Harry Potter: 7 Reasons Voldemort Is Stronger Than Grindelwald (& 8 Why He’s Weaker)

The Wizarding World is home to some of the most dastardly villains in fiction. The Harry Potter series was traumatized by Lord Voldemort. A psychopathic bent on avoiding death forever, he waged war on the Wizarding World and nearly tore apart Hogwarts from the inside. Before Voldemort’s time, there was Gellert Grindelwald, a dark wizard with an obsession with the Deathly Hallows. He wanted to conquer the entire world and nearly succeeded in doing so.

Among these two antagonists, who is the stronger dark wizard? To answer that question, we’re exploring 5 reasons Lord Voldemort is stronger and 5 reasons why Grindelwald is stronger.

Updated by Madison Lennon on February 17, 2020: The Harry Potter franchise is an incredibly lucrative one that appears to have no end in sight. Even though the main book and film series has come to an end, it continues to chug along with the Fantastic Beasts trilogy.

The new story focuses on the iconic friendship and rivalry between Albus Dumbledore and Gellert Grindelwald. With the third movie on the horizon, now seemed like the perfect time to revisit this list and add to the infamous compare and contrast between the two most deadly dark wizards of all time. 

15 Grindelwald: Did Not Fear Death

One of the defining facts of Voldemort’s character is that he feared death. That’s why he went to such great extremes to prevent it, i.e., the creation of his Horcruxes. Grindelwald, on the other hand, did not fear death, which made him more powerful in many ways. He wasn’t limited by anything. He also did not fear Dumbledore the same way that Voldemort did.

There is an excellent chance that Grindelwald knew how to create Horcruxes, given his in-depth studies of the dark arts, but he never felt the need to make them, leaving his soul intact. Grindelwald was capable of playing the long game while Voldemort was rash and guided by his obsessive fear of leaving the mortal realm.

14 Grindelwald: Was Able To Resist The Most Powerful Legilimens Of All Time

After Grindelwald was arrested and thrown into a jail cell, he became susceptible to Voldemort, who was desperate to find the Elder Wand. However, Grindelwald was able to resist Voldemort — who is considered the most powerful Legilimens of all time.

He did not divulge the location of the wand, as his final act of redemption. He even taunted Voldemort and showed no fear in the face of his potential death, again, another thing he had over Voldemort.

13 Voldemort: Ended Grindelwald’s Life

Perhaps one of the most significant ways Voldemort triumphed over Grindelwald is that he was the one who killed the other dark wizard. That said, Grindelwald wasn’t at the height of his power, so it wasn’t a fair fight.

Voldemort only killed him because he was frustrated, in a rush to go after Harry, and realized that Grindelwald wasn’t going to give him the location of the Elder Wand. Without Voldemort, Grindelwald would potentially still be alive. However, he also said he was aware Voldemort would eventually come for him, knowing it was how he would meet his death.

12 Grindelwald: Acolytes

While Voldemort had his Death Eaters, Grindelwald had his Acolytes. In some ways, the Acolytes were a more loyal group than the Death Eaters because of a clever test set forth by the dark wizard.

He used a circle of protective fire to test the loyalty of those who claimed to pledge themselves to him, something that Voldemort should have considered. Many of the Death Eaters defected from Voldemort or betrayed them, Grindelwald weeded out those who were unsure with his fire test that killed anyone with second thoughts.

11 Voldemort: Parselmouth

Voldemort was a renowned Parselmouth, which aided him in his devious schemes, given his control over all things serpent. Voldemort had a powerful ally known as Nagini. While there is some backstory about Nagini divulged in the Fantastic Beasts series — including the controversial reveal that Nagini is a Maledictus — she was never a servant of Grindelwald.

Without Nagini, it’s possible that Voldemort would not have been able to return to full power. She, along with Peter Pettigrew, were the only living beings that Voldemort kept with him while in his weakened state, and they helped get him back to his most potent capacity.

10 VOLDEMORT: HORCRUXES

While Grindelwald’s quest involved finding items that would make him a master of death, Voldemort had seemingly found a way to become immortal in the form of Horcruxes. Splitting his soul into seven pieces, Voldemort was nearly invincible. Each Horcrux had a way of defending itself. The Horcruxes threatened Harry and his friends on multiple occasions (one even managed to cause the inevitable death of Albus Dumbledore).

Even if someone were to destroy all the Horcruxes, they would still have to duel Voldemort himself, who was more than a capable wizard. The Horcruxes made destroying Voldemort an impossible task. Only the most determined of wizards attempted it.

9 GRINDELWALD: ELDER WAND

Grindelwald and Voldemort both wielded the Elder Wand at certain times, but there was a big difference in how each used it. Voldemort was an extraordinary wizard, but the Elder Wand never obeyed him. It answered to Harry the entire time. Grindelwald, on the other hand, was the master of the Elder Wand at the time.

In Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, he was shown to conjure spells that most wizards would never even dream of achieving. It took multiple Aurors and sorcerers to fight off his deadly fire spell at the end of the film. Voldemort had power, but not the power of the Elder Wand.

8 VOLDEMORT: DEATH EATERS

Voldemort was effective in both Wizarding Wars because he had his numerous Death Eaters at his side. The Death Eaters were not only vast in number, but they had a host of magical abilities that most wizards couldn’t possess. The Death Eaters call on Voldemort at any time, who would be little more than seconds away.

They could also transform into clouds of smoke that allowed them to travel at fast distances or even fight quicker than most wizards could. The Death Eaters were also loyal to Voldemort whether by fear or true belief in his ideal world. Whatever the reason, they were deadly.

7 GRINDELWALD: PERSUASIVE

Grindelwald was a master of speech. When he was imprisoned by the Ministry of Magic, they cut out his tongue because of how persuasive he was. When Grindelwald got out and began amassing followers across Europe, that silver tongue became evident. He had charismatic speeches about the true rights of both wizards and muggles.

While Voldemort has proven to be persuasive to gain all sorts of followers, there were people who knew he was evil and joined him anyway. Those that fight alongside Grindelwald felt that they were fighting for the greater good. That made his followers potentially more threatening.

6 VOLDEMORT: PSYCHOLOGICAL FEAR

Lord Voldemort wasn’t even his real name. However, it inspired fear in the hearts of so many wizards that nobody dared speak it. Few people knew his actual name as well. What’s so dangerous about the fear of the name is that it only made the wizards fear Voldemort even more.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione weren’t afraid to use the name because they knew that would only dissuade them from fighting him. Many wizards chose not to partake in the Wizarding War simply because of how scared they were of the Dark Lord. One of his greatest weapons was psychological fear.

5 GRINDELWALD: MASTER DUELER

Voldemort and Grindelwald were both great at dueling, but Grindelwald surpasses the Dark Lord. Voldemort dueled Dumbledore, but Dumbledore always had the upper hand. It wasn’t until Dumbledore’s death that Voldemort launched a siege on Hogwarts. However, Grindelwald managed to duel Dumbledore when he was much younger and more vibrant.

Their duel was so epic that it became the stuff of legend. While Dumbledore came out on top in the end, even he admitted to Harry that Grindelwald was very close to him in skill. Voldemort wouldn’t stand a chance to a duel against Grindelwald. He was much too skilled.

4 VOLDEMORT: RUTHLESS

Grindelwald and Voldemort were both dark wizards who led a lot of people in their time. However, Voldemort never played the long game. He was concerned with who stood in his way and exhausted all possible resources to get rid of them.

Voldemort would persuade people to join him only to kill them moments later. Voldemort laid waste to his Death Eaters a few times. He had no regard for human life and no regard for wizard life. All he saw was his ultimate goal and he was going to get rid of anyone he needed to along the way.

3 GRINDELWALD: INTELLIGENT

Voldemort was a tricky wizard, but Grindelwald has him beat by a mile. Grindelwald was much more intelligent, often seeing the long-term effects of his actions and hatching plans to achieve them. The Crimes of Grindelwald was solely focused on him finding a way to get through to Credence just so he could add him to his ranks.

Grindelwald targeted the most useful and powerful wizards of his time in an effort to bring them to his team. If he were faced with a serious opponent, Grindelwald would probably try to win them over before fighting them, whereas Voldemort would just throw a killing curse.

2 VOLDEMORT: LOVE OF DEATH

Voldemort celebrated the ending of life when it had nothing to do with his own. He destroyed lives because it was fun and sent his Death Eaters to torment both wizards and Muggles. He had meetings where he would slaughter Hogwarts teachers over a long table. Likewise, some of his Death Eaters shared his love for death and went wild when it came to the battle at Hogwarts.

This love of death made Voldemort a loose cannon. There was no telling what he was going to do next because then sky was the limit with him. It didn’t matter who anyone was. If they got in his way, they were going to die.

1 GRINDELWALD: CONQUEROR

It seems that Grindelwald’s strategies paid off more than Voldemort’s. In just six years, he managed to conquer just about all of Europe, which lead to a Global Wizarding War where wizards from every corner had to get involved and fight. Voldemort conquered a good chunk of Europe, but it took him 14 years to get anywhere close to Grindelwald’s territory.

Furthermore, Voldemort didn’t have the entire world gunning for him, only a portion of it. The only way Grindelwald was stopped and the war ended was by Dumbledore. Voldemort was stopped by none other than Harry Potter, a mere boy of 17.