Disney Speedstorm tier list – April 2023 best characters

Who’s the best character in Disney Speedstorm? That’s the question we’re attempting to answer in our tier list.

We’ve been covering the game since launch and this is our current list of the best, worst and downright average racers in the game.

Our Disney Speedstorm tier list should help you decide which racers to level up, and which ones you should be trying to unlock before anyone else.

We’ll continue to update it each time new characters are added, or each time the game receives an update that strengthens or weakens certain characters.

Disney Speedstorm tier list

It’s important to note that everybody plays karting games differently, so our tier list may differ slightly from yours depending on your play style.

That said, our list takes a number of aspects into account, including each character’s stats and how they stack up against every other character, as well as the usefulness of their unique special moves.

For each character we’ve listed where they rank in each of the five stats – top speed, acceleration, handling, boost and combat – so you can see at a glance where they fit in.

VGC’s Disney Speedstorm tier list, as of April 2023

The list below is based on every character’s stats once they reach level 30. At higher or lower levels some characters may rise or drop slightly in the ranks, but their place in the tier list should still be the same.

It’s worth noting that some of these stats also change as you apply crew members and level them up, so if we mention a weakness for a certain character below you may be able to remedy it a bit by applying the right crew members.

To keep things less complicated, though, everything you see below is based on stock level 30 characters with no crew members applied.

Disney Speedstorm tier list – S Rank Racers

Mike Wazowski

Top Speed – 16th
Acceleration – 1st
Handling – 2nd
Boost – 8th
Combat – 17th

Unique Skill – Hold the Door

• Normal – Summons doors in front of you. If you enter one you teleport forwards, if opponent enters one they teleport backwards.
• Charged – Same, but doors appear further ahead

Weapons – Boost, Shot, Hack, Shield

The combination of having the best acceleration in the game and handling that’s second only to Donald Duck means Mike can quickly recover from setbacks and can navigate even the most awkward of turns with ease.

His boost is only mid-powered but the fact that his Boost power-up levels up as his star level increases means if you use a charged Boost it’ll continue to keep the meter topped up for a while.

If you’re good enough at hitting boost arrows on the ground you can keep it topped up for an extremely long time, essentially adding high top speed to his great acceleration and handling.

Even better, his unique special is one of the best in the game, and as long as you drop it at the right time so the doors don’t land on an alternate route, you can easily enjoy a huge teleport forward. There’s a reason people are already asking for Mike to be nerfed, basically.

Disney Speedstorm tier list – A Rank Racers

Elizabeth Swann

Top Speed – 13th
Acceleration – 5th
Handling – 6th
Boost – 2nd
Combat – 4th

Unique Skill – Jade Captain’s Knot

• Normal – Elizabeth dashes forwards for a while, pushing opponents out of the way.
• Charged – Elizabeth dashes forwards for a while, leaving behind a trail that stops opponents.

Weapons – Cloak, Shot, Boost, Hack

If you add up the rankings for each stat, on paper Elizabeth is the best character in the game (even though in practice she’s not quite there).

Elizabeth’s great boost stat combined with her upgradable access to the Boost power-up means she comes close to Mike in terms of being able to maintain a very fast boost for a lengthy period of time.

Add to this her unique skill, which is another boost move (and can stack with the normal boost to go even faster), and you have a character who specialises in top speed while still having enough tricks to defend herself at the same time.

Donald Duck

Top Speed – 18th
Acceleration – 2nd
Handling – 1st
Boost – 4th
Combat – 8th

Unique skill – Why I Oughta

• Normal – Gives you a shield. If you’re hit you’ll become angry, which means you get a speed boost and stun anyone you touch.
• Charged – Makes you angry instantly.

Weapons – Fire, Boost, Cloak, Bomb

Donald is an interesting racer because even though his class is a Brawler, his stats and moves imply that he’s a Defender.

He doesn’t have a great forward-facing offence, and has to keep his boost up or he might struggle. Luckily, he has the Boost power-up which makes this a lot easier.

This aside, his charged skill is useful, even if his normal one is a bit of a waste of time (it requires an opponent to hit you first, and nobody’s going to hit you when you have a massive green shield around you).

Disney Speedstorm tier list – B Rank Racers

Mickey Mouse

Top Speed – 14th
Acceleration – 7th
Handling – 5th
Boost – 5th
Combat – 16th

Unique skill – Trailblazer

• Normal – Activates a speed boost, which leaves behind a trail that speeds up anyone who touches it.
• Charged – Same as normal but makes Mickey (and others) invincible too.

Weapons – Rush, Shot, Bomb, Shield

Mickey isn’t massively remarkable in normal races (though he isn’t terrible, of course, otherwise he wouldn’t be this high up). His top speed is low, and his unique skills leave behind a trail that lets skillful opponents keep up with you.

That said, he’s a very useful character when the task is to get a fast time (such as the Seasonal Events that put you on a leaderboard).

His top speed may not make you think this, but his decent boost stat combines with the fact that his unique skill gives him a lengthy speed boost, and Rush is one of his main weapons, which can be levelled up quite a bit.

As long as you’re lucky and don’t get attacked too much, this combination can deliver fast lap times, second only to Mike.

Meg

Top Speed – 17th
Acceleration – 6th
Handling – 7th
Boost – 1st
Combat – 13th

Unique skill – Grecian Burn

• Normal – Gives Meg a speed boost, which lasts longer if you overtake racers with it.
• Charged – Makes Meg intangible, leaving behind a trail that refills your boost if someone touches it.

Weapons – Bomb, Boost, Cloak, Fire

Meg has reasonable stats and her boost is the best in the game, but it doesn’t last very long so you have to keep topping it up with drift boosts.

This is because she’s a Trickster, and Tricksters top up their bar boost quicker by drift boosting.

She can also keep her boost topped up by using her charged unique skill and hoping people will run over the trail. While she does have access to the Boost power-up, it doesn’t level up with each star upgrade she gets.

That said, her nomal unique skill is a real lifesaver when you’re at the back of a tight pack of opponents.

Shang

Top Speed – 5th
Acceleration – 11th
Handling – 14th
Boost – 11th
Combat – 1st

Unique skill – Military Might

• Normal – Throws a staff that travels forwards then comes back, hitting everyone in the way.
• Charged – Spins the staff around you for a while, shielding you and stunning anyone who comes close.

Weapons – Shield, Fire, Bomb, Rush

Shang is a good character to use if you’re skillful enough to reach the front of the grid, because he’s got reasonable top speed and a lot of defensive capabilities in his arsenal to keep him at the front once he gets there.

His Shield blocks attacks, Fire and Bomb can both be dropped behind you and Rush can put some distance between you and your opponent.

His charged skill is also useful because it lasts a decent length of time and is basically a normal and charged Shield at once, giving both protection and the ability to stun opponents.

His only weakness is that he doesn’t have a lot of forward-facing attacks, so you’ll need to get to the front using your own racing ability. His Boost and Handling are also only average.

Mulan

Top Speed – 15th
Acceleration – 4th
Handling – 4th
Boost – 3rd
Combat – 14th

Unique skill – Firework Barrage

• Normal – Launches a series of explosives that stun anyone they hit.
• Charged – Launches a rocket backwards.

Weapons – Hack, Boost, Fire, Shield

Mulan has low top speed but is otherwise fairly quick.

Although her class is officially a Trickster, she feels a lot more like a Speedster in terms of her stats.

While most characters’ unique skills have one particularly strong variation and one weaker one, both Mulan’s normal and charged ones are quite effective, giving you useful specials that can be aimed both forwards and backwards.

That said, you do need to have a good aim for the normal unqiue skill, because she fires it straight ahead.

Disney Speedstorm tier list – C Rank Racers

Figment

Top Speed – 8th
Acceleration – 10th
Handling – 11th
Boost – 16th
Combat – 9th

Unique skill – Spark of Imagination

• Normal – Creates a blast that obscures the vision of nearby opponents and triggers a short speed boost that stacks for each opponent it hits.
• Charged – Same as normal, except it’s a trail left behind you instead of a blast.

Weapons – Hack, Cloak, Fire, Rush

Figment is another character whose stats are either average or sub-average across the board.

His boost is particularly bad, especially because he doesn’t have access to the Boost power-up, meaning it’s hard to keep it going for any decent length of time.

His unique skill is okay but relies on you being in a large group to be truly effective.

What’s more, the fact it only obscures an opponent’s screen instead of stunning them means a skillful player will be able to get through it, essentially making it pointless at times.

Belle

Top Speed – 11th
Acceleration – 3rd
Handling – 3rd
Boost – 6th
Combat – 18th

Unique skill – Enchanted Mirror

• Normal – Spawns furniture further down the track, which stuns opponents if they hit it.
• Charged – Calls in flocks of birds which provide speed boosts to anyone who touches them.

Weapons – Boost, Cloak, Fire, Hack

Belle is a fairly unremarkable character, for better or worse.

She doesn’t do much wrong and her acceleration and handling are strong, though her combat stats are the worst in the game so maybe keep your distance from opponents.

Her charged skill is useful if you’re ahead, but be wary, because it can benefit opponents too.

As such, it only really works best if you’re in first place, meaning its usefulness is limited.

Goofy

Top Speed – 10th
Acceleration – 9th
Handling – 10th
Boost – 15th
Combat – 10th

Unique skill – Barnstormer

• Normal – A speed boost that’s hard to control.
• Charged – Drops an explosion behind you and gives a big speed boost.

Weapons – Hack, Shot, Boost, Shield

Goofy is in the lower half of the rost in almost every one of his stats.

That’s not to say he’s a particularly awful racer, just that he’s deeply average in every sense.

His charged unique skill can be useful in getting some distance between the player and opponents.

His normal unique skill, however, is (deliberately) impossible to control and isn’t much faster than a normal boost, meaning it has no massively redeeming qualities.

Randall

Top Speed – 7th
Acceleration – 12th
Handling – 9th
Boost – 10th
Combat – 12th

Unique skill – Scream Collector

• Normal – Become invisible for a long period of time. Drive near opponents to scare them, collecting one scream. After collecting five, you get a powerful speed boost.
• Charged – Opens one door that teleports you a short distance forward, and collects one scream.

Weapons – Bomb, Shot, Rush, Shield

Randall is similar to Goofy in that none of his stats stand out against the rest of the roster.

This means that while he doesn’t have any major weaknesses, he also doesn’t really have a major strength players can lean on.

His unique skill sees him collecting screams, but while the speed boost that comes from it is one of the fastest and longest in the game, it’s almost not worth the effort that goes into getting it.

You probably won’t collect all five screams in one unique skill, for example, meaning you’ll get the benefits of your skill less frequently than others will.

Jack Sparrow

Top Speed – 6th
Acceleration – 13th
Handling – 13th
Boost – 9th
Combat – 11th

Unique skill – Cutlass Flurry

• Normal – Spins ghostly cutlasses around your kart for a while, stunning anyone who comes close, while also building the boost bar.
• Charged – Same as normal, but the radius is much larger and it lasts far shorter.

Weapons – Hack, Shot, Cloak, Rush

Most of Jack’s stats sit in the bottom half of the roster, and his power-ups don’t really compensate for them much.

His boost is average and the lack of access to the Boost power-up means you’ll struggle to keep it topped up.

His unique skill is useful at times, but those times are pretty specific – usually when you’re at the back of a tight pack of racers.

As such, most of the time you won’t really get the benefit of it, making it a bit pointless.

Baloo

Top Speed – 3rd
Acceleration – 17th
Handling – 16th
Boost – 12th
Combat – 3rd

Unique skill – Bare Necessities

Normal – Become invincible and throw rotten fruit backwards, which stuns enemies.
Charged – Summons ripe pieces of fruit in front of you, which regain your boost bar. Opponents can collect them too.

Weapons – Shield, Shot, Boost, Hack

With the second-worst acceleration and third-worst handling in the game, Baloo’s top speed sort of makes up for it.

The fact he also has the Boost power-up means you can at least top up his otherwise average boost to keep it running for a little longer.

His unique skills aren’t massively exciting, though, because the normal one is no different from dropping a Shot behind you (except there are a few this time instead of one).

The charged one, meanwhile, is risky because your opponents can get the fruit instead and benefit from your ability.

Disney Speedstorm tier list – D Rank Racers

Beast

Top Speed – 2nd
Acceleration – 18th
Handling – 17th
Boost – 13th
Combat – 7th

Unique skill – Enchanted Rose

Normal – Stuns opponents in front of you. Use it three times and every skill box grants it from that point on.
Charged – Leaps forward. Use it three times and every skill box grants it from that point on.

Weapons – Shot, Boost, Hack, Shield

Beast has the worst acceleration in the game, which makes him useful if you can keep him in front.

That’s easier said than done, though, because with awful handling and such a low boost score you’re going to get people catching up to you all the time.

The fact that Boost is one of his power-ups is fine, but if you use your unique skill five times that’s all you get from then on, which undoes that.

Since he’s a Brawler class the best way to quickly increase his boost bar is to stun opponents, meaning you’re practically invited to constantly be in a battle rather than getting the opportunity to zoom off.

Hercules

Top Speed – 9th
Acceleration – 14th
Handling – 12th
Boost – 17th
Combat – 5th

Unique skill – Olympian Flyby

Normal – Calls Pegasus, who flies ahead and leaves a trail that speeds up all racers and makes them invincible.
Charged – Same as Normal, except Pegasus’s trail stuns opponents.

Weapons – Shot, Boost, Cloak, Hack

Hercules’s stats are poor across the board, and his normal unique skill is a waste of time because it speeds everyone else up along with you.

The charged one is much better, but it’s so similar to the normal one that it essentially renders it pointless, meaning he’s pretty much only got one unique skill.

This is an obvious setback, then, meaning Hercules players are a little limited when it comes to ways to reach the front of the pack.

Celia

Top Speed – 4th
Acceleration – 15th
Handling – 15th
Boost – 18th
Combat – 2nd

Unique skill – Snake and Shake

Normal – Puts her snakes in a good mood and creates a forcefield which generates boost fuel when you drive near opponents.
Charged – Puts her snakes in a bad mood and creates a forcefield which generates more boost fuel when you drive near opponents, and slows them down.

Weapons – Shield, Shot, Bomb, Rush

Celia has the worst boost in the game and her two unique skills basically involve driving near opponents to charge it back up.

In other words, players have to risk getting close to others to charge something other racers can usually charge easier on their own.

This also essentially means she has no truly powerful unique special moves, since all they do is replicate standard racing practice for other racers.

This, combined with her low acceleration and handling, means she really doesn’t have a lot going for her.

Sulley

Top Speed – 1st
Acceleration – 16th
Handling – 18th
Boost – 14th
Combat – 6th

Unique skill – Fearsome Roar

• Normal – Roars once, stunning opponents around you.
• Charged – Roars three times (with a smaller radius).

Weapons – Fire, Bomb, Rush, Shield

Sulley may have the highest top speed in the game, but speed isn’t everything (even though the game literally has it in the title).

Nobody has worse handling, and his awful acceleration means he takes an age to reach that top speed.

What’s more, a combination of an awful boost stat and no access to the Boost weapon means players can’t consistently keep a boost state going for too long (especially because Brawlers can only top it up quicker by stunning enemies, rather than drifting or using boost arrows).

On top of that, his unqiue skill is pretty rubbish, especially considering he already has access to the Fire weapon, the charged version of which basically does the same thing.

Mowgli

Top Speed – 12th
Acceleration – 8th
Handling – 8th
Boost – 7th
Combat – 15th

Unique skill – One of the Pack

• Normal – Calls three wolves that run alongside you. They stun anyone they hit and give you a speed boost if you run into them.
• Charged – Same as normal but they run farther ahead, still stunning opponents but not giving you a speed boost.

Weapons – Rush, Cloak, Fire, Bomb

Poor little Mowgli doesn’t really get the job done, sadly.

Despite being a Speedster class character, his acceleration, handling and boost are only slightly better than average, meaning he has the characteristics of a Speedster but none of the stat benefits.

His unique skill is also underwhelming – use the normal version and the wolves run just far enough ahead that you’ll struggle to hit them for a speed boost, and if you use the charged version they zoom off so far that most of the time they don’t even hit anyone.