From warriors and demon slayers to guardians and protectors of the weak. In this category, we list the best 20 anime swordswomen. While you may be used to seeing men wielding swords in anime series and films, we all know that if a woman decides to pick up a blade she is going to become a force to be reckoned with.
Some of the characters in this list use their powerful sword skills to destroy their enemies, and some use their magical abilities to enhance their swordplay game.
Top 20 Best Anime Swordswomen
20. Maka Albarn
Anime: Soul Eater
We kick off with the protagonist of the anime series Soul Eater. Maka loves slaying evil monsters and witches. She’s a beast on the battlefield and is deadly with a scythe. However, Maka is also a sensitive girl with temper issues. She has strong moral composure and always tries to do the right thing.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Maka is a skilled swordswoman, although she’s using a huge scythe in combat. She trained to use multiple advanced battle techniques, but her best secret weapon is her brain. She’s a clever girl who uses her brains to defeat her enemies.
19. Kuina
Anime: One Piece
Kuina from the anime series One Piece was Koushirou’s daughter, and a childhood friend and rival of the Roronoa Zoro. Her goal was to become the greatest swordswoman, but she died at an early age falling down some stairs.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Despite her young age and cute looks, Kuina was stronger than most of the adults in her dojo. She has exceptional sword skills, her sword “Wado Ichimonji” is one of the 21 great-grade swords.
When Zoro, one of the best sword fighters in anime, challenged Kuina to a duel with real swords, he lost for the 2000th time!
18. Asuna Yuuki
Anime: Sword Art Online
Asuna is an extremely skilled swordswoman. The female lead of SAO is the sub-leader of the powerful frontline guild “Knights of Blood.” Asuna has worked hard for her strength. She’s supersonic fast to the point she has earned the title “The Lightning Flash.”
Sword Skills and Abilities
Lambent Light is Asuna’s main weapon of choice, and Asuna uses a rapier that utilizes accuracy and speed. Her sword skills rely on reflexes and calculations, and while Asuna is super fast, (She got a knick name “The Flash”), She cannot think fast enough. She needs to coordinate her next counterattack which lets her opponent escape easily.
She is the next clearest with the LN’s having a reference to fencing and her techniques shown are almost half fencing. She is very effective at Healing if she uses a bow since she can survey the battle from afar.
17. Balsa Yonsa
Anime: Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit
The main protagonist of the medieval anime series Guardian Of The Sacred Spirit. Her character is full of depth, beauty, a tough personality, and a sense of pride like no other.
Sword Skills and Abilities
This woman is a trained warrior who makes a living as a bodyguard for different people. She takes on the role of being a prince’s “bodyguard” after his own family and people threaten to kill him. Her skills and experience, her matureness, and her resolve would be an advantage in hand-to-hand combat. She is the most badass swordswoman.
16. Lina Inverse
Anime: Slayers (KanzakaDex)
Lina Inverse, aka Lina the Pink, is a proud member of the Sorcerer’s Guild. By the age of 14, she had already become famous as the most powerful and feared sorceress in all the land. She is a proud member of the Sorcerer’s Guild, and her assigned mage color is pink. She’s a well-versed swordswoman.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Lina carries the Nihongo (Sword of Ligh) Hikari no Ken, a powerful magical artifact that Lina greatly covets. The Sword of Light mirrors the swordswoman’s mental energy, turning it into an attack both on the physical and the astral side. The sword can also absorb spells to become stronger for short periods. But the sword can also drain her strength tremendously. When Lina uses the sword, it turns he hair white.
Her magical power far exceeds her swordplay abilities. Lina’s favorite spells are Black Magic spells, White Magic, Fireball, Flame Arrow, and Fire Shamanism.
15. Shura Kirigakure
Anime: Blue Exorcist (Ao no Exorcist)
Shura is an exorcist swordswoman and a mentor. She was raised by the demon Hachirotaro and trained to obtain the title of Meister as a Knight. Her ancestor Tatsuko was a member of the Iga ninja clan.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Shura’s sword abilities are based on Yamata no Orochi, the legendary creature of Japanese myth. She is of the knight class and her fighting abilities are based on Yamata no Orochi, the legendary creature of Japanese myth.
She has great knowledge and vast experience in cursed swords, and she wields the demon-slaying sword, Kurikara. Her demon blade fighting skills were passed down from mother to child through the ages by Hachiro.
14. Youko Nakajima
Anime: The Twelve Kingdoms
Juuni Kokuki is an average cute girl who lives in an extremely conservative, repressive home. She’s not permitted to play sports, disagrees with her parents, or compete in any way.
That abruptly changes as she gets dragged into an alternate realm of the “Twelve Kingdom” where she transforms into a 16 years old queen who has to fight to survive.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Youko grows as a person and ruler, she’s strong and compassionate, and she listens to her citizens. She’s at her best as a swordswoman who slices demons for breakfast. She’s also smart, which makes her politically powerful as well. Her transformation into a badass anime swordswoman is truly compelling.
13. Makie Otono-Tachibana
Anime: Blade of the Immortal
Born into a samurai family Makie Otono-Tachibana, Makie inherited the family’s famed talent, she always wanted to be a swordswoman from a young age, but her mother convinced her otherwise. She finally chooses the path of the sword to avenge her mother’s disgrace.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Makie is the undisputed master swordswoman and probably the best duelist in the anime series. Her swordsmanship is so perfect that not a single drop of blood lands on her. Her weapon of choice is a double-bladed three-section staff named “Haru-no-Okina” (Old Man of Spring.) She is incredibly fast and skilled with her sword.
12. Saeko Busujima
Anime: Highschool of the Dead
She comes from the “Guardian of Japan” bloodline, and she follows the Samurai code, she’s the president of the Kendo Club and a living and breathing human weapon in a zombie apocalypse world. Saeko is a skilled melee combat specialist and the most useful fighter among her group of friends. I’ll not go into her physical appearance, just check her out.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Saeko is an athletic warrior and one of the most lethally efficient members of Takashi’s group. She’s a perfect female swordsman for any zombie apocalypse.
She uses a bokken wooden sword and later a katana. Her skills with a sword are matched by her calm and collected manner during combat. Saeko is disciplined, smart, sharp, and brave, Saeko is a true fighter. She’s also kind, however, she has a dark side. Saeko loves killing bad people, she wants to kill more and more of them.
11. Akame
Anime: Akame ga Kill!
Akame has a dark past. Akame has known massive pain, struggles, and sadness. She was sold to the Empire along with her sister Kurome to be trained as an assassin, and since childhood, Akame has been a well-experienced swordswoman who killed many people.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Akame’s sword Murasame is called the “One-Cut Killer”, anyone scratched by it will die from the poison that kills the victim in seconds. She is an overall power machine in terms of quick strikes in swordsmanship, she is much faster and much smarter than her opponents. While she does rely heavily on her speed in matches, she is also a composed tactical fighter who incorporates evasive and jumping attacks as well.
10. Satsuki Kiryuuin
Anime: Kill la Kill
At number ten best anime swordswoman we have the Satsuki Kiryuuin. The icy girl and the student council president of “Honnouji Academy.” Her goal: To rule the world through the superpower-endowing “Goku Uniforms” which grant the wearer unique superhuman abilities. She forcefully rules with iron-fisted control.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Her sword, Bakuzan, which means “to cut one’s eyes”, is enough to withstand powerful blows. It can cut Life Fibers.
Satsuki is a skilled swordswoman and a master of Junketsu’s advanced abilities. During the battle, she is composed and calculated. However, she has an unusual monstrous physical strength.
9. Mikasa Ackerman
Anime: Attack on Titan
Mikasa is almost a superhuman and a very skilled swordswoman. She is also a natural military wizard and a soldier of the “Survey Corps”, the most elite branch of the military on Paradis Island. As such her job involves leaving the walls and going out to fight titans and reclaim territory and protect her family.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Mikasa Ackerman is not just a beautiful face, She has incredible physical strength, as the Ackerman clan has Titan’s power in their human body.
Mikasa is well-versed in the art of wielding a sword. She has the disposition of a well-trained veteran soldier ready to face any situation.
8. Clare
Anime: Claymore
She’s a badass swordswoman mercenary. Clare is the white hair anime swordsman and one of the “Claymores” forms, a group of hybrid warriors who are half-human and half yoma (kind of a monster) created to exterminate yomas.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Clare is an enhanced human and a powerful warrior that can take on strong demons. Moreover, she possesses superior speed, strength, and reflexes. When she is using the quick sword, her speed is just too much for any opponent.
Her attacks move at incredible speeds. On top of that, she has a variety of superhuman physically impossible techniques with her blades. Clare learned deadly sword skills and techniques which helped her defeat other enhanced humans like her.
7. Artoria Pendragonv (Saber)
Anime: Fate/Zero Type Moon
At number seven we have Astoria aka Saber from the famous sword-fighting anime series. Fate has this weird fetish where it turns historical male figures into females. Artoria was born with the magical energy of a dragon!
Sword Skills and Abilities
She is the holder of the Element of the Red Dragon, which grants Astoria magical energy, simply through breathing like dragons. In addition, Artoria has sharp Instincts that have won her many battles.
Surprise attacks tactics are useless against her. Artoria’s swordsmanship and power are based on her Mana Burst ability which makes her one of the most skilled sword fighters in anime. It basically inserts magical energy into her weapon and body.
She uses Mana Burst freely for her sword techniques, guarding, and movement. Her armor is significantly strong, but it reduces her speed and maneuverability.
Astoria can step beyond her physical form and freely use the Excalibur sword, one of the most powerful of the Fate series. It is the most powerful magical and holy sword that symbolizes King Arthur. The sword transfers her magical energy into light by accelerating it with her factor of the dragon.
6. Shiki Ryougi
Anime: The Garden of Sinners (Kara no Kyoukai)
Just missing the top five is Shiki. She is a very strong anime swordswoman and also the heiress of a family “Demon Hunter Organization.” Shiki trained all her life to fight supernatural beings which probably made her a crazy girl.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Shiki has a magical prosthetic arm that allows her to catch things from a distance. She hypnotizes herself to enhance her physical abilities.
Shiki also possesses the “Eye of the Mind.” This allows her to see the “lines of a target’s death” and she can cut them. If she cuts the correct one she can kill the target.
She has a natural talent to foresee / sense and avoid danger based on an innate sixth sense, intuition, or prescience. On top of that Shiki has a high pain tolerance. That makes her a monstrous warrior.
Shiki wields a Japanese katana “Kanesada Kuji:” a five-hundred-year-old sword that has gained a large amount of Mystery due to its old age. She’s extremely skilled in swordsmanship – her strike range with a knife is 3 meters, 9 feet, and with a katana, this triples to 9 meters, 27 feet. Unfortunately for Shiki’s opponents, it would be an extremely one-sided fight.
5. Shana
Anime: Shakugan no Shana
At number five we have the anime swordswoman, Shana, the leading character of Shakugan no Shana. She’s endowed with enough preternatural strength to save the entire universe.
She’s not even human. She’s a Flame Haze, a being who crosses into our dimension from another. Plus, she’s got a really big sword! The Flame Haze has no name, she is given the name “Shana” after her special sword, the “Nietono No Shana.”
She is known as the sword-wielding “Flame-Haired Red-Hot-Eyed Hunter”. Shana is hinted to be the most powerful Flame Haze to ever exist.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Shana has super strength, speed, durability, and endurance. She engulfs Nietono no Shana with her flame and releases such flame forward, burning everything to ashes along its trajectory.
With the Power of the “Existence spell,” Shana can increase her powers and mobility. The movement-enhancing spell, which takes the form of a pair of fiery wings, allows her to fly.
She also can stop time until she tells it to continue, and the creation of fire-based constructs and weapons, and small-scale matter/reality manipulation. She can turn anything that is living into energy and absorb its energy or use it to fix something that was damaged.
4. Casca
Anime: Berserk
She’s tough and wears male clothing and she’s the only woman soldier who led her platoon. Casca from the epic medieval series Berserk will always search for direct contact with the enemy, constantly putting herself in danger. No doubt, she had her share of battle scars.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Casca is one of the best swordswomen in the world, and the only female warrior in a brutal medieval world. She is a better fighter than most men. This badass swordswoman performed amazing displays of skills, such as swordsmanship, and horsemanship.
Casca uses a light sword and armor enabling her to fight more gracefully than her male comrades. She will never surrender, no matter what. Casca is blessed with leadership skills and commanded an army by herself. She has proven it time and time again.
3. Cal (Kar) Shekar
Anime: Taboo Tattoo
Cal Shekar from Taboo Tatoo is number three. She is a well-versed swordswoman samurai. She is one of the strongest female swordswoman anime characters. Cal is in her own league!
Sword Skills and Abilities
Carl is like a super-fast cat girl and can seemingly teleport herself. Aside from her speed, her sword-fighting skills are unmatched. She is a skilled anime swordswoman who knows how to use a sword, and she doesn’t need to be close to her opponent to strike them with both short and long-range deadly weapons. She can use her sword from distance and can cut through dimensions!
Cal has a powerful unique ability that cancels and deflects back at her opponent in any form of attack, whether it’s physical or magic. It’s called: Absolute Boundary. Thanks to the power of taboo tattoos, she’s able to produce very strong barriers capable of repelling strong attacks and also giving her great offensive power against her enemies.
One of the most impressive anime swordswomen on this list. Most skilled swordswomen going head-to-head with Cal would check out pretty fast.
2. Rukia Kuchiki
Anime: Bleach
Coming in at number two is Rukia Kuchiki! She is the captain of the 13th division and “Soul Reaper,” an occupation that includes killing Hollows and helping souls pass on to the afterlife. Her sword, “Sode no Shirayuki” is said to be the most beautiful in the entire series.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Rukis is an expert swordswoman with a century and a half old experience fighting for survival and training as a soldier. She’s a master of the “Kidou” hand-to-hand fight”.
Rukia is incredibly fast and her intelligence is very high. Her attacks can destroy a town and her Bankai, Hakka no Togame can destroy mountains. It also allows her to lower the temperature of her body at will and unleash a powerful, blinding white explosion that freezes everything she touches.
Rukia’s sword and power are based on the legend of the yuki-onna, the ghostly ‘snow woman’ legend, it turns her into a cold and detached mystical being.
1. Kirin Toudou
Anime: Asterisk War (Gakusen Toshi Asterisk)
If we take into consideration pure swordswoman skills, Kirin Toudou from Asterisk War is no doubt the world’s best. She is a “child prodigy” who has gone through rigorous training since a very young age as a swordsman. She’s one of the most powerful and skilled anime swordswomen just based on pure swordsmanship skills and talent.
Sword Skills and Abilities
Kiran Toudou’s skills are beyond human, but without the need for inhuman abilities to make it possible. She would be able to beat her opponents who have supernatural powers in one on one scenarios with just her katana called “Senbakiri” as her weapon.
She is the only child of the Toudou family, Kirin is very proficient in her family’s sword fighting style, the “Toudouryuu,” a type of martial art. The essence of the Toudouryuu is to trick the opponent through the use of gaze, breathing, and slight movements. The Toudouryuu has 49 techniques. A combination of the techniques creates fluid attacks.
Kirin’s one downfall is that since she’s always fought alone, team fights are not her specialty.