The 15 Best Supernatural Villains, Ranked

Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Dean Winchester (Jensen Ackles) might be the beating heart of "Supernatural," but the show's villain game was the body around it. "The Boys" creator Eric Kripke filled "Supernatural" with consistently compelling antagonists who kept the Winchesters' lives terrifying and uncomfortable. What's more, not all of these evil-doers were villains all the time. As the show's goalposts moved and allegiances changed, one season's ally could easily become another season's big bad ... and vice versa. 

Just like the "Supernatural" creative team took valuable lessons from even the worst episodes, the show made its cavalcade of villains a crucial ingredient in the secret sauce that set the show apart. Throughout its 15 seasons, "Supernatural" rolled out one memorable villain after another, and managed to keep things interesting by alternating conventional fantasy baddies with some truly surprising twists on the theme. Let's take a look at some of the greatest antagonists that the show gave us.

Hell sees its fair share of rulers over the course of the show, and late-game arrival Asmodeus (Jeffrey Vincent Parise) is definitely one of the strongest. The supposed runt of the Princes of Hell litter takes over "Supernatural" Season 13 and immediately introduces an "evil overlord" management style. Asmodeus is all about cunning and ruthlessness, with a penchant for dangerous master plans thrown in for good measure.  

Powered by a combination of his own Prince of Hell powers and the divine grace that he siphons from Archangel Gabriel (Richard Speight Sr.), Asmodeus is a mighty creature who's easily the strongest active demon during his time in the spotlight. However, power isn't everything. Asmodeus' "Supernatural" arc isn't particularly long, and there have been other, far more impressive rulers of Hell before him. Combine this with the Colonel Sanders jokes the show keeps making about his signature white suit, and Asmodeus can be somewhat lacking in terms of villain credibility.  

What's worse than an untrustworthy angel? One that's identifies as a drab middle manager who relishes in doing his job in a way that causes maximum discomfort to the people around him. 

Zachariah (Kurt Fuller) is Castiel's (Misha Collins) angelic boss who repeatedly sticks his nose in Sam and particularly Dean Winchester's lives. He's not above messing with his targets' minds, sending them to alternate timelines, or even torturing them as needs must. All of this comes wrapped in a smug, faux-affable attitude, a self-admitted tendency to be as despicably petty toward everyone as possible, and a slippery slope of a villain arc that leads up to a great Season 5 confrontation. 

At the end of the day, Zachariah is effectively a petty, somewhat disrespected middle manager stereotype taken to its logical extreme. Apart from his career-driven office drone qualities, his utter contempt toward humans in general and the Winchesters in particular makes him memorable.  

By and large, the Men of Letters are researchers and investigators of the paranormal, and the American branch of the order is largely extinct. Not so with the British Men of Letters, who are still going strong ... and whose tools and overall approach to monster hunting are far more precise and efficient than the Winchesters'. Unfortunately, their militant, pragmatic approach goes a bit too far in many ways. 

The British Men of Letters have no problem making deals with Hell or launching large-scale attacks toward their American counterparts if they think they can gain something from it. Though the Winchesters do get something from their interactions with this organization, the Brits eventually reveal themselves as truly antagonistic, which leads to a major confrontation in the Season 12 episode "Who We Are"  

The British Men of Letters are a rare and refreshing human threat in a show rife with demons and monsters. Their storyline's personal connections to the Winchesters and assorted interesting lore drops make the Brits a great villain group. 

Ruby (primarily portrayed by Katie Cassidy and Genevieve Padalecki) is technically just a rank-and-file demon, but she gets extra points for her sheer duplicity and cunning. She becomes a major player in "Supernatural" Season 3, where she establishes herself as an ally to the Winchesters ... or so they think. Ruby does help the brothers in many ways, ultimately gaining Sam's trust and even becoming his lover. 

Of course, Ruby is still a demon, so she has ulterior motives all along. Her two-season arc as a Winchester ally is actually a long game to unleash Lucifer himself, and the way she manipulates Sam into doing her bidding is one of the most majestic slow-burn plans on the show. Performance wise, it doesn't hurt that Ruby and Sam have plenty of chemistry — so much so, in fact, that their actors Genevieve Padalecki (neé Cortese) and Jared Padalecki are now married. For fans who want to see more of the pair's work, Genevieve Padalecki plays Jared Padalecki's wife in "Walker," the 2021 reboot of "Walker, Texas Ranger."  

Castiel (Misha Collins) enters the "Supernatural" fray in Season 4, Episode 1, ushering in a cavalcade of Heaven-centric storylines that would go on to power the series so often. He goes on to have one of the most interesting character arcs on the show, dying multiple times and going through a series of allegiance changes. 

While Castiel is generally a friend and an ally to the Winchesters, the many changes he experiences during his time on the show include a stint as a major antagonist. In "Supernatural" Season 6, Castiel becomes an increasingly untrustworthy figure who hunts for the powers of the Purgatory with the demon Crowley (Mark Sheppard). After Castiel hogs all the souls in this strange plane for himself, he ends the season with powers equivalent to God himself ... which, with Castiel's mindset at the time, isn't great news. 

Castiel eventually snaps back toward a more heroic mentality, of course. Still, the angel's comparatively brief villain turn works precisely because of his major role in the series and his friendship with the Winchesters. While being one of the big bads of "Supernatural" Season 6 is only a part of his arc, Collins' committed performance means that Castiel belongs on the list.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are technically not "Supernatural" big bads despite their vast power. However, the show's interpretation of the end times quartet is both imaginative and formidable, and their combined screen time is more than enough to establish them as a massive threat.

The Horsemen become instrumental during Season 5, when Lucifer (Mark Pellegrino) plans to unleash the apocalypse and the Winchesters discover that the Horsemen's rings can be used to lock the devil back in his cage. This prompts a series of risky missions to retrieve the rings from War (Titus Welliver), Famine (James Otis), Pestilence (Matt Frewer), and Death (Julian Richings). All four are excellent and memorable characters, thanks to impeccable casting across the board. 

Welliver plays War as a charming, hallucination-inducing sadist who roams the Middle East between global projects. Otis' Famine masquerades as a frail, sneering old man who hates just about everyone and relishes on making people indulge in their worst desires. Frewer infuses Pestilence with the uncomfortable energy of a mad doctor who's just as happy to tamper with medicine bottles in a drug store as he is to create deadly viruses in a lab. While less actively malevolent than the other Horsemen, Richings' Death is the most terrifying of the quartet. The actor plays him with a reserved, disgruntled authority that suggests his might be the last face you'll ever see ... and that said face might not care about your demise at all. 

Abaddon (primarily portrayed by Alaina Huffman) is a cool combination of aggressive monster-of-the-week villain and scheming big-picture antagonist. A crusading Knight of Hell with power to spare, she has a tendency to embrace her basest instincts and resort to violence at a moment's notice. Yet, what makes her truly dangerous is her ability to scheme and strategize.

After entering the "Supernatural" villain mix in Season 8, Abaddon establishes herself as a major power player in Season 9. Her big master plan is no less than to take over both Hell and Earth, regardless of who stands in her way ... and for a good while, it seems that she has the strength and skill to pull off this ambitious plan. 

Abaddon's combination of severe anger issues, clever power plays, and a cruel sense of humor make her dangerous — and one of the show's most entertainingly evil antagonists.

The Darkness (mainly portrayed by Emily Swallow) is more than just an ominous name. She's essentially God's (Rob Benedict) powerful twin sister, and embodies the concept of dark the same way he personifies the light. She's such a legendary entity that most other paranormal characters tend to just outright dismiss her as a myth.

God and the Darkness have several philosophical differences regarding the creation business. This is why the former imprisoned the latter in a special extradimensional cage, where the Darkness suffered alone for countless years. Once she gains her freedom in "Supernatural" Season 8, the Darkness promptly possesses a baby called Amara Schneider. She rapidly grows to adulthood with a steady diet of souls, and forms a plan to reboot her brother's creation. Fortunately for the universe, she's also developed a fascination with a mortal called Dean Winchester ...

The thing that makes Amara so interesting is that despite her vast powers and unnerving intentions, she's a fairly sympathetic villain. She has to endure plenty of betrayal, loneliness, and suffering. Nevertheless, she's fully able to show mercy and move on, and she can even admit to her own faults and limited worldview when push comes to shove. 

The first among all demons, Lilith (primarily portrayed by Anna Grace Barlow and Katherine Boecher) is a powerful entity who takes over as the show's main antagonist in Season 3, after Azazel (primarily portrayed by Fredric Lehne) falls. As befits her status, Lilith is just as terrible as her inhuman, white demon eyes suggest. She has a penchant for possessing children while committing gruesome deeds, which adds a classic "creepy kid" element to her formidable power set. She flays innocent people alive, and considers babies a delicacy. Oh, and she seeks to unleash Lucifer, who's just about the only creature in Hell who's even worse than her.

Apart from this laundry list of nastiness, Lilith is a formidable villain whose story arc sees some of the most classic pieces of the "Supernatural" puzzle fall into place. She makes future King of Hell Crowley her consigliere and dramatically shifts the fortunes of both Winchester brothers. Her two-season tenure as the show's big villain also brings Castiel and other angels in the mix.

Metatron (Curtis Armstrong) is a unique and effective "Supernatural" villain whose unassuming looks hide a steel trap mind. Words are often power on the show, and Metatron is the keeper of God's written word. After living in exile on Earth, Metatron becomes a major player in Seasons 8 and 9. Using the Word of God written on the Angel Tablet, he takes over Heaven itself and starts positioning himself as a god.

The heavenly scribe is one of the many "Supernatural" villains who contain multitudes. Despite his angelic origin, Metatron loves humanity's little quirks like stories, and considers angels untrustworthy. He also seems to have genuinely lofty and altruistic ideas for his own ascension to godhood. Though his arrogance and extreme bitterness make sure that he qualifies as an antagonist for much of his time on the show, Metatron doesn't quite have what it takes to enter the top five. 

A show's first major villain can determine a lot about its overall atmosphere, and "Supernatural" hit a home run with the Yellow-Eyed Demon. The show's first overarching antagonist is an incredibly personal enemy to the Winchester family since he killed Dean and Sam's mother, Mary (Samantha Smith). The brothers eventually find out that the Yellow-Eyed Demon isn't just any old evil-doer, either. He's none other than Azazel, one of the four powerful Princes of Hell. 

Azazel is the blueprint for the many powerful demons "Supernatural" went on to introduce. Sadistic, confident, and manipulative, he genuinely relishes in making his victims suffer. He's so fearsome that even other demons are wary of him, and such a personal threat to the Winchesters that the stakes are sky high whenever he's around. Crueler, stronger, and more fearsome villains would follow Azazel after his defeat at the end of "Supernatural" Season 2, but the Yellow-Eyed Demon remains the blueprint. 

It was a bold move from "Supernatural" to turn God into a villain. The long game the show plays with his introduction is equally ambitious. Though we won't know it until later, viewers first meet God in Season 4. At this point, the creator deity is posing as Chuck Shurley, an oddball writer with a god complex and prophet-like abilities. After a couple of seasons as a recurring character, Chuck quite literally vanishes from his chair, and isn't seen again until Season 10. He only reveals himself as God during the Darkness storyline in Season 11, and doesn't reach true big bad status until he decides to punish all humanity for the Winchesters' insubordination in the Season 14 finale, "Moriah." 

This slow build allows the viewers to become acquainted with God's many sides. As a result of this approach, the show's depiction of a fickle deity who's perfectly ok with wiping out his creations when his ego takes a hit is both effective and unnerving.

Dick Roman (James Patrick Stuart) is an aberration, as "Supernatural" villains go. For much of its run, the show's worst antagonists come from Heaven and Hell. In Season 7, Roman and his Leviathans let the viewers know that the Purgatory has its dangers, as well. 

The otherworldly Leviathans make their grand entrance by possessing the God-powered Castiel, and the leader of these creatures later takes the identity of the billionaire Roman. This gives the antagonist the benefit of being both the leader of a dangerous villain faction and a powerful evil billionaire — a true double trouble of wickedness. 

Apart from Roman's horrifying true nature and his smug super-rich vessel, he gains villain points from his grand plan, which might just be the most devious plot throughout the show's entire run. Roman isn't about conquering the universe or acquiring powerful arsenals. Instead, he simply plans to create a food additive that will turn humanity into an apathetic meat cattle for the Leviathans to consume — an inspired idea even by the show's lofty villainy standards.

It's probably fair to say that most "Supernatural" fans knew to expect Mark Sheppard's reliably unreliable Crowley. The demon secures a spot on the list with his characteristic combination of menace and humor. He constantly balances the thin line between a charming trickster and a sadistic manipulator. In fact, his status as an ally or an antagonist largely depends on whether his personal interests happen to align with the Winchesters' mission or run against them.  

Crowley wears so many hats over the course of the series that his eternally shifting allegiance is understandable. Sometimes, he's the King of Hell — at another point, he's a helpless captive. There really is no telling where Crowley ends up during any given season, which makes him a particularly iconic and memorable villain. In fact, there's a very decent chance that he would finds himself at the top spot if it wasn't for the fact that he's been known to take the side of the proverbial (and sometimes literal) angels on occasion.

Supernatural began as a "rip-off" of a classic horror TV show, so perhaps it was inevitable that the greatest antagonist of the series is the ultimate horror villain: the devil himself. Any "Supernatural" episode with Lucifer speaking softly while staring holes into his lessers can prove why he's the show's ultimate villain. He's so saturated in power and self-serving evil that he often seems slightly bored. Switching between magnetic and menacing at the drop of a hat, Lucifer combines the devil archetype's traditional manipulative tendencies with extremely human bad boy vibes ... which is ironic, considering how much he hates humanity.

The show lets you know that Lucifer is coming for a long time before the fallen angel actually enters the frame. Both Azazel and Lilith actively build toward his impending arrival, and when Lucifer finally acquires a vessel in Mark Pellegrino's Nick in Season 5, he quickly establishes himself as a genuinely menacing and charismatic figure. 

There are many TV shows like "Supernatural" out there, but none with a villain with Lucifer's style. He consistently swings for the fences. He wants to take over a main character's body, and tries to begin the apocalypse. Even after a massive defeat, he will haunt his enemies as a hallucination and return with a new set of plans a few seasons down the line. The sum total of Lucifer's magnetic machinations means that he's not just the best "Supernatural" bad guy — he's on TVLine's list of best TV villains ever.