The top lane tier list for patch 26.21 has the same shape it had two patches ago: tanks and stat-check bruisers own the lane, and the flashy picks you see on highlight reels sit lower than their popularity says. Malphite, Shen, Ornn, Garen and Sett are still our S tier. All five win more than half their games at Emerald+ and all five can go in blind without auto-losing lane. Our numbers come from op.gg’s Emerald+ Ranked Solo\/Duo data for the full 26.20 patch, last checked October 2026. Patch 26.21 only went live on 21 October, so it has no usable sample yet, and we have adjusted placements for its changes by hand. Riot does not publish official win rates, so every figure here is third-party match sampling.<\/p>\n
This page is the patch version, and it gets rebuilt every time Riot ships a new one. If you want the evergreen version (the top laners that climb no matter what the patch notes say), that lives in our best top laners to climb<\/a> guide. Here you get the full S-to-D table, why each S-tier pick is there, which picks are safe blind, how the best pick changes from Gold to Diamond+, and what moved since 26.19.<\/p>\n