Balatro has been nominated for Game of the Year at the 2024 Game Awards, a prestigious nomination if there ever was one for an indie card roguelike title. Being a roguelike, or rather roguelite, it has a ton of buffs players can pick up in between rounds, fittingly called Jokers.
Not all Jokers are made the same, so here is a full Balatro Joker tier list breaking them down from best to worst, as well as some extra info on the ideal ones you should always stick into your inventory.
All Balatro Jokers, ranked
| Joker tier | Joker name |
|---|---|
| S | Blueprint, Brainstorm, Throwback, The Duo, The Trio, The Order, The Tribe, Campfire, Baseball Card, Hologram, Cavendish, Invisible Joker, Canio |
| A | Spare Trousers, Ancient Joker, The Family, Seeing Double, Fibonacci, DNA, Triboulet, Steel Joker, Blackboard, Constellation, Hiker, Card Sharp, Vampire, Rough Gem, Bloodstone, Arrowhead, Onyx Agate, Glass Joker, Smeared Joker, Misprint, Raised Fist, Oops! All 6s, Luchador, Mail-In Rebate, To the Moon, Ramen, The Idol, Loyalty Card, Hit the Road |
| B | Joker, Greedy Joker, Lusty Joker, Wrathful Joker, Gluttonous Joker, Jolly Joker, Zany Joker, Mad Joker, Crazy Joker, Droll Joker, Sly Joker, Willy Joker, Clever Joker, Devious Joker, Crafty Joker, Half Joker, Four Fingers, Credit Card, Banner, Mystic Summit, Chaos the Clown, Scary Face, Abstract Joker, Hack, Gros Michel, Even Steven, Odd Todd, Scholar, Supernova, Ice Cream, Blue Joker, To Do List, Red Card, Riff-Raff, Shortcut, Baron, Cloud 9, Rocket, Obelisk, Photograph, Fortune Teller, Stone Joker, Flash Card, Acrobat, Swashbuckler, Flower Pot, Wee Joker, , Shoot the Moon, Driver’s Licence, Yorick, Diet Cola, Chicot |
| C | Mime, Ceremonial Dagger, Marble Joker, Dusk, Delayed Gratification, Ride the Bus, Space Joker, Burglar, Egg, Runner, Ice Cream, Splash, Green Joker, Vagabond, Midas Mask, Gift Card, Erosion, Hallucination, Juggler, Golden Joker, Lucky Cat, Trading Card, Popcorn, Walkie Talkie, Seltzer, Castle, Smiley Face, Golden Ticket, Sock and Buskin, Certificate, Showman, Stuntman, Satellite, Cartomancer, Burnt Joker, Bootstraps, Perkeo |
| D | Joker Stencil, 8 Ball, Pareidolia, Business Card, Sixth Sense, Faceless Joker, Superposition, Madness, Square Joker, Séance, Turtle Bean, Reserved Parking, Drunkard, Bull, Mr. Bones, Troubadour, Merry Andy, Matador, Astronomer, |
Balatro tier list breakdown
Best Legendary Balatro Joker: Canio
Of the five Legendary Jokers in Balatro, I found Canio to be the only useful one in a general sense. Destroying Face Cards does seem like a big deal, but the payoff is incredible (it’s an S-tier Joker for a reason). With 10 destroyed Face Cards, this Joker gives a whopping X11 Mult, making it one of the most powerful buffs in the entire game.
Best Rare Balatro Jokers: Brainstorm, Blueprint, Baseball Card
There’s no better ability than copying others, which is precisely what our S-Tier Brainstorm and Blueprint Jokers do. They take on the effects of the Joker to either the left or the right of them and act as them the entire time they’re in your hand. This essentially means you can double the effects of the Jokers you copy, allowing you to craft some incredible combinations. A couple of Cavendishes and Holograms could take you a long way, especially if you make them either Holographic or Polychrome for even more Multiplying goodies. Hit the Road is also an honorable mention here with its massive boost, which, unfortunately, resets every round.
On the other hand, we have the Baseball Card, which gives an X1.5 Multiplier per held Uncommon Joker. While it only works with Uncommon Jokers and not Rare or Legendary ones, the effects it can grant are massive and can easily take you beyond Ante Eight and into the Endless Mode. It’s a saving grace for when you don’t have any great Jokers on hand and have to make do with Uncommon ones, the best of which we’ll touch on in the following section.
Best Uncommon Balatro Jokers: Hologram, Throwback, Fibonacci
Adding playing cards to your deck usually is a great idea since most of the special effects they carry are nothing if not beneficial. The Hologram Joker only amplifies the viability of this strategy, gaining X0.25 Mult every time you add a playing card to the deck. It doesn’t even have to be one with a special effect; so long as it’s a new addition, the Joker will gain an awesome Multiplier.
Its Uncommon Joker cousin, Throwback, is even more powerful. It’s probably one of the most powerful if not the best Joker in Balatro. By gaining an X0.25 Mult per Blind skipped, this means it can get up to X0.5 per Ante or X4 by the time you clear the eighth one and enter the Endless Mode. That’s a massive amount and it alone can bring you into the thousands in Mult, especially if you grab a Polychrome edition.
Last but not least of the Uncommon Jokers is Fibonacci that builds up a flat Multiplier each time an Ace, two, three, five, or eight is played and counted. With eight flat Mult per card, this means that Fibonacci alone can net you a +40 Mult, which, if you happened to have Throwback, would immediately become 160, with a few extra X Mults taking it beyond the thousand mark. Having at least one of these flat Multiplier Jokers is advised, or, better yet, getting your X Mult Jokers to become Holographic.
Best Common Balatro Jokers: Cavendish, Misprint, Raised Fist
One of the best Jokers in Balatro happens to be a Common one. Cavendish, giving an X3 Mult with the risk of being destroyed (0.001 percent chance), is a brutal Joker and perfect for just about any combination you can think of. It doesn’t require any sort of setup, additional cards, skipping blinds, or anything else as a pre-condition. The Joker simply works with that little bit of risk that it will disappear at the end of a round, which you’d need to be extremely unlucky to see.
On the other hand we have Misprint, one of the first Jokers players will get their hands on, which gives a random flat Multiplier when used. While it can sometimes give you a one, two, or even zero, the card usually gives a lot more and can prove invaluable in early-game runs, no matter how big the Multiplier it grants.
Raised Fist is sort of the opposite. It gives a flat Multiplier that is based solely on the value of the worst card in your hand. Take that number and double it, and there’s your Multiplier. If grabbed as a Polychrome or Holographic card, Raised Fist can easily be viable for the entirety of the run and even beyond deep into the Endless Mode.
