To commemorate the ongoing Return to Drangleic 2026 event amongst the Soulsborne community, I aim to publish a few columns of ‘best/worst’ in important categories.

Rings are important for everyone. Single player, multi player, casual or challenge runs, spells or melee, everyone can and will quickly fill all four of those slots up. Let’s talk about some rings which are clearly worth consideration… and some which are not. We will alternate between the best and worst with each entry, starting with the fifth best and worst and advancing until we arrive at the top or bottom.

First, let it be said that no covenant specific rings, such as Crest of the Rat, will be ranked. As well, the Name-Engraved Ring and Agape Ring have been excluded. Covenant rings and the Name-Engraved Ring are not utility rings, instead existing to interact with aspects of this game, so ranking them fairly would be difficult.

Let’s begin.

Fifth worst: Bloodbite Ring

If you came to DS2 having played Elden Ring first, this will be some real tonal whiplash. Enemies wielding Blood Loss are very few and far between. Even when they do appear, Blood Loss is just not that impactful in this game. It deals far less damage than Elden Ring and has some slightly irritating but manageable side effects.

Fifth best: Bracing Knuckle Ring

Another major changeup from Elden Ring is that durability is a really big deal in this game. Quite a lot of weapons have problems lasting for the long haul without breaking. Even just the base version of this ring, much less the +1 or +2 versions, will seriously help to solve the problem. Durability is not exclusive to one playstyle, build or the other. So unless you’re planning to use the Santier’s Spear, you have at least some strong reason to consider this ring.

4W: Ash Knuckle Ring

Somewhat similarly to the Bloodbite Ring, Petrification simply is not prevalent enough to justify equipping this ring and just forgetting about it. Yes, the petrification resistance boost is actually quite enormous. And yes, petrification is an instant killer, so this ring can theoretically save someone’s life. Unfortunately, this is a strictly PvE ring since players can’t wield Petrification in PvP. In that regard, you equip this ring to better deal with terrifying enemies such as… Basilisks and Rats. Come now, surely you can do better.

4B: Ring of Steel Protection

Ah, finally, a resistance based ring that puts in work around the clock. Every enemy in this whole entire game is capable of dealing physical damage, and this ring offers some pretty decent protection if you can handle it being slightly heavier than the average ring. The first two iterations of this ring are incredibly easy to get ahold of, and the best version of it can be acquired simply beating Looking Glass Knight with a Bonfire Aesthetic or on NG+. Thus, it’s consistent and easily accessible at its most powerful form.

3W: Slumbering Dragoncrest Ring

This one is unfortunate, as it is a hard fought reward for completely finishing the Rat King covenant, my personal favorite covenant in this game with some really fun PvP mechanics and general gameplay. This ring doesn’t appear on this list as much for its niche utility as you might think. Sneaking around actually does have some mild use in some cases. However, this ring is objectively inferior in terms of providing that to the player. It does not allow for sneaking if the player wears any sort of moderately heavy armor. The White Ring does exactly what this ring does, while accounting for armor and even being far, far easier to obtain. In a world where we judge things strictly off of utility, the Slumbering Dragoncrest Ring has no reason to exist at all.

3B: Old Leo Ring

This ring is technically niche, as it does absolutely nothing if the player has no source of thrusting damage. However, thrusting damage is common and fairly easy to even just stumble on. The value on this ring is a pretty incredible 12.5%, so it’s warranting of the player factoring it into their build making scheme for sure. The current world record speedrun makes use of this ring, as it is fuel for the nonstop pain train that is the Rapier on speedruns. Part of why the world record run can even do that is that this ring is accessed very early and quite easily, with players only needing to defeat the early game Old Dragonslayer boss to simply receive it.

2W: Ring of Binding

I know, this ring offers some kind of a psuedo-insurance policy for if the player keeps on dying continuously throughout their playthrough. Demon’s Souls, which punished the player similarly to DS2 on death, could actually really have used this ring. But in DS2, it just isn’t that valuable. Human Effigies are not very difficult to come across, the player has access to embarrassing amounts they can just buy. Dedicating an entire ring slot to a ring which only reaches its peak power after the player takes three whole deaths is highly inefficient. For players struggling with death a lot, the Ring of Life Protection or Ring of Soul Protection would be a much better idea. Those rings are actual insurance policies with no prerequisites for optimal use.

2B: Ring of Blades

Unless engaging in some very specific challenge run like a Spells only sort of deal, this ring is consistently useful from playthrough to playthrough. It’s also pleasingly simple to interpret for new players, as it simply enhances physical damage and leaves it at that. All melee weapons can take advantage of this and ranged weapons like bows benefit too. It gets the nod over the Old Leo Ring because it’s just more flexible. However, the two can and often do brilliantly work together to pump as high of a number as possible behind that Rapier DPS, those Grand Lance pokes, that amazing rolling R1 from a Zweihander, and so, so much more.

“Dis”Honorable Mentions

Old Sun Ring/Ring of Thorns– these rings both operate very similarly, and it was quite tempting to put them on the main list. These rings are so unbelievably mediocre and underwhelming, it’s impressive that they exist in conjunction with one another in this game. To say nothing of how laughably inaccessible the Ring of Thorns +2 is.

Dispelling Ring/Ring of Resistance – There simply doesn’t exist an area of this game where the player finds themselves facing all manner of elemental damage types, all at once. These rings might be okay if you’re a brand new player and have no idea what to expect from the game. This is the only time they have anything close to “real” utility. The defensive values on these rings are simply too poor to be worth using.

Ring of the Living – It will never be anything less than hilarious that a ring this useless is found in Frigid Outskirts. It’s almost like From Software knew how mediocre and useless it was, so they stored it away deep in the most unpleasant area in the game, so that nobody bothers with it.

The Worst: Northern Ritual Band

This ring’s existence almost angers me, because it looks like it should be one of those risk/reward elements. The player exchanges a pretty extreme amount of HP, and they receive extra fuel behind their spells to do tons of damage. Sounds fair on paper, right? This exact concept worked out fairly decently in Dark Souls 1 with a piece of equipment. It would also go on to do fairly decently in Dark Souls 3. In Elden Ring, it crapped out again. But gee, wouldn’t you believe it, DS2 and ER’s version are ring/talismans, while DS1/DS3 conveys this exchange by way of a headpiece that doesn’t take up a ring slot. Do you notice a trend here?

In practice, literally just wear the Crown of the Iron King. It does far, far more for a player than this does, and it has absolutely zero drawbacks. That crown single handedly destroys the appeal for this ring in totality.

Even without the crown though, this ring still asks for a pretty ridiculous amount of the user’s max HP for a modest return in spell casts. There are just better, less self destructive ways to keep topped off on spell capacity than this.

Honorable Mentions

Chloranthy Ring – A nice, simple buff that any build can use. Not as valuable as it is in other Soulsborne games, but still pretty strong

Clutch Rings – These are obviously very niche and extremely build specific, but for the build they’re being used on, they put in a lot of work. The defense self-debuff makes it slightly difficult for newer players to use, but the boost in damage output is really noticeable

Lingering Dragoncrest Ring – Really, really useful in conjunction with basically any sort of buff spell, as it works with all of them. It’s a shame that the +2 version is practically impossible to acquire

The Best: Dragon Ring

Choosing between this and the Ring of Blades was really, really tough. The tiebreaker came down to the notion that any build on the planet, even a Spells only build, can draw tons of easy value out of this ring. This is the ring to just slap on to a build and call it a day if you have no idea what to do, and it will put in work however it is deployed. The Dispelling Ring and Ring of Resistance tried but failed to double dip in providing a small amount of a few different things. The Dragon Ring family provides boosts to max HP, max Stamina and equip load, which are all consistently useful. It stacks with anything and everything, so it has perfect synergy with any build one could possibly imagine. To make matters better, the Third Dragon Ring, this ring family’s strongest iteration, is very easy to acquire, and the Second Dragon Ring doesn’t take a PHD to earn either.

It’s kind of funny then, that the First Dragon Ring, the weakest version of the three, is actually quite a grind to obtain.