Trinity Ghoul, can be acquired via Exotic engrams.

2. Completing Exotic quests

Quest Exotics: The most iconic exotics are often tied to Exotic quests of varying degrees of difficulty and length. Exotic quests are, for the most part, long and complicated, each deserving a good tutorial. Be warned that several Exotic quests were removed from the game and put into the DCV (Destiny Content Vault).

To get started, you can head to our comprehensive guide featuring every Destiny 2 exotic quest still available (including video guides).

3. Buying Exotics at The Monument to Lost Lights

The Monument to Lost Lights (aka, the “Exotics Kiosk”) is a fairly new method to acquire Exotics weapons that were previously connected to old Season Passes and Exotic quests that are no longer available in-game. Either way, the Monument to Lost Lights has all those exotics for sale.

You can read all about it in our Monument to Lost Lights guide, including the cost to acquire each Exotic and a complete tier list to help you decide what to get next.

4. Buying Exotics from Xûr every weekend

Xur is an infamous NPC that appears every weekend (from Friday’s reset to Tuesday’s reset) and offers a different Exotic weapon and Exotic armor (one per class) every weekend. Xur also sells a random Exotic Engram containing either a weapon or armor piece. We cover Xur’ Exotics here.

5. Claiming Exotics from the Season Pass

The easier Exotics available to you can be found in the Season Pass. The Paid and Free tracks of the Season Pass offer a handful of Exotic engrams. All you need do is earn the XP to unlock them before the season ends.

6. Earning reputation from Vendors

Resetting your Vendro reputation tracks will reward you with an Ascendant Shard for the first reset of the Season, and then Exotic engrams for every subsequent reset that same season.

7. Completing Nightfall: The Ordeals at the highest difficulties

As mentioned before, Exotic engrams have a higher chance of dropping from end-game activities. If collecting exotics is your priority, Nightfall: The Ordeals are for you. There isn’t a single activity that rewards as many Exotic engrams as high-difficulty Nightfalls do.

Farming Master and Grandmaster Nightfalls are no easy feat, but if you find the right team, research the best strategies, and can pull it off, you won’t know what to do with so many Exotic engrams.

8. Completing Raids & Dungeons

A select handful of exotics can only drop from raid or dungeon bosses, such as the brand-new Euphony, which can only drop from the Salvation’s Edge Raid, or Buried Bloodline, which can only drop from the Warlord’s Ruin Dungeon.

Note that Bungie has introduced a system that allows you to complete specific triumphs and/or challenges to improve your Exotic drop rates.

Destiny 2 Exotics in-depth

How many Exotics are there?

Despite being the rarest and most powerful items available, the game receives a healthy quantity of new Exotics each season/episode. As of Episode 1: Echoes (Season 24), a total of 122 Exotic weapons have been released so far.

The easiest Exotics to get in Destiny 2

As you start your adventures,  you’ll want to focus on the most accessible Exotics first. Luckily, all but a few raid and quest-exclusive Exotics are fairly easy to acquire, as long as you’re prepared to grind. Most exotics can be found via Exotic engrams, meaning that every method that rewards Exotic engrams (Season Pass, Xur, Rank resets, etc) will help you easily find new Exotic weapons and armor.

Upgrading your Exotics: Catalysts

Unlike Legendary weapons that can be upgraded by simply spending some resources, Exotics require specific items called Catalyst. Not every Exotic has a catalyst, and finding the catalysts that do exist is a lengthy and difficult affair, but most of them grant significant improvements and can sometimes transform average weapons into powerhouses.

Our Catalyst guide covers every catalyst in the game, including how to find them, their benefits, and how to unlock them.