Since the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game came out and gave players their first look at some strong bugs, there have been insect-type monsters.
But the days of cards like Ultimate Great Moth and Insect Queen are long gone.
Now, there are a few archetypes that are mostly made up of Insect Type Monsters, and there are also a lot of solo Insect-type monsters that would work well in a deck full of these creatures.
But insects haven’t always ruled the meta, and some of their cards and archetypes are likely to stay on the banned list.
Here are the best insect monsters in Yu-Gi-Oh!
18. Battlewasp – Arbalest the Rapidfire
Rapidfire is a great choice for your turn’s standard summon.
It lets you bring back from your graveyard a level 3 or lower insect in defense position.
Rapidfire has a good 1800 ATK for his level, and when he dies in battle or from an effect, you can call a Battlewasp from your hand or deck.
17. Maxx “C”
The other card that is banned today is a hand trap that lets you draw whenever your opponent uses a special summon that turn.
In the current meta, where it’s not unusual to summon 5 or more creatures in a single turn, this is a crazy card advantage.
It’s unlikely to ever get off the list of things that can’t be used, but it’s still a good example of what insects can do.
16. Level Eater
Level Eater is weak and can only be summoned with a tribute, but it works so well with link and synchro calls that it has been banned.
You can use a special ability to call Eater from your graveyard by lowering the level of a monster you control that is level 5 or higher by one.
Since this doesn’t only happen once per turn, you can easily link climb to crazy heights or change levels to make a synchro call work.
15. Insect Knight
We’ll start with Insect Knight, who has 1900ATK/1500DEF.
So, for a level 4, this monster has very good stats.
The Insect Knight is a normal monster, so it doesn’t do anything.
But this is a good thing to have if you also have monsters like Gokipole (a little further down the list).
Don’t ignore this card, no matter how normal it is.
14. Greatfly
This link monster acts more like a field spell because it gives your Wind monsters more power and hurts your opponent’s Earth monsters.
Greatfly is a Link-2 that only has 1400ATK. But when it’s on the field, every Wind monster, including itself, gets 500 ATK/DEF.
Earth monsters lose 400 ATK/DEF, which is a big difference against the right deck.
This monster isn’t very high on this list because, as strong as this effect is, most insects aren’t Wind type unless they have wings.
13. Aztekipede, the Worm Warrior
This strong LVL4 has a great way to summon multiple monsters in one turn. This is a great way to make your boss monsters work.
At 1900ATK/400DEF, Aztekipede, the Worm Warrior, has good stats. But the best part is that all you have to do to Special Summon it is send an insect from your Graveyard to the Extra Deck.
With these kinds of effects, it’s always easy to go into things like LVL4 XYZ foes.
And if this card does damage in battle, your opponent must also send the top card of their deck to the Graveyard. Even though it’s not very cool, that can still cause some useful trouble.
12. Danger! Mothman!
You always want cards that can be Special Summoned easily.
Danger does it better than most. monsters.
Danger! Mothman! is an LVL4 with 1800ATK and 400DEF. But what makes it so good is the way it summons things.
You make your opponent afraid. Mothman! , then your opponent picks a card at random from your hand.
If they don’t catch Danger! Mothman! Then you can Special Summon it and let them throw away the card they picked.
If they decide to go with Danger! Mothman!, you throw it away and both of you draw a card.
You would obviously choose the free monster. But, no matter what, this card is good.
11. Chainsaw Insect
About 1900ATK is what some of the biggest LVL4 monsters have.
They can sometimes have a little more.
So what the heck happened?!
Chainsaw Insect is LVL4 and has an absurd 2400ATK/0DEF.
That’s almost as good as some boss monsters.
But if this monster fights, it draws a card for your opponent. That’s not great. But this creepy-crawly can beat almost every other LVL4 and give you an advantage right away.
Even scary monsters can’t handle an axe, it seems…
10. Primitive Butterfly
Not all insects are the most dangerous. So you’ll need some strong monsters in your Extra Deck.
This monster is a great way to quickly bring out those extra monsters you’ve been saving, and it gives Insect decks a lot of freedom they’ve been missing.
Primitive Butterfly is an LVL5 monster with 1200ATK and 900DEF.
If you don’t control any monsters, you can Special Summon it from your hand if you don’t.
It’s always great to get rid of a monster for free. But you can also raise the level of all your Insect monsters by 1 once per turn.
All of a sudden, it won’t be so hard to call on those monsters with very high LVLs.
9. Brain Crusher
One of the most fun things to do in Yu-Gi-Oh! is to steal your opponent’s monsters.
And what you steal can decide the winner of the whole battle.
Brain Crusher is a Level 7 monster with 2400ATK and 1500DEF.
It has a great effect that lets you Special Summon an opponent’s monster to your side of the field if it was killed by Brain Crusher during the End Phase.
This ability can do a lot of different things, and it can definitely kill decks that need certain cards to be in the Graveyard.
8. Number 28: Titanic Moth
This Insect is also a Fire-type monster, which makes sense since it can actually burn your opponent to death.
Titanic Moth is an LVL7 XYZ that has 2400ATK and 2200DEF.
But if this is the only monster you control, it can attack straight and do half as much damage.
If you deal battle damage and remove a material, this monster does 500 burn damage for every card in your opponent’s hand.
This can easily do more than 2,000 damage, which is enough to win a fight on its own.
7. Doom Dozer
Many bug monsters don’t have good raw stats. But every rule has an exception.
Not only is this powerhouse a force to be reckoned with, but it’s also very easy to Summon.
Doom Dozer is a strong LVL8 monster with 2800ATK and 2600DEF. To bring it out, you just have to get rid of two Insect monsters from your Graveyard.
When Doom Dozer deals damage in battle, you send the top card of your opponent’s deck to the Graveyard.
Depending on the deck you’re playing against, this may actually help, but hopefully this monster will hit your opponent so hard that it doesn’t matter.
6. Traptrix Myrmeleo
If you like trap-heavy decks and love making your opponent look stupid when they play a crazy strong monster, you’ll love this one.
Traptrix Myrmeleo is LVL4, has 1600ATK/1200DEF, and is resistant to “Hole” traps, such as the Bottomless Trap Hole.
You can also add a “Hole” Trap from your deck to your hand when this card is Normal Summoned. This is a great way to make your opponent think about what will happen if they call something.
You can also destroy a Spell or Trap your opponent controls if this monster is Special Summoned.
And getting rid of a back row is always a strong move.
5. Contact “C”
In professional Yu-Gi-Oh! games, bugs have been getting a bad rap lately.
But this nasty little monster can stop some of the best decks from even starting.
When your opponent summons a monster, you can Special Summon Contact “C” to their side of the field.
This might seem like a bad thing if you have 1500ATK/2200DEF.
But while it’s on their field, they can’t Fusion Summon, Synchro Summon, XYZ Summon, or Link Summon unless they use this card as a material.
This can stop a lot of combos before they even start, giving your Insects a lot of room to wreck damage on your opponent.
4. Kumongous, The Sticky String Kaiju
What deck would be complete without a way to get rid of any monster, even if it is resistant to effects?
Kumongous, the Sticky String Kaiju, is a powerful way to get rid of any monster.
You can Special Summon Kumongous to your side of the field by Tributing a monster your opponent controls.
The end result is that you just gave your opponent a monster with 2400ATK.
But when something like Doom Dozer makes it easy to destroy, this is a good way to deal with almost any danger in the game.
3. Inzektor Exa-Beetle
Many of the best monsters in Yu-Gi-Oh! can’t be killed in fight or by effects.
There are always ways to get around these, and Insect decks have a pretty good one.
Inzektor Exa-Beetle is an LVL6 XYZ with only 1000ATK and 1000DEF.
But when it’s Summoned, you can equip it with a monster from either Graveyard, and it gets half of that monster’s ATK and DEF.
This can give Inzektor Exa-Beetle a lot of power, but it also has a great effect where you can remove a material to send a card from each side of the field to the Graveyard.
That’s not much to pay to get rid of a boss.
2. Gokipole
It must be awful to know that the only reason you’re on the field is as bait.
But if these things happen, it might not be so bad.
Gokipole is a level 3 monster with 1000ATK and 1200DEF.
When this monster is killed, you can draw an LVL4 Insect from your deck.
The best part is that if you pick a normal monster (Insect Knight is great for this), you can Special Summon it and then destroy a monster on the field with a higher ATK than the one you brought out.
This effect also does not have a goal. So this humble LVL3 can be a smart boss killer in the end.
1. Retaliating “C”
Not many decks like it when their cards are taken away.
In fact, some decks fall apart entirely if cards are lost this way.
And this great little insect takes full advantage of that!
Retaliating “C” is an insect that is LVL4 and has 1400ATK and 1400DEF. And here’s why it’s great:
You can bring this card from your hand into play when your opponent uses a Spell that Special Summons. If you do this, instead of sending a card to the Graveyard, you banish it.
Macro Cosmos is one of the most scary Traps in Yu-Gi-Oh! because it gets rid of all cards that go to the Graveyard. And Retaliating “C” lets you do that from your hand!
Plus, you can Special Summon an Earth Insect monster when Retaliating “C” goes to the Graveyard.
That’s great.
But this card is number one on this list because it can stop your opponent just by being there.
