Harry Potter: Harry’s 10 Biggest Rivals, Ranked

Harry Potter is a character that has to encounter his fair share of both rivals and enemies. Throughout the Harry Potter series, Harry has to contend with many people who have it out for him in one way or another.

While some of his rivals were just people he was in competition with or fellow students, many of them were more like enemies or people who were trying to destroy him. He definitely had to deal with more rivals than any one person ever should. Here are all of his biggest rivals ranked to lead up to the biggest of them all.

10 Rita Skeeter

Rita Skeeter might not have been an enemy in the same way that some of Harry’s enemies were, but she definitely didn’t have any good feelings for him. Rita was always trying to get the most salacious story, and she was happy to lie to do so. She was willing to make a spectacle out of Harry just for a good angle, and because of the lies she wrote about Harry and the people he cared about, she definitely became a rival of his.

9 Cedric Diggory

While Cedric Diggory was a really good person, the situation with the Triwizard Tournament made them into rivals. Cedric felt like his spotlight had been stolen from him somewhat as he had to share the title of Hogwarts Champion with Harry. While they both were rivals against one another in the Tournament, they did help each other out and also cared about one another’s well-being. Cedric was also extremely fair-minded and never let any possible jealousies allow him to treat Harry badly.

8 Bellatrix Lestrange

As the person who brought about Voldemort’s demise, Harry had an entire league of enemies/rivals before he could even talk. While pretty much any Death Eater could be considered his rival, Bellatrix particularly had it out for him because of her devotion to Voldemort as well as her cruel nature.

She became even more of a direct enemy for Harry after she was the one to murder Sirius. Harry definitely hated her more than most of the other Death Eaters for this reason.

7 Cornelius Fudge

While Cornelius Fudge might have started out on Harry’s side, this all changed after he refused to believe that Voldemort had returned. After this, he used the Daily Prophet to try and smear Harry and Dumbledore’s reputations so that no one would believe them about Voldemort. He definitely became a rival after this, and he clearly was particularly cruel in how he treated Harry. While he might not have wanted him killed, he did want his name besmirched and for him to be expelled.

6 Barty Crouch Jr.

Barty Crouch Jr. was more than just a random enemy to Harry because of the fact that he spent so long tricking him. Barty Crouch Jr. spent Harry’s entire fourth year of Hogwarts using Polyjuice Potion to pretend to be Mad-Eye Moody. Harry grew to trust him and see him as a mentor as the fake Moody helped him with the Triwizard Tournament. So, the fact it wasn’t actually Moody was a big betrayal for Harry and definitely an extremely hard thing to learn.

5 Peter Pettigrew

Peter Pettigrew was more than just a random enemy for Harry. Because of the fact that Pettigrew was best friends with his dad all throughout their time at school, the fact that Pettigrew betrayed them was very personal. Pettigrew’s betrayal of James and Lily was what lead to their deaths, so he was a rival to Harry that went far beyond just being a random villain. In the end, Harry’s fairness in sparring Pettifrew’s life paid off in the end.

4 Draco Malfoy

Draco Malfoy was Harry’s most obvious and direct rival at Hogwarts. These two were always rivals, and they were always rather obsessed with one another in this way. They always wanted to be better than the other, and they were particularly concerned about beating each other at Quidditch. They both saw each other as rivals and were always getting into duels and arguments. While they became less antagonistic in adulthood, they were definitely rivals at school.

3 Severus Snape

Severus Snape was definitely someone who was a rival to Harry despite being his professor. Snape had left bitterness and feelings of rivalry for Harry because of his relationship with James.

While Snape might have been more of a complex character than he seemed at first, this doesn’t mean he was a nice character. These two never liked each other, and they would never have gotten along purely because of Snape’s history with Harry’s parents. Harry definitely saw Snape as someone he needed to outsmart.

2 Dolores Umbridge

Dolores Umbridge started out as a rival in some ways, but then she evolved to be a total enemy. She was someone who had it out for Harry from the start, and he was always trying to fight back against her. They were ideologically different in every way, and where Harry was a kind-hearted person, Umbridge was as cruel as one can be. She might not have been a Death Eater ever, but she was just as effective and evil in supporting Voldemort’s ideology after he came back to power.

1 Voldemort

Of course, no other person could be the number one rival on this list other than Voldemort. While these two were obviously enemies more than anything else as Voldemort was the main villain of the series, they also had an interesting kind of rivalry. There were many parallels between these two in order to show how important choices are in who a person becomes. Voldemort also saw Harry was a rival because he worried that Harry as more powerful than he was and wanted to prove that he was stronger.

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