Star Wars: The 18 Most Powerful Artifacts In The Universe, Ranked

The Star Wars canon and Legends feature a bewildering array of powerful Force-imbued artifacts. Many of the artifacts, designed to channel and enhance the owner’s light or dark side powers of the Force, may rightly be considered magical or charmed objects that would interest anthropologists seeking to understand the spiritual, magical and religious beliefs of a culture rather its scientific and technological culture.

In line with that, our list of the most powerful artifacts in the Star Wars universe is mostly restricted to Force-imbued artifacts that were of cultural and historical interest. The artifacts were mostly magical (“Force-imbued”) or at best only quasi-technological in nature. Thus, weapons, superweapons, and other WMDs, that were based primarily on fictional Star Wars universe science and technology, such as the Death Star and the Shawken Device, are not included in the list.

Artifacts that had the greatest destructive or potential destructive powers are ranked high. This explains why the list is dominated by Sith artifacts. Practitioners of the dark side of the Force who sought for power that comes from the ability to unleash destructive forces were more likely to create artifacts that helped to achieve their goals. However, some Jedi artifacts that were non-destructive but served roles fundamental to the maintenance of law and order, advancement of culture, and to counter the dark side, are also highly ranked as well.

Having laid down the ground rules, we present Star Wars: The 18 Most Powerful Artifacts in the Universe, Ranked.

18 Sith Artifact: Gauntlet of Crassus

The Gauntlet of Crassus was a powerful dark side Force-imbued artifact that belonged originally to the Sith Lord Crassus, who created it. The gauntlet, designed to be worn on the left hand, enhanced the telekinetic dark side powers of the wearer 10-fold. It also augmented the grip of the person wearing it, so in theory, it would have been a perfect artifact for the Sith Lord Darth Vader to use to implement his infamous remote Force choke.

The Gauntlet of Crassus was eventually buried with its creator and owner, the Sith Lord Crassus, when he died, according to Star Wars: Force and Destiny Core Rulebook.

The last known location of the powerful artifact was inside the tomb of Crassus, in the Valley of the Dark Lords, located on planet Korriban.

17 Jedi Artifact: Circlet of Saresh

This was a Force-imbued headband that first appeared in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. The artifact belonged to Jedi Knight Guun Han Saresh, a member of an influential family from planet Taris. The artifact was used to boost his light side Force powers. Guun’s father commissioned the creation of the headband to mark his son’s initiation into the Jedi Order after he completed his apprenticeship.

The headband was designed so that it could be used only by someone on the light side of the Force.

However, Guun lost the artifact during an encounter with a terentatek, a monstrous creature which fed on the blood of Force-sensitive individuals. Dark Lord of the Sith Darth Revan found the artifact and might have used it to augment his powers when he was searching for the Star Forge.

16 Sith: Staff of XoXaan

The Staff of XoXaan was a magical Sith artifact that belonged to the ancient Sith Lord, the Lady XoXaan, a character introduced in issue #14 of the Star Wars: Legacy series, Claws of the Dragon, Part 1. The humanoid female was one of the original 12 defectors from the Jedi Order who founded the Order of the Sith Lords during the Old Republic era and the Hundred-Year Darkness War.

Like many other Sith artifacts, the Staff of XoXaan was used to channel and amplify the powers of the dark side of the Force.

XoXaan lost the powerful artifact during the New Sith Wars and it eventually came into the possession of Iona Murron, a member of a wealthy family from Nubia. The staff helped Sith Lord Darth Kage to lure Iona to the dark side of the Force. But she eventually abandoned the dark side and joined the Jedi Order.

15 Sith: Embrace Of Pain

The Embrace of Pain is the only purely technological artifact to make our list. It was a gruesome device that epitomized the malevolence of the dark side. The Sith artifact, which first appeared in The New Jedi Order: Dark Tide I: Onslaught, was an instrument of punishment. It had straps designed to restrain the victim and inflict pain by stretching.

The device could deliver pain impulses to the brain.

It had sensors that read the victim’s brain and nerve impulses to measure reaction to the punishment being applied. The sensors helped to regulate the application of pain so that the victim could be kept indefinitely on the brink of death. Jedi Knights feared the device, but species with masochistic tendencies, such as the Yuuzhan Vong, used it for recreational purposes and meditation.

14 Jedi: Master Vodo’s Quarterstaff

The Krevaaki Vodo-Siosk Baas, who appeared in Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 1: Masters and Students of the Force, was an old Jedi Master who used a wooden quarterstaff to support himself when walking. However, he also used the Force-imbued wooden staff for combat.

Once, while sparring with his padawan, Exar Kun, his quarterstaff was damaged.

He restored the stick but avoided using it for combat after the accident. Exar Kun later became a Sith Lord, and modified his single-bladed Jedi Knight’s lightsaber to create a double-bladed sapphire weapon.

Kun committed atrocities during the Great Sith War and Baas felt responsible, as Kun’s former Jedi Master. He confronted Kun in an epic duel in the Senate Hall on Coruscant. The heartless Sith took down his old master after he caught him off-guard with his new double-bladed lightsaber design.

13 Sith: Exar Kun’s Lightsaber

Sith Lord Exar Kun’s double-bladed Force-imbued lightsaber was arguably the most powerful lightsaber weapon ever created. The Sith Lord Kun, who first appeared in Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 1: Masters and Students of the Force, was originally a Jedi Knight. He crossed over to the dark side and created a double-bladed sapphire lightsaber using instructions he obtained from an ancient Sith holocron.

The new weapon was much more powerful than the single-bladed weapon he wielded as the padawan of Jedi Master Baas.

Kun signaled his ascension as a Dark Lord of the Sith by using his double-bladed weapon to take out his former Jedi Master. He was eventually vanquished during the Great Sith War and lost his weapon. The weapon was eventually recovered on Yavin IV by an agent of the Jedi hired to collect the most powerful Sith artifacts in the galaxy.

12 Sith: Bracers Of Najus

The Bracers of Najus were powerful Sith artifacts featured in Standoff on Leritor, a Star Wars RPG adventure in Star Wars Gamer 10. They were created by Najus, a highly-skilled Sith craftsman when he was seeking to augment his dark side powers to confront the light side powers of the Jedi. The artifacts worked by enhancing the dark side powers of the user when they confronted an opponent with light side powers.

However, the Bracers were ineffective against an opponent on the dark side of the Force.

The Bracers of Najus went missing when a Sith spaceship carrying them crashed on planet Leritor. They were found hundreds of years later by Profex Rynalla, a human adherent of the dark side who equipped a large expedition of Klatooinians and traveled to Leritor to recover the bracers.

11 Sith: Mask Of Darth Nihilus

After Sith Lord Darth Nihilus escaped the activation of the Mass Shadow Generator superweapon during the Mandolorian Wars, he became obsessed with harnessing the dark side powers of the Force, but the methods he adopted caused the gradual disintegration of his physical body. He tried to preserve his spirit as his physical body disintegrated by using the power of the dark side to connect his spirit directly to an armor and mask that he built (Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords).

The Mask went missing after Nihilus passed, but it was already known to be imbued with the Sith Lord’s dark force.

It was also believed that anyone who found it would become imbued with dark side powers like the original owner. However, there was the risk that the wearer would also slowly self-annihilate.

10 Sith: Force Disperser

A Force Disperser was a powerful device that Sith Lords used to conceal or cloak their dark side of the Force powers. The most prominent person who ever used the device in the Star Wars universe was Emperor Palpatine.

He maintained the public persona of Palpatine when he served as the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic, but moonlighted as the Sith Lord Darth Sidious.

Darth Sidious kept a Force Disperser in his office on Coruscant in Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith, but the artifact was first identified as a Force Disperser in Star Wars: Beware of the Sith.

The cloaking techniques that Sith Lords used to conceal or mask their dark side powers from member of the Jedi Order who dominated Coruscant during the Republic were generally known as Force Clouding.

9 Sith: Dreypa’s Oubliette

Dreypa’s Oubliette, also known as the Jebble Box, first appeared in Dark Times 7: Parallels, Part 2, but the object was first identified as the Oubliette built by the Sith Lord Remulus Dreypa in Knights of the Old Republic 27: Vector, Part 3.

Dreypa built it originally to confine Lord Karness Muur after he obtained the powerful Muur Talisman (coming up soon) from the Sith Lord Sorzus Syn. The Muur Talisman was a threat because it transformed sentient beings into Rakghouls. The Rakghoul Plague was spread when the Rakghouls bit and scratched others.

Dreypa’s Oubliette could be used to confine anyone considered a threat to their environment.

It could preserve a living being alive for thousands of years. Anyone confined in the Oubliette was entirely isolated from his cosmic environment and could even survive the catastrophic death of the galaxy.

8 Jedi: Crown Of Verity

The Crown of Verity, introduced in Nexus of Power, was a Force-imbued ancient artifact that came into the possession of the Jedi Order thousands of years after it was first created and used by the ancient Benetage civilization to ensure that magistrates who wore it dispensed justice without fear or favor, spoke the truth, and detected falsehood. The Jedi preserved the artifact inside the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

The Jedi Master Tobar Ka-Teen took interest in it and wanted to duplicate its powers.

He took it to the ruins of Acablas on the Outer Rim planet Auratera to study. But while he was there, in the company of clone troopers, Emperor Palpatine issued Order 66 and Ka-Teen was never seen again. It was presumed that the troopers who accompanied him killed him. The Crown of Verity was lost and never recovered.

7 Jedi: Healing Crystals of Fire

The Jedi considered the Healing Crystals of Fire, which first appeared in Jedi Apprentice: The Captive Temple, as the most valuable of the treasures of the Jedi Order. And due to the great value given to them, they were guarded in an inner sanctum of the Jedi Temple in Coruscant by an exclusive group of the Jedi Order known as the Circle of Jedi Healers. The stones were used in the Halls of Healing to treat and heal grievous wounds that could not be treated using ordinary medical procedures.

Many seriously wounded members of the Jedi Order were brought back from the brink using the crystals.

Several unsuccessful attempts were made to steal them from the Jedi Temple on Coruscant before they eventually went permanently missing during the Great Jedi Purge.

6 Jedi/Sith: Force Crystals

We list Force crystals as artifacts because, although most were naturally occurring objects, their Force potential could be exploited only by Force-sensitive individuals who were able to adapt them for specific personalized use that non-force sensitive individuals could not. As Jaden Korr observed in Star Wars: Riptide, a novel by Paul S. Kemp, the crystal was not the source of power itself.

Its alignment with the Force was mediated by the Force-sensitive individual, otherwise it was just an inert rock.

The Sith used Force crystals to power weapons and superweapons. Large crystals were also often used to power the huge cannons of big spaceships. Force-sensitive individuals also used them to augment their Force powers. Some types of Force crystals, such as Kyber crystals, were used to power lightsabers. The Jedi mined them on Ilum and Dantooine.

5 Jedi Holocrons And Memory Crystals

Jedi holocrons were repositories of the closely guarded secrets of the Order. Holocrones stored information, including ancient secrets, knowledge, skills, history, and teachings of the Jedi Order, in the form of interactive holograms. The storage devices were equipped with elaborate and sophisticated mechanisms to prevent unauthorized access. Some holocrons needed a memory crystal to access the information they contained.

The archives of the Jedi Temple on Coruscant held a vast collection of Jedi holocrons.

Access to the archives was strictly restricted. The archives had ancient holocrons containing sensitive information, such as lists of all known Force-sensitive individuals in the galaxy, along with advanced teachings and techniques for the application of the light side powers of the Force. The holocrons also contained information available to the Jedi about the capabilities of the Sith and possibly also a list of all known or suspected members of the Sith Order.

4 Sith Holocrons

Sith holocrons were holographic repositories of the Sith Order’s most closely guarded secrets. A Sith holocron was essentially a pyramidal-shaped storage device often engraved with mysterious symbols of ancient origins. The Sith holocron was powered by a crystal located at the apex. The components of a typical device included crystals that stored information in the form of interactive holograms and a Sith gatekeeper that regulated access to the information, and functioned as a form of search engine that helped the owner to access the information he required.

To prevent unauthorized access to the information stored in the holocron, the owner’s physical appearance, signature traits, and cerebral networks, were captured as an interactive hologram and used as a password to the information stored in the hologram. The Sith holocron also had artificial intelligence capabilities that allowed it to automatically apply information to solve problems.

3 Jedi: Eye of the Sun

The Eye of the Sun, featured in The Eye, the RPG adventure in the fifth year of the Living Force, was probably the most powerful Jedi artifact ever created.

It was created during the Ruusan campaign of the New Sith Wars by a group of Jedi Masters to fight the powerful Sith organization, Brotherhood of Darkness, founded by the Dark Lord Skere Kaan.

After the campaign, it was sent for safe-keeping under the Ch’hala Heart Tree on Cularin, in the galaxy’s Expansion Region, between the Inner and Mid Rims.

After the Darkstaff (see below) destroyed the planet Oblis and dispatched Lord Darth Revan through a wormhole 100 years into the future, it tried to use the Dark Jedi Len Markus to find the Eye of the Sun and feed on its power to destroy Cularin, but the Heroes of Cularin thwarted the evil plan.

2 Sith: The Darkstaff

The Darkstaff, which first appeared in the RPG adventure, Philology, was one of the most powerful Sith artifacts known. It was a sentient artifact created by an unknown Sith Lord thousands of years before the rise of the Empire. It was later stored by the Sith on the Arcanum space station until stolen by Sith Lord Tagriss on behalf of the Dread Masters who took it to the planet Oblis in the Cularin system.

The natives of Oblis captured it and tried to use it to fight an entity threatening their planet. But instead, the Darkstaff destroyed their planet, blowing it up into bits and pieces that formed the asteroid belt in the Cularin system.

The Darkstaff later tried to feed on the power of the Eye of the Sun, but the Heroes of Cularin used the power of the light side to destroy it.

1 Sith: The Muur Talisman

The Muur Talisman was probably the most dangerous Sith artifact ever created. The Talisman was created before the Golden Age of the Sith for Lord Karness Muur by the Sith Lord Sorzus Syn (Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic: Vector). It had the power to make its possessor immortal. Lord Muur used the talisman to unleash the Rakghoul Plague which transformed billions into Rakghouls. Rakghouls were mindless zombies that the possessor of the Talisman could control.

Karness was eventually taken out by his Sith colleagues who feared the awesome power he had acquired.

The Talisman survived him and ravaged the Outer Rim planet Taris. It became lost in the ruins of the Taris Undercity but was found by the Mandalorian Pulsipher.

The Jedi Master Celeste Morne came under the influence of the Talisman and allowed Zayne Carrick to confine her and the Talisman inside Dreypa’s Oubliette for 4,000 years.

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Do you know of any other Stars Wars universe artifact that we have missed or any artifact on our list that you would have ranked differently? Let us know in the comments.