Elden Ring – how to parry enemy attacks, our tips and tricks to parrying

Learning how to parry in Elden Ring will get you on your way to dealing with tough enemies. Parry timings in Elden Ring are iffy, and it is much more punishing than previous Souls games if you miss your parry.

You can parry with any shield in the game that has the Buckler Parry, Parry, or Golden Parry Ash of War skill. If you’re feeling extra fancy, the Parrying Dagger is an incredibly stylish way to parry attacks, but it is fairly difficult to time.

This guide will explore how to parry in Elden Ring and we will give you our tips on how to perform it and how to nail those timings. Elsewhere in Elden Ring, make sure you read our guide covering all the Great Runes and our walkthrough for Millicent’s quest line. Now, this is how to parry in Elden Ring.

How to Parry in Elden Ring

To parry in Elden Ring, press L2/LT while you have a shield equipped. If you find your shield doesn’t parry, you need to make sure the shield’s Ash of War specifically says ‘Parry’. If the shield you’ve equipped doesn’t have it listed as its skill, you won’t be able to execute this action at all.

Almost all of the available classes at the start of the game will be equipped with a shield that can parry. So if you picked any combat archetype apart from the Wretch, you won’t have to worry about finding one during the game’s early stages.

✓ JAck’s Advice

Thief class starts with the Buckler

The Buckler is a special shield specifically geared towards parrying in Elden Ring. The parry animation is different and your shield has a more lenient window to trigger a successful parry compared to the standard shield parry.

After you’ve equipped a shield that can parry, you’ll be able to parry by simply pressing the L2/LT button on your controller. Keep in mind, however, that you’ll need to time the action successfully to execute it, and this is where it becomes a risk/reward manoeuvre Souls games are synonymous with.

A successful parry will stagger the enemy and will also typically allow you to inflict them with a critical strike, otherwise known as a riposte. If your parry was unsuccessful, you will either take the full hit and then some extra damage, or you will have what’s known as a ‘partial parry’ which will negate the attack, but severely drain your stamina instead.

✓ Jack’s Opinion

Is parrying worth it?

Unfortunately, modern FromSoft games are designed to trick you out while you’re trying to parry enemies. You will notice a ton of foes in the game have extremely long wind-up animations and hold their attacks for an unnaturally long time. This is the devs trying to make you parry too early, and take the hit you wanted to deflect. Due to this, parrying in Elden Ring isn’t as effective as it once was in, say, Demon’s Souls or Dark Souls.

How to parry in Elden Ring – our tips and tricks

If you want to get better at parrying in Elden Ring, we have a few tips and tricks you can use to try and work on your timing. Give them a try and see if it helps, we’ve found great success parrying using the Buckler, but it will cost you the defence that a shield provides and make you a bit more squishy.

Look at your foe’s weapon hand

When trying to time your parry, pay attention to the hand that your enemy holds its weapon in. This is an old trick that works back in Dark Souls, and it should help you figure out parry timings much better in Elden Ring. Generally speaking, you want to wait until you see the enemy’s hand start to move towards you, not the weapon. When you see the hand move to strike, you should start parrying a this moment.

Try out the Buckler

If you have trouble parrying with the normal shield parry, you’re not alone. The shield has an incredibly brief window of parry frames, even compared to earlier Souls games. Parry frames are what we call the movement frames of the shield during your parry animation, the shorter the window the more precise you have to be. This is why the Buckler is much better at parrying in Elden Ring since it has a longer animation and a more generous window to trigger a successful parry.

Use the Golden Parry Ash of War

There is an Ash of War that greatly enhances the normal parry for shields, and it is the Golden Parry Ash of War. You can get this Ash of War and put it on any shield that allows parrying. When you parry with this skill, you will have a longer range and a much more generous window to trigger a parry. It is the easy mode of parrying and you can get it from a Scarab just past the Outer Wall Phantom Tree, on the outskirts of Leyndell.

That’s all you need to know about how to parry in Elden Ring. For more in-depth guides, read our page covering how to respec your stats and our guide covering the Colosseum Modes in Elden Ring.

How to parry FAQs

Can you parry with a sword in Elden Ring?

Unfortunately, you won’t be able to parry using swords. You can only parry by equipping shields that have the Parry skill. You can also use the Parrying Dagger in your off-hand, but this is tough to time correctly.

Can you parry bosses in Elden Ring?

Yes! Most bosses that use a weapon to attack you can be parried. Some attacks cannot, but it’s always worth checking for the sake of research. Maybe it will pay off.