Some of the most powerful monsters in Yu-Gi-Oh are level 8s.
Look at the Blue-Eyes White Dragon, the Ancient Gear Golem, or the Galaxy Eyes Photon Dragon, to name just a few… and you’ll see how strong monsters at level 8 can be.
Now think about what would happen if you put two of these together.
The power of two Rank 8 XYZ Monsters is combined into one rank 8 monster. So these are some of the most powerful Yu-Gi-Oh! cards.
If you have level 8 monsters in your deck and want to spice up that extra deck, check out our list of the best level 8 monster cards below.
18. Vola-Chemicritter Methydraco
Vola-Chemicritter can do well in battle no matter what place he takes, since both of his stats are 3000. He needs two level 8 Gemini monsters as materials.
Luckily, this includes Gemini monsters whose effects haven’t yet been activated. Gemini monsters count as normal monsters until their hidden powers are activated by normal summoning them while they are already on the field.
Vola-Chemicritter can bring back a gemini monster from your graveyard when xyz is called. This means that you lose two monsters to summon him but gain two when he arrives.
Also, as long as Vola has xyz material, your opponent can’t attack or use effects on gemini monsters you control. This is a strong shield that protects your other friends.
17. Number 90: Galaxy-Eyes Photon Lord
Photon Lord actually likes to be in the defense position, where he can protect you with a 3000 DEF shield.
He accepts any two level 8s as material, but if you use a Photon member as material, Photon Lord gets a useful immunity to destruction.
Plus, as a quick effect, Photon Lord can detach a material once per turn to stop a monster’s effect, and if the material was a Galaxy card, he also kills the monster whose effect he stopped.
16. D/D/D Super Doom King Dark Armageddon
The D/D/D Super Doom King is a rare pendulum-xyz monster that has 3500 ATK and 3000 DEF.
But he can’t be called with a pendulum, and he needs two level 8 D/D/D monsters as materials. This limits his use to the archetype of his kin.
But when xyz is called, you can give Super Doom a face-up D/D monster from your extra deck as a material. This gives him even more tools to use.
Also, card effects can’t kill pendulum monsters you control, including himself. This is a great shield that saves many of the D/D members.
15. Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand
If a card’s power depended on how badass the art looks, this one would be almost as powerful as an Egyptian God card.
Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand is a great XYZ monster that can do a lot of different things. How it works is as follows:
You can remove an XYZ material from it to target any monster on the field that has its face up. Its own effects are cancelled out, but other cards’ effects can’t hurt it.
This is great for two very different things:
You can either use this ability to stop your opponent’s powerful monster effects by canceling them (at the cost of being unaffected by card effects for the rest of the turn), or you can use it to protect your own monsters from card effects that would hurt them.
14. Number 23: Lancelot, Dark Knight of the Underworld
Want to do a lot of damage to your opponent while they have no way to defend themselves?
Then this guy can help you out.
Even though this card has XYZ material, it can directly hit your opponent.
With an attack score of 2000, that much damage will add up quickly, and before you know it, you could win the game.
And there’s more, which is made possible by the first effect:
When you use this card to deal damage in battle, you can destroy any face-up monster your opponent controls.
As if that wasn’t enough, it also has quick-effect denial, which lets you stop any spell, trap, or monster effect from going into effect by removing an XYZ material.
Why can’t this card do anything?!
13. Galaxy-Eyes Full Armor Photon Dragon
You can summon this card by using 3 level 8 monsters, which is a lot.
However, you can also use any Galaxy Eyes XYZ monster you control as the only material and XYZ call Galaxy Eyes Full Armor Photon Dragon.
And with 4000 attack points, this guy is not to be taken lightly.
With just a couple of attacks from this card, your opponent will be totally wiped out. Even the best duelists can’t survive getting 8000 damage to the face.
But you can take an XYZ material off this card to remove any card your opponent controls that is face up. So long as magic, traps, and monsters are facing you, you can do whatever you want with them.
12. Thunder End Dragon
Thunder End Dragon is a little harder to call than most of the other level 8 monsters on this list. It needs 2 normal level 8 monsters to be called.
This is pretty hard to do with most current decks, which wouldn’t dream of running a normal monster.
But this card is a dream come true for decks like Blue-Eyes, which can flood the field with more level 8 standard monsters than I could ever count.
You can remove an XYZ element from this card to kill every other monster on the field.
Even though this kills any other monsters you might have, it leaves your opponent completely helpless while a dragon with 3000 attack looks them in the eye.
This can easily win the game in the right settings.
And most of the time, it’s just damn strong!
11. Number 68: Sanaphond the Sky Prison
With number 68, the graveyards become a powerful tool that your opponent can’t touch.
This card gets 100 damage for every card in the graveyards of each player.
With a base attack of 2100, which is pretty good, it won’t be long before this card can’t be stopped.
If your opponent has a combo deck that uses the graveyard a lot, this guy will soon be better than the God cards.
Number 68 also has its own security built in:
If you remove an XYZ material from this card, it can’t be killed by a card effect, and neither player can special summon monsters from the graveyard.
This means that your attack stat will stay high and your opponent’s moves will not work.
10. Number 15: Gimmick Puppet Giant Grinder
Gimmick Puppets are, without a doubt, one of the creepiest Yu-Gi-Oh characters ever made.
Dolls are creepy enough without having eyes that look like they are dead and being possessed.
Number 15, the Gimmick Puppet Giant Grinder, is one of the boss monsters in this scary deck.
You can remove an XYZ material from this card to kill a monster your opponent controls up to twice per turn.
If that monster was an XYZ monster, you could do as much damage to your opponent’s life points as its attack.
Even though Links and Pendulums have been around since the XYZ era, XYZ monsters are still very famous.
They are very easy to call, and there are a lot of cards from which to choose. There really is an XYZ monster for every deck.
You have a pretty good chance of getting this burn damage, which makes Number 15 a very safe way to burn your opponent and do a lot of damage.
9. Number 62: Galaxy-Eyes Prime Photon Dragon
If you thought that having 4000 attack was a lot, wait until you see this guy.
The base attack of number 62 is 4000, which is strong enough to beat almost any monster in Yu-Gi-Oh.
You can also give this monster an attack equal to the total rank of all XYZ monsters on the field multiplied by 200 by removing an XYZ material from this card.
At the very least, if you only have this card on the field, you have a monster with 5600 attack.
When you and your opponent both have other XYZ monsters on the field, the attack stats of these monsters are hard to beat by most other cards in the game.
Just check to see if your opponent has a Magic Cylinder…
8. Hieratic Sun Dragon Overlord of Heliopolis
This is one of the best ways to get rid of a monster if you have an XYZ monster.
You can remove a material from this card to sacrifice any number of cards from your hand or field to destroy the same number of cards on the field.
How good this card can be is really only limited by the sky.
If you have a lot of Scapegoat tokens on the field or just a few useless monsters left in your hand, you can do a lot of damage at once.
The fact that you can remove spells, traps, or monsters from either side of the field is another great thing about this card.
At first, it might seem strange to get rid of your own cards, but there are a lot of effects that happen when they are killed by a card effect.
This means that you can use this damage as part of an attack that kills your opponent for good.
7. Number 107: Galaxy Eyes Tachyon Dragon
Just when you thought the Galaxy Eyes monsters couldn’t get any better, another one comes along and blows them all away.
At the beginning of the battle phase, you can remove an XYZ material from this card to cancel every other monster’s effects.
On top of that, all attack numbers on the field go back to their original values. This means that if your opponent used any effects that boost attack, they were all wasted.
If you used this effect and then your opponent’s card effect happened, you could give Number 107 1000 more attack and let it attack again!
That’s a direct hit of 7,000 damage to your opponent. All because they used the impact of a single card.
6. Dingirsu, Orcust of the Evening Star
If you’ve played current Yu-Gi-Oh!, you’ll know this rank 8 monster right away.
You can use any Orcust link monster as the only material to XYZ summon this card. This means that even if you don’t have enough level 8 monsters, you can still use this card’s amazing power.
When this card is special summoned, you can either attach one of your discarded machine monsters to it as an XYZ material, or you can send a card your opponent controls to the graveyard.
“Send” is the most important word here, which makes this card very useful.
With this wording, card effects can’t destroy or target monsters that can’t be killed or targeted, so very few monsters, if any, can survive this kind of removal.
5. Number 22: Zombiestein
In Yu-Gi-Oh, the strongest monsters aren’t always the ones with the most power.
And that’s definitely something that Number 22: Zombiestein has.
This guy has a huge 4500 attack, which is more than enough to beat any monster in a fight.
But his effect isn’t worth writing home about:
It lets you negate one face-up card on the field at the ridiculous cost of detaching an XYZ material, discarding a card, and turning this card to defense position (where it has a poor 1000 defense).
But if you want big beat sticks, this card is what you need.
For good results on cards? Not really.
4. D/D/D Duo-Dawn King Kaliyuga
D/D/Ds are a type of archetype that has mastered every type of summoning (except for ritual monsters, which are always forgotten).
So it’s not surprising that some of the best XYZ monsters in the game belong to them.
D/D/D Duo Dawn King Kaliyuga is the best rank 8 card for D/D/D decks, and for good reason.
When it is called, all other cards and effects on the field are canceled out, and no new cards or effects can be used.
This makes the board completely unplayable, so your opponent can’t do anything in response to this card’s call.
You can also remove an XYZ material from this card once per turn for a quick action to destroy all spells and traps on the board.
Heavy Storm is so good that it is still not allowed to be played.
Plus, King Kaliyuga lets you bring back your “Dark Contract” cards, which are the spells and traps that make D/D/D decks what they are. This is a great way to give your deck more stability.
3. Galaxy-Eyes Cipher Dragon
Galaxy Eyes Cipher Dragon is the most powerful monster in the Galaxy Eyes world.
It lets you steal your opponent’s monsters and turn them into copies of this card with attack values of 3000 and names like “Galaxy Eyes Cipher Dragon.”
Even though mentioning the name change may seem like an odd thing to do, it is a very important detail for a Galaxy Eyes deck.
Now that the stolen monster counts as a Galaxy Eyes, you can use it for all kinds of card effects that require a “Galaxy Eyes” monster.
This includes the affects of some XYZ summons, spells, and monsters. So, this place has a lot going for it.
2. Number 38: Hope Harbinger Dragon Titanic Galaxy
If you look at any deck that always has level 8 monsters in it, you’re sure to find this card.
It’s a rank 8 monster that can do a lot of different things and should be in any extra deck.
What it does is:
When a spell card with an effect is active, you can cancel it and attach it to this card as an XYZ material. This is a great way to take your opponent’s spell cards away (and make sure they don’t get them back).
Number 38 also lets you get a benefit when one of your other XYZ monsters is destroyed, giving an XYZ monster you control the attack of the monster that was killed.
For me, the best way to deal with this is to put it all on one big monster beat stick.
1. Aegaion the Sea Castrum
Who would have thought that one of the best level 8 monsters would be a common card?
What it does is:
During either player’s turn, they can get rid of a random card from their opponent’s extra deck to make this card’s attack equal to that of the monster they just got rid of.
This is a fairly safe bet.
There may be some weaker monsters in your opponent’s extra deck, but there will also be some of their best monsters. This gives you a great chance to get a high-attack monster out on the board.
Then, you can detach an XYZ material to select one of the banished extra deck monsters, return it to the extra deck, and destroy a monster on the field of the same type (synchro, xyz, or fusion).
This is great for decks like synchro or fusion that focus on one of the summoning techniques. Because now you’ll be able to get rid of a card every turn in an insanely reliable way.
Aegaion is my number one choice because it can shut down so many decks by itself.
