Harnessing the power of nature is no easy feat, and Druids have many different spells that fail to capture that raw force in 5E. However, the spells that do manage to do so are some of the best options in the game, offering unquestionable area denial and fantastic problem-solving capabilities.
It can be difficult to know which ones to choose. Thankfully, the Druid is a prepared caster that knows all of their spells, letting you experiment with multiple options quite freely. However, if you want to know which direction to look, we’ll provide some strong options.
Best Druid Cantrips
Guidance
Guidance is the strongest out-of-combat cantrip in the game, simply because adding a d4 to a skill check is impactful at all points in the game. An average of two to your dice roll doesn’t sound very flashy, but it requires no resources. There’s a reason why it also made our Cleric list.
The Druid has room for their damage option and two utility cantrips, and this one should really be one of them.
Shape Water
Shape Water is an interestingly potent spell for a few cases. Being able to magically freeze a five-foot cube of water after shaping it can mess with a lot of systems, gears, and electronics.
Carrying around a few gallons of water might sound ridiculous, but if you and your DM are creative, this can potentially be more impactful than Prestidigitation.
Best 1st-Level Druid Spells
Absorb Elements
Resistance is resistance, and Absorb Elements guarantees resistance to some of the most commonly used attacks in the game. Eating a Fireball head-on sucks, but if you can halve it, it sucks quite a lot less. Most dangerous fights in 5E have energy being flung around in some way, so you can guarantee some first-level spell slots being put into this.
The extra damage on the weapon swing is very funny but not the main appeal of this ability.
Entangle
The Druid’s signature first-level spell, Entangle, is one of those spells that is annoying at level one and 20. Encapsulating an area with restraining plants causes fights to become especially gummy. Since you’re placing it, you can ensure that your frontliners are in range to deal with enemies while everyone else has to wade through difficult terrain.
And the poor souls getting caught must make a Strength saving throw—which is far from the most commonly huge saving throw—to evade it or become restrained. The Druid gets this for a reason. Put it on your list.
Goodberry
Goodberry is a great way to spend extra spell slots at the end of the day to ensure the party is healed and nourished. It’s extremely spell slot efficient, guaranteeing 10 hitpoints of healing per first-level slot used. And, rain or drought, you can ensure that your entire party—and their animal companions—are well-fed.
Best 2nd-Level Druid Spells
Pass without Trace
If you’ve ever been worried about moving through a stealth encounter and having the Paladin’s fullplate ruin everything, this is a spell you should check on. Plus 10 to any check is really powerful. In a system where a 21 is an endgame-level passive Perception, a second-level spell adding 10 makes stealth so much easier. Just make sure you understand how stealth and cover works, or have the Bard back you up with Invisibility.
Spike Growth
Entangle is an annoying spell but isn’t particularly effective after the first round you cast. Spike Growth fixes that extremely quickly. This Fireball-sized radius deals damage to creatures who move through it, dealing 2d4 damage with no saving throw for every square it touches.
And that’s not willful movement, either. You can drag foes through Spike Growth to deal huge amounts of damage. A Warlock with Repelling Blast, for instance, can see their damage improved by 4d4 damage per shot. Then, if the enemy is melee, they’ll have to consider moving back through difficult terrain that domes them for 2d4 each step. Very strong spell with many different synergies.
Summon Beast
A new option from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, Summon Beast is an excellent spell that lasts a full hour and provides you an ally in combat that scales with spell level. For Wild Shape Druids, casting this spell before you Shape can give you an ally to flank with or a bird to pester enemies with.
While far from Spiritual Weapon, this is a great option for Druids looking for that concentration slot and find Spike Growth or Entangle unwieldy.
Best 3rd-Level Druid Spells
Conjure Animals
Summoning creatures in 5E is a great way to break the encounter system wide open. With how 5E calculates AC, even a CR two Rhinoceros has a reasonable chance to hit a high-level character. And, if you decide to do swarming tactics, a single-target-based warrior can have a rough time singularly killing every single Giant Wasp that came to your aid.
However, your DM gets to decide on your animals. And if you spam this spell, you can expect to summon more and more random fish onto the battlefield.
Dispel Magic
While far from Counterspell, Dispel Magic makes it possible for the Druid to solve a problem after it has been used. These problems can range from ancient seals on doors that would otherwise take a puzzle to solve to undoing the petrification on your poor Artificer.
Best 4th-Level Druid Spells
Fire Shield
Reflective damage is rarely what you want on a melee Warrior since you’re still eating damage for breakfast. However, the Druid is no typical melee Warrior. Assuming you select either the Circle of Moon or Spores, you’ll likely have between 28 and 126 hitpoints to sacrifice and middling AC to boot.
Fire Shield gives you resistance to common energy types, takes no concentration, and reflects melee damage for 2d8 with no save. This is an excellent buff to throw on to convince enemies that maybe you should leave that on-fire triceratops alone.
Giant Insect
Giant Insect allows you to create a massive pile of insects that obey your commands and are extremely annoying to deal with. From poison to raw damage and area control, this spell can allow the Druid to be a real headache.
However, its limitation on needing targets can be a bit of a bummer. Thankfully, Druids should be fully willing to scoop up some spiders into a jar with the plan to turn them into hilarious and effective restraining machines.
Best 5th-Level Druid Spells
Maelstrom
Keeping with the theme of powerful concentration-based area denial, Maelstrom adds on damage and a titanic area of effect. 6d6 damage is no joke, especially when it does the damage every round.
The entire area is difficult terrain, making it unruly to walk through, and enemies are pulled closer to the center. If they have no magical options to get out, this can quite legitimately put any enemy with 30-foot movement or less in a deadly blender.
Wall of Stone
An exceptionally vibrant spell, Wall of Stone creates a number of panels that allow you to create relatively durable battlements. Through clever usage of this spell, you can give your party time to buff and prepare.
These wall panels can have upwards of 180 hitpoints, and nothing says you can’t just block a hallway with all ten of them. Enemies that can beat through 1,800 health before you’re ready for them are extreme threats.
In addition, it’s possible to use it as a bridge, attempt to trap slow creatures inside of it, or give your party a makeshift castle over the course of a few days. The potency of this spell comes in its flexibility.
Best 6th-Level Druid Spells
Heal
Heal also made our Cleric spell list, and that’s because it is one of the few ways to heal in combat without losing out on efficiency. Spells hit hard in 5E, so Cure Wounds can’t keep up during combat scenarios. Heal relies on no dice rolls and provides 70 hitpoints, a close-to-full heal for many characters, while also purging a few minor conditions.
The Moon druid might not find this too attractive, but even they might want an emergency pick-me-up if a fight goes long enough to exhaust their Shapes.
Best 7th-Level Druid Spells
Reverse Gravity
If you’ve ever wanted to force an entire room to be useless—without magical access—then Reverse Gravity is your spell. Against melee-focused enemies, this spell is a death sentence, forcing a Dexterity save just to avoid taking fall damage. Then, they have to decide how they plan on making ranged attacks while clutching close to a fixed object.
This has little strength against spellcasters—or those who are Fey Touched—who can safely Misty Step out of danger. However, against their minions, you might find yourself in a very commanding position.
Best 8th-Level Druid Spells
Incendiary Cloud
10d8 fire damage, 20-foot radius sphere, and damage at the end of each turn turns this spell into a level eight Fireball. However, it’s a bit more dangerous than that. Utilizing your party, you can make it as hard as possible to escape from 45 average damage per turn. Restraining, grappling, and other means can make things easy.
While the spell has to move slightly every turn, Jeremy Crawford has clarified that you can choose to just have it wiggle in place, allowing you to block off hallways or slowly push enemies in a direction of your choice.
Best 9th-Level Druid Spells
Shapechange
This spell changes how a standard Druid works considerably. Wild Shape is impeccably strong, but a Wild Shape that includes creatures of your level in CR is a significant step up. This spell is great for all kinds of druids, offering you a nearly infinite number of combat forms and the potential to acquire forms that are excellent for out-of-combat. In addition, as long as the creatures can supply somatic components, they can theoretically cast magic. This means there are quite a lot of forms that can completely annihilate the fight.
Although it is very hard to go wrong with CR 20 Dragons. 333 free hitpoints is hard to chew through on a good day.
Honorable Mentions
- Produce Flame is the ranged damage option for Druid, which is good enough. d8 damage dice is passable while providing utility in a makeshift torch that your druid can carry around.
- Shillelagh is handy for melee druids, like for Circle of Spores, or druids looking to multiclass.
- Healing Word is critical if you are the party’s healer, as spending a bonus action to save someone from unconsciousness is excellent action economy.
- Augury should be used when there are spare spell slots to give the party additional information.
- Enhance Ability is a good way for a Druid to aid their party during a day where combats look light, and ability checks seem to be the aim of the day.
- Heat Metal is a great way to burn a human boss to a crisp.
- Call Lightning is a way for a Wild Shaping Druid to deal ranged damage, but the damage comes a bit too slow to be consistent.
- Revivify is an important spell to have on hand, since dead characters cost a lot of money to pick up without it.
- Polymorph can end fights by itself by turning enemies into small animals.
- Wall of Fire is one of the best area-of-effect damage spells in the game, as well as offering excellent area denial.
- Greater Restoration should be on your mind if you’re entering a deadly dungeon especially if you hear about petrification or curses.
- Scrying is a good way to gather information, as long as you have a name to base it on.
- Summon Draconic Spirit is a summon that can sniff out invisible foes, potentially fly, and deal area-of-effect damage.
- Investiture of Stone is an excellent option for melee-focused druids, as long as you’re fighting enemies using natural attacks. Investiture of Wind is also great since it is one of the few ways Druids can fly without shaping.
- Transport via Plants is a weird but strong teleportation spell.
- Plane Shift lets your party leave a dangerous situation or exile an enemy from a fight.
- Draconic Transformation provides the Druid with blindsight, flight, and a Fireball as a bonus action.
- Antipathy/Sympathy, when utilized with preparation and with a specific party member in mind, can force bosses or enemies close to the party member that can kill them quickly.
- Feeblemind shuts down casters and, depending on the DM, can render many enemy types completely useless.
- Foresight is very interesting for classes like Barbarian or Rogue since it basically makes them war gods.
