100 Greatest Metal Bands of All Time

Black Sabbath

The band that invented heavy metal — Tony Iommi's down-tuned, doom-laden riffs and Ozzy Osbourne's wail on Paranoid and Master of Reality created the genre out of industrial gloom. Everything heavy descends from them.

Iron Maiden

The most important metal band after Sabbath — Steve Harris's galloping bass, twin-guitar harmonies, and Bruce Dickinson's operatic wail made The Number of the Beast and Powerslave the genre's grand standard.

Metallica

The biggest metal band on earth — they perfected thrash on Master of Puppets, then conquered the mainstream with the Black Album, one of the best-selling records ever made.

Judas Priest

Metal's defining aesthetic — Rob Halford's screaming tenor, dual lead guitars, and the leather-and-studs look on British Steel and Painkiller set the visual and sonic template for the entire genre.

Slayer

The most extreme of the Big Four — Reign in Blood's 29 minutes of pure velocity and menace remains the most influential thrash album ever recorded, the gateway to death and black metal alike.

Megadeth

Thrash at its most technical and venomous — Dave Mustaine's intricate riffing and acid wit on Rust in Peace stand as one of metal's most virtuosic statements.

Pantera

The architects of groove metal — Dimebag Darrell's riffs and Phil Anselmo's fury on Vulgar Display of Power redefined heaviness for the 1990s and dragged metal out of the glam era.

Motörhead

The bridge between metal and punk — Lemmy Kilmister played the fastest, loudest, dirtiest rock and roll until the day he died, with Ace of Spades as the genre's rawest anthem.

Deep Purple

A founding pillar of hard rock and heavy metal — Machine Head and the "Smoke on the Water" riff are scripture, and Ritchie Blackmore's playing shaped every metal guitarist who followed.

Tool

Progressive metal as spiritual quest — Maynard James Keenan's vocals over odd time signatures and hypnotic rhythms made Ænima and Lateralus some of the most cerebral heavy music ever made.

Slipknot

The most extreme band to ever achieve mainstream stardom — nine masked members, percussion chaos, and the brutal nihilism of Iowa made them the defining metal act of the new millennium.

Dio

Ronnie James Dio's towering vocals and fantasy imagery defined traditional heavy metal — Holy Diver is one of the genre's greatest albums and "the devil horns" his lasting gift.

Death

The originators of death metal — Chuck Schuldiner's vision evolved from the brutality of Scream Bloody Gore to the technical sophistication of Symbolic, defining an entire genre.

Mastodon

Modern metal's most adventurous band — the progressive sludge of Leviathan and Crack the Skye fused brutality with melody and concept-album ambition.

Opeth

Progressive death metal's masterminds — Mikael Åkerfeldt's shift from death growls to clean prog on Blackwater Park and Ghost Reveries made them genre-defying giants.

Sepultura

Brazil's greatest metal export — they pushed thrash to its limits on Beneath the Remains, then invented groove-laden tribal metal with the landmark Roots.

Anthrax

The most fun of the Big Four — Among the Living mixed thrash velocity with mosh-pit energy and a rap-metal experiment that pointed toward the genre's future.

Mayhem

The most notorious black metal band — De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas defined the Norwegian sound, and the band's real-life violence and church burnings made them infamous worldwide.

System of a Down

Armenian-American political fury over wildly unpredictable time signatures — Toxicity made them one of the most original and successful metal bands of the 2000s.

Korn

The inventors of nu-metal — detuned seven-string riffs, hip-hop rhythms, and Jonathan Davis's raw trauma on their self-titled debut launched an entire genre.

Helloween

The fathers of power metal — the Keeper of the Seven Keys albums fused speed, melody, and soaring vocals into the blueprint for the entire European power metal scene.

Emperor

Symphonic black metal's grandest architects — In the Nightside Eclipse layered keyboards and ferocious tremolo riffing into one of the genre's most majestic and influential records.

Morbid Angel

Death metal's technical pioneers — Altars of Madness combined blistering speed with Trey Azagthoth's otherworldly guitar work to define the American death metal sound.

Gojira

France's greatest metal band — the environmental themes and crushing, technical riffing of From Mars to Sirius and Magma made them modern metal's most respected progressive force.

Lamb of God

The leaders of the New Wave of American Heavy Metal — Randy Blythe's roar and the band's groove-thrash precision on Ashes of the Wake made them metal's biggest 2000s breakthrough.

Meshuggah

The inventors of djent — their polyrhythmic, mathematically precise riffing on Destroy Erase Improve and obZen spawned an entire technical metal subgenre.

Rammstein

Germany's Neue Deutsche Härte titans — pyrotechnic live spectacle and Till Lindemann's rolled-R baritone over industrial metal made them the most theatrical band in the genre.

Faith No More

The pioneers of alternative metal — Mike Patton's genre-hopping vocals on The Real Thing and Angel Dust prefigured nu-metal and influenced a generation of experimental bands.

Testament

The finest of the second-tier Bay Area thrash bands — The Legacy and The New Order earned them a reputation as one of thrash's most consistently excellent acts.

Candlemass

The kings of epic doom metal — Epicus Doomicus Metallicus literally named the genre, and Messiah Marcolin's operatic vocals made them doom's most majestic voice.

Venom

The accidental fathers of extreme metal — their raw, primitive Black Metal album named the genre and inspired thrash, death, and black metal in equal measure.

Bathory

Quorthon single-handedly pioneered both black metal and Viking metal — the icy ferocity of his early work and the epic Hammerheart shaped two entire genres.

Exodus

The originators of Bay Area thrash — Bonded by Blood is one of the genre's defining records, and the band's lineup served as a launching pad for Metallica's Kirk Hammett.

Kreator

Germany's premier thrash band — Pleasure to Kill set a benchmark for sheer brutality and made them one of Teutonic thrash's most enduring and influential acts.

Dream Theater

Progressive metal's defining virtuosos — Images and Words and Metropolis Pt. 2 set the standard for technical musicianship and epic, conceptual songwriting in the genre.

Cannibal Corpse

The best-selling death metal band in history — relentless brutality and notorious gore-soaked imagery on Tomb of the Mutilated made them the genre's most recognizable name.

Darkthrone

Black metal's most influential purists — the deliberately raw, lo-fi production of A Blaze in the Northern Sky and Transilvanian Hunger defined the genre's aesthetic.

Deftones

Nu-metal transcended — Chino Moreno's ethereal vocals and Stephen Carpenter's crushing riffs on White Pony created a dreamlike heaviness all their own.

Blind Guardian

Power metal's greatest storytellers — Hansi Kürsch's layered vocals and Tolkien-inspired epics on Nightfall in Middle-Earth made them the genre's most ambitious band.

Manowar

The loudest band in the world and the most committed to pure metal mythology — their loincloth-clad celebration of steel and warfare on Kings of Metal is gloriously over the top.

Type O Negative

Gothic metal's darkly humorous giants — Peter Steele's cavernous baritone and the lush gloom of Bloody Kisses made them goth metal's most beloved band.

At the Gates

The architects of melodic death metal — Slaughter of the Soul defined the Gothenburg sound and became the single most influential template for modern metalcore.

Machine Head

Groove metal's torchbearers — Burn My Eyes was one of the best-selling debuts in metal history, and The Blackening reasserted them as a modern thrash force.

Nightwish

The pioneers of symphonic metal — operatic vocals, orchestral arrangements, and the breakthrough of Once made them the biggest symphonic metal band in the world.

In Flames

Melodic death metal's most successful exports — The Jester Race and Clayman helped define the Gothenburg sound and influenced a generation of metalcore bands.

Avenged Sevenfold

Modern metal's biggest arena band — they evolved from metalcore to grandiose hard rock, and City of Evil and their self-titled album made them genuine stadium headliners.

Trivium

The most accomplished band of the metalcore generation — Ascendancy fused melodic death metal and thrash, and Matt Heafy's versatility made them a modern metal mainstay.

Killswitch Engage

The leaders of melodic metalcore — Alive or Just Breathing and The End of Heartache defined the metalcore boom with crushing breakdowns and soaring clean choruses.

Dimmu Borgir

Symphonic black metal's most commercially successful band — the grandiose orchestration of Death Cult Armageddon brought the genre to mainstream metal audiences.

Immortal

Black metal's most iconic visual force — the frostbitten riffing and corpse-painted imagery of At the Heart of Winter and Pure Holocaust made them a cornerstone of the Norwegian scene.

Sleep

Stoner-doom's most worshipped band — the single hour-long riff of Dopesmoker is a monument, and Holy Mountain is the genre's defining statement.

Electric Wizard

The heaviest band in doom — the suffocating, fuzz-drenched gloom of Dopethrone is widely cited as one of the heaviest albums ever recorded.

Saint Vitus

American doom metal's founding fathers — their Sabbath-worshipping crawl and Scott "Wino" Weinrich's vocals made Born Too Late a doom touchstone.

Neurosis

The inventors of post-metal and atmospheric sludge — the crushing, cathartic builds of Through Silver in Blood and Times of Grace influenced an entire generation of heavy bands.

Cathedral

Pioneers of the doom metal revival — Lee Dorrian's ex-Napalm Death pedigree and the molasses-slow Forest of Equilibrium helped relaunch doom for the 1990s.

Obituary

Florida death metal originators — John Tardy's inhuman growls and the groove-laden brutality of Cause of Death and Slowly We Rot defined the Tampa scene.

Entombed

The architects of Swedish death metal — the buzzsaw guitar tone of Left Hand Path became the genre's signature sound, and Wolverine Blues invented death 'n' roll.

Soundgarden

Grunge's heaviest band, rooted in Sabbath and Zeppelin — Chris Cornell's extraordinary voice and the crushing odd-meter riffs of Superunknown and Badmotorfinger.

Alice in Chains

The darkest and heaviest of the grunge bands — Layne Staley and Jerry Cantrell's haunted harmonies and sludgy riffing on Dirt made it a metal-grunge masterpiece.

Saxon

A cornerstone of the NWOBHM — Wheels of Steel and Strong Arm of the Law delivered the working-class British metal anthems that inspired Metallica and the entire thrash generation.

Diamond Head

The most influential of the NWOBHM also-rans — "Am I Evil?" was covered by Metallica and their riffs were a direct blueprint for the birth of thrash metal.

Carcass

The originators of goregrind and a melodic death metal landmark — Heartwork fused brutality with melody and remains one of the genre's most influential records.

Behemoth

Blackened death metal's biggest modern band — Nergal's blasphemous vision and the monumental The Satanist made them one of extreme metal's most theatrical forces.

Amon Amarth

Melodic death metal's Viking warriors — the relentless battle anthems of Twilight of the Thunder God and Jomsviking made them festival-headlining giants.

Children of Bodom

Melodic death metal fused with neoclassical shredding — Alexi Laiho's virtuosic guitar work on Hatebreeder and Follow the Reaper made them a generation's gateway band.

Arch Enemy

Melodic death metal's most prominent band — the dual-guitar leads of the Amott brothers and ferocious female vocals on Wages of Sin broke new ground for the genre.

Paradise Lost

The founders of gothic and death-doom metal — Gothic and Draconian Times pioneered the fusion of doom's weight with melancholic gothic atmosphere.

Within Temptation

Symphonic metal pioneers — Sharon den Adel's soaring vocals and lush orchestration on Mother Earth and The Silent Force made them one of the genre's biggest acts.

Sabaton

Power metal's history teachers — anthemic, war-themed songs and a relentless touring ethic on The Art of War and Carolus Rex made them one of metal's biggest modern bands.

Baroness

Progressive sludge metal's most melodic band — the chromatically titled Red, Blue, and Yellow & Green albums fused heaviness with colourful, expansive songwriting.

Down

The NOLA sludge supergroup — Phil Anselmo and Pepper Keenan's NOLA: A Dirge for the Damned distilled Southern doom and sludge into a stoner-metal landmark.

Eyehategod

The most abrasive of the sludge bands — the feedback-soaked, blues-soaked misery of Take as Needed for Pain defined the New Orleans sludge sound.

Periphery

The band that popularized djent — Misha Mansoor's polyrhythmic, high-gain riffing and clean melodic choruses made them the leading light of progressive metalcore.

Architects

Modern metalcore's most acclaimed band — the technical precision and emotional weight of Lost Forever // Lost Together and Holy Hell made them genre leaders.

Bullet for My Valentine

British metalcore's biggest commercial success — the twin-guitar melodies and screamed-and-sung dynamic of The Poison brought metalcore to the mainstream.

Ghost

Theatrical occult rock with a metal heart — Tobias Forge's satanic-pope persona and irresistible hooks on Meliora and Prequelle made them one of metal's biggest modern crossovers.

Dark Tranquillity

Co-founders of the Gothenburg melodic death metal sound — The Gallery and Character set the template that countless melodeath and metalcore bands followed.

Cradle of Filth

Symphonic extreme metal's biggest crossover — Dani Filth's shriek and the gothic horror theatrics of Cruelty and the Beast made them the most famous British extreme band.

Accept

German metal pioneers — Udo Dirkschneider's rasp and the anthemic "Balls to the Wall" made Restless and Wild a key influence on the speed and thrash metal scenes.

Celtic Frost

Avant-garde extreme metal pioneers — Morbid Tales and To Mega Therion influenced black, death, and gothic metal alike with their experimental, genre-defying heaviness.

Possessed

Arguably the first death metal band — Seven Churches and the song "Death Metal" itself gave the genre its name and its earliest blueprint.

Sodom

One of the "big three" of Teutonic thrash — the raw, war-obsessed aggression of Agent Orange made them a cornerstone of the German extreme metal scene.

Destruction

A founding band of Teutonic thrash — the relentless, technical aggression of Infernal Overkill and Eternal Devastation made them German thrash royalty.

Overkill

East Coast thrash's most durable band — Bobby "Blitz" Ellsworth's shriek and an unbroken catalogue from The Years of Decay onward earned them cult devotion.

Napalm Death

The inventors of grindcore — Scum and its sub-second song "You Suffer" pushed speed and brevity to their absolute limits, founding an entire extreme subgenre.

Nile

Technical death metal with an Egyptian twist — the brutal, ancient-themed assault of Annihilation of the Wicked made them one of death metal's most distinctive bands.

Gorgoroth

Black metal at its most uncompromising — the raw blasphemy of Antichrist and Pentagram made them one of the Norwegian second wave's most notorious bands.

Satyricon

Norwegian black metal innovators — they moved from the raw Nemesis Divina to the groove-driven black 'n' roll of Volcano, expanding the genre's reach.

Hammerfall

The band that revived traditional power metal in the late 1990s — Glory to the Brave brought heroic, melodic metal roaring back into fashion.

Stratovarius

A defining force in neoclassical power metal — the speed, melody, and keyboard-guitar duels of Visions and Episode shaped the European power metal sound.

Symphony X

American progressive power metal's finest — Michael Romeo's neoclassical shredding and the conceptual grandeur of The Odyssey and Paradise Lost set a high bar for the genre.

Mercyful Fate

King Diamond's falsetto and theatrical satanism made Melissa and Don't Break the Oath foundational texts for both thrash and black metal.

Trouble

Pioneers of American doom metal — the Sabbath-rooted heaviness of Psalm 9 and The Skull made them a hugely influential, if underrated, doom institution.

Kyuss

The founders of desert rock and stoner metal — the fuzzed-out grooves of Blues for the Red Sun launched the careers of Josh Homme and the entire stoner movement.

Fear Factory

The pioneers of industrial metal — the machine-precise riffing and clean-versus-harsh vocal contrast of Demanufacture made them hugely influential on modern metal.

Disturbed

One of the biggest nu-metal-era bands — David Draiman's distinctive vocal hooks and the multi-platinum The Sickness made them an arena-filling commercial juggernaut.

Bring Me the Horizon

Modern metal's biggest crossover act — they evolved from deathcore on Count Your Blessings to the genre-blending arena anthems of Sempiternal and That's the Spirit.

Cavalera Conspiracy

The reunion of Sepultura's Cavalera brothers — Max and Igor's Inflikted recaptured the tribal, groove-driven brutality that made them metal legends.

Devin Townsend Project

The vehicle for one of metal's great visionaries — the "wall of sound" production and emotional range of Addicted and Epicloud span ambient to crushingly heavy.

Animals as Leaders

Instrumental progressive metal's most virtuosic act — Tosin Abasi's eight-string fretboard innovation made their self-titled debut a landmark of the djent movement.

What is the greatest metal band of all time?

Black Sabbath are almost universally ranked the greatest metal band of all time, as they essentially invented the genre in 1968. Iron Maiden, Metallica, and Judas Priest are the usual contenders for the top spots beneath them.

Who are the Big Four of thrash metal?

The Big Four of thrash metal are Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, and Anthrax. These four American bands defined and popularized thrash in the 1980s, and famously toured together in 2010 and 2011.

What was the first metal band?

Black Sabbath are widely credited as the first true heavy metal band, with their 1970 self-titled debut. Earlier heavy rock acts like Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, and Blue Cheer helped pave the way, but Sabbath defined the genre's dark, down-tuned sound.

What are the main subgenres of metal?

The main metal subgenres include traditional/heavy metal, NWOBHM, thrash, death metal, black metal, doom and sludge, power metal, progressive metal, groove and nu-metal, gothic and symphonic metal, and metalcore. Each branched off as the genre evolved from the 1970s onward.

What is the best-selling metal band?

Metallica are the best-selling metal band of all time, with worldwide album sales estimated at over 125 million. Iron Maiden, AC/DC (often counted as hard rock), and Black Sabbath also rank among the genre's top sellers.