If you want to know how to counter Yasuo, the short answer is: pick a champion whose crowd control he cannot Wind Wall, and play the 25 seconds after he uses it. On op.gg’s Emerald+ data for patch 26.20, Lissandra (54.86%), Annie (54.53%) and Pantheon (55.07%) are the best mid counters, while Sett and Renekton lead in top. The one item that matters is Plated Steelcaps for melee laners, or Zhonya’s Hourglass for mages who keep eating Last Breath. You will leave with the counter table for both lanes, his exact cooldowns, a laning plan by phase, and the “counters” you should stop picking.
Yasuo is played in mid 60% of the time and in top about a quarter of the time, so both lanes get their own rows below. If you want the wider logic of when a counter-pick is worth it at all, our counter-pick guide by lane covers that. This page is the narrow, Yasuo-only version.
Why Yasuo is hard to lane against
What makes Yasuo miserable to lane against is how many free chances he gets per trade. His passive gives him a shield of 125 to 674 health (by level) the moment he takes champion damage at full Flow, and Flow refills just from walking around. His Wind Wall eats every projectile for 4 seconds. His E lets him dash through your minions, and his Q has no mana cost and comes back in 4 seconds before attack speed, as low as 1.33 seconds late.
Every one of those tools has a hole, though. The shield only fires once per Flow bar, so an auto attack or a cheap spell pops it before your real combo. Wind Wall stops projectiles, not point-and-click spells, ground zones or melee hits. E has a per-target lockout of 10 seconds at rank 1, so a Yasuo with no fresh minions between you is a melee champion walking at you. And he is statistically worst in the middle of the game: op.gg’s Emerald+ split has Yasuo mid at 51.81% in its shortest-games bucket and 48.06% at 30 minutes, before he recovers to 50.05% in games past 40.
Yasuo counter table, mid and top
These are the matchups where the other champion wins most often, from op.gg’s Yasuo counter data: Ranked Solo/Duo, all regions, Emerald+, patch 26.20, pulled 21 October 2026. Only matchups with 300 or more games made the list. Yasuo himself sits at 49.71% mid and 49.52% top in that sample, so anything above 53% is a real edge, not noise. Riot does not publish official matchup data, so treat the decimals as a tracker read rather than gospel.
| Champion | Lane | Win rate vs Yasuo (games) | Why it works |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pantheon | Mid | 55.07% (1,687) | Point-and-click W stun, E blocks his damage from the front, and he wins levels 1-3 outright |
| Lissandra | Mid | 54.86% (6,699) | W root and R are not projectiles, R on herself survives Last Breath, and the biggest sample on the list |
| Annie | Mid | 54.53% (2,074) | W cone and Tibbers ignore Wind Wall, and her stun lands the instant he dashes in |
| Vladimir | Mid | 54.10% (5,085) | Pool dodges Q3 and Last Breath, and his Q heal keeps him topped up through short trades |
| Malzahar | Mid | 53.69% (4,923) | Passive Void Shift soaks his first hit, and R suppression goes straight through Wind Wall |
| Vex | Mid | 53.44% (4,173) | Her passive punishes dashes, and Yasuo dashes on every trade |
| Viktor | Mid | 52.74% (7,489) | Gravity Field zones his E path, but nerfed in 26.21 so watch his number |
| Sett | Top | 56.27% (2,024) | Wins every extended melee trade, and W’s true-damage center punishes him for standing in front of you |
| Tryndamere | Top | 55.05% (1,108) | Out-duels him from level 1, and R makes his all-in pointless |
| Renekton | Top | 54.99% (3,306) | Point-and-click W stun, two dashes of his own, and Renekton spikes before Yasuo does |
| Malphite | Top | 54.05% (2,855) | Armor stat check plus an unstoppable knock-up that sets up his own R |
| Darius | Top | 53.44% (2,047) | Wins short trades with Q heal and pull, and got buffed in 26.21 |
The mid list is almost all mages whose key spells are not projectiles. The top list is all melee champions who want a long fight, which is the one thing Yasuo cannot take before his second item.
Yasuo’s cooldowns: the windows to punish
Most counter guides skip the cooldowns, which is a shame, because this is where the lane gets decided. All numbers come from the League of Legends wiki, checked October 2026. Most Yasuos level Q first, then E, and put a single point in W at level 3. That means his W stays at rank 1 until level 14 or 15.
| Ability | Cooldown by rank | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Q Steel Tempest | 4s, down to 1.33s with bonus attack speed | Q3 knocks up for 0.9s at up to 1,150 range. Count his stacks; each lasts 6 seconds |
| W Wind Wall | 25 / 23 / 21 / 19 / 17s | About 25 seconds of free projectiles for the whole lane once he uses it |
| E Sweeping Blade | 0.5s, but 10 / 9 / 8 / 7 / 6s per target | He cannot dash to you twice in a row. Fewer minions around you means fewer angles |
| R Last Breath | 70 / 50 / 30s | Needs an airborne target in 1,400 range. No knock-up on your team means no ult |
| Passive shield | Refills with Flow | One auto or cheap spell pops it, then it needs a full Flow bar again |
The clean trade pattern for most counters looks like this. Pop the shield with an auto or a cheap ability. Bait the wall with a projectile you do not mind losing. Then you have 25 seconds to use your real spells. At level 6 the window that matters is R: his 70-second Last Breath at rank 1 is the longest cooldown he has, and if he burned it on a dive, you have over a minute to force fights on your terms.
How his kit beats you, and how to deny it
Wind Wall eats your waveclear and your combo
If your champion lives on projectiles (Lux, Ezreal-style poke, Annie’s Q), the wall deletes your trade. Fire one spell you do not mind losing first, or trade with abilities that are not projectiles. Lissandra W, Annie W, Vladimir’s pool and Malzahar R all ignore it. When the wall is down, that is your all-in window, not your “farm safely” window.
E through minions turns your wave into a highway
Yasuo’s dash is a fixed 475 units, so if he uses E on a minion, you know exactly where he lands. One of the top replies in an r/summonerschool thread on playing Lux into Yasuo makes the same point: aim at the landing spot, not at him. Even better, stand outside your own wave. If there is no minion between you, his only way in is to walk, and a walking Yasuo is a melee champion with no mana and no range.
Q3 and the level 6 knock-up
Q3 is his only reliable crowd control and the thing that turns on Last Breath. When he has two stacks, step out of the tornado’s line or keep a minion in front of you. When Q3 is down, he has no crowd control at all. If his jungler or support has a knock-up of their own, respect level 6 and never walk up with Flash down.
Laning plan by phase
Levels 1-3. Most Yasuos start Doran’s Bow (79.7% of mid games on op.gg Emerald+) and Lethal Tempo (81.5%), which means he wants long trades early, not one-shot combos. Melee top laners should take those trades at level 2 if they hit it first. Mages should pop the shield with autos, then hold the wave near their own tower. Our guide to freeze and slow-push basics explains how to keep it there. A frozen wave near your tower means he has to walk a long way with no minions to dash on.
Level 6. His all-in now has a finisher, but only if someone gets knocked up. Count his Q stacks and track his jungler. If he uses Last Breath and you live, you have 70 seconds before he has it again, which is your cue to push and move first to river.
First item. Most Yasuos go Immortal Shieldbow, then Infinity Edge, then Death’s Dance. Shieldbow is his first real spike. Before it, short trades go your way. After it, his Lifeline shield means you need more burst to finish him under 30% health. Plan your hardest trades for the lane before his first back.
If you would rather skip this kind of lane entirely and let someone else handle the climb, our League of Legends boost team plays mid and top at every rank, in a ladder where Yasuo shows up in about one Emerald+ game in seven.
Teamfights and draft answers
Yasuo’s teamfight damage depends on knock-ups. Without them, Last Breath has nothing to hit. So beyond your lane pick, check that your own team is not stacking knock-ups he can use. If your support is on Alistar or your jungler is on Gragas, he gets free ult setups.
In the fight itself, a few rules help. Keep your carries spread so Q3 cannot catch two people. Bait the Wind Wall with a less important projectile before your ADC commits. And hold your hard crowd control for the moment he lands from Last Breath, because he always lands right next to the target he ulted. A Yasuo who ults into five people and gets Lissandra R’d as he lands is the most common way we see him lose a fight in Diamond games.
Counter items
Yasuo deals mostly physical damage, crits on his Q, and leans on shields and healing. That gives you four kinds of items to buy against him.
| Item | Cost | What it does vs Yasuo | Who buys it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Plated Steelcaps | 1,200g | 25 armor and 10% less damage from attacks | Melee tops, anyone he is ahead of |
| Randuin’s Omen | 2,700g | 75 armor and 30% less damage from critical strikes | Tanks, top laners |
| Frozen Heart | 2,500g | 75 armor and 20% less attack speed for nearby champions | Tanks, mana users |
| Thornmail | 2,450g | 75 armor and 40% Wounds when he attacks you | Tanks vs Doran’s Bow and Death’s Dance healing |
| Zhonya’s Hourglass | 3,250g | 2.5s stasis to wait out Last Breath or his follow-up | Mages |
| Serpent’s Fang | 2,500g | Cuts his passive and Shieldbow shields | AD assassins and duelists |
Shield-cutting deserves more credit in this matchup than it gets. His passive shield and Shieldbow’s Lifeline can soak a whole combo, and our guide to anti-shield items shows which ones are worth it in this patch.
Counters that are overrated
Some names show up on every “Yasuo counters” list and lose the matchup on current data. Same op.gg Emerald+ 26.20 sample:
- Syndra: 47.80% over 5,481 games. Her Q and E are blocked by Wind Wall, and her stun needs her E to land.
- Cassiopeia: 47.07% over 990 games. Her grounding W sounds great, but Yasuo just walks around it, and she has no escape.
- Orianna: 45.82% over 2,405 games. The ball is a projectile, and the shockwave is easy to sidestep with E.
- Sylas: 45.15% over 6,210 games. Stealing Last Breath sounds funny until you remember Sylas also loses lane to him.
- Zed: 49.30% over 8,848 games. That is basically even, so pick Zed if you main him, but not as a counter.
- Rumble top: 43.96% over 480 games. Older articles still list him; his flamethrower is not blocked, but his lane control does not hold up anymore.
Annie used to be called overrated too. On this patch she is back near the top of the list, partly because Tibbers and her W cone both ignore Wind Wall.
Where this advice falls short
Matchup win rates are averages, and Yasuo is one of the most skill-sensitive champions in the game. A Yasuo one-trick with 500 games on him is not the same opponent as a player who locked him because they saw a montage. A 54% matchup still loses almost half the time, and a good Yasuo beats a bad Lissandra every day of the week. Some of these samples are also small (Tryndamere’s 1,108 games is a lot less than Lissandra’s 6,699), and the numbers come from patch 26.20, the week before the patch 26.21 notes nerfed Viktor and buffed Darius. Yasuo himself was not touched in 26.21. Finally, counter-picking into a champion you do not know is usually worse than playing your main into a slightly bad matchup. If the counter is not in your pool, play the laning plan above with what you know.
Frequently asked questions
Who is the best counter to Yasuo mid?
Lissandra on current data: 54.86% over 6,699 Emerald+ games on op.gg, patch 26.20, and none of her key spells are projectiles. Pantheon (55.07%) and Annie (54.53%) post slightly higher numbers on smaller samples.
What is Yasuo weak against?
Point-and-click crowd control, champions who punish dashes, and lanes where he has no minions to dash through. Wind Wall only stops projectiles, and its 25-second rank-1 cooldown leaves long windows to trade.
What should I build against Yasuo?
Plated Steelcaps early if you are melee or he is ahead, then Randuin’s Omen or Frozen Heart. Mages want Zhonya’s Hourglass for Last Breath, and duelists should consider Wounds and shield-cutting.
How long is Yasuo’s Wind Wall cooldown?
25, 23, 21, 19 and 17 seconds by rank. Most Yasuos take one point at level 3 and do not rank it again until 14, so you are playing around 25 seconds for the whole lane.
Is Malphite a good Yasuo counter?
Yes in top, where he wins 54.05% over 2,855 Emerald+ games. Mid he is closer to even at 52.68%. The armor check and an unstoppable knock-up do most of the work.
When is Yasuo strongest?
Short games. op.gg’s Emerald+ game-length split has him at 51.81% in the shortest games and around 48% at 30 to 35 minutes, so a lane that ends even is already a small win for you.
To recap: pick something he cannot Wind Wall, pop the shield before you commit, and punish the 25 seconds after the wall and the 70 seconds after Last Breath. Lissandra, Annie and Pantheon mid, and Sett, Renekton and Malphite top, are the counters that win right now.
If you would rather spend the season climbing than studying Yasuo cooldowns, our League of Legends boost covers the division climb, placements or duo queue with a high-elo mid or top laner, from Emerald and Diamond up to Master.
