5 – MARCO THE PHOENIX
Marco is 45 years old. He is a very strong individual, as he demonstrated in the Marineford War that he was on a similar level of fighting as the three Admirals. He was fully capable of fighting admirals Kizaru, Aokiji, and Akainu while holding his own.
Marco the Tori Tori no Mi, Model: Phoenix, a Mythical Zoan-type Devil Fruit which allows him to transform into a phoenix, granting him the ability to fly.
While this fruit’s power is classified as a Zoan, due to the uniqueness of the phoenix, the additional powers it grants may be considered similar to those of Paramecia (the somewhat “superhuman” power that affects the user’s body: regeneration) and Logia (the generation of light-blue phoenix flames).
The fruit’s greatest attribute, however, is that Marco can recover from any damage he accumulates in his human form by reverting to his phoenix, or hybrid phoenix form, or just by summoning blue flames around his body. These blue flames are not hot and they do not burn or spread like normal fire; instead, they are what allow him to heal, and are referred to as the “Blue Flames of Resurrection”. Furthermore, the healing properties of his blue flames can also be used to treat other beings, albeit to a more limited extent, allowing Marco to act as an efficient doctor. Though the phoenix flames do not burn or spread like normal fire, they are still considered a special form of flame much more potent than normal fire, proven when Marco overpowered Big Mom’s “special” fire homie Prometheus, the phoenix fire causing the latter pain.
4 – BENN BECKMAN
Benn Beckman has the highest IQ of anyone in the East Blue. Across his voyages he’s learned a lot of experience, with an incredibly advanced intellect and great thinking capabilities. He’s 50 years old.
When the Red Hair Pirates arrived at Marineford to stop the war, Beckman was able to climb on to a Marine ship’s mast and sit on it, all the while pointing his flintlock at Kizaru, without the latter noticing. Admiral Kizaru chose not to fight him, even though he had just fought the First Commander of Whitebeard’s crew and Whitebeard himself.
According to “One Piece: Vivre Card Databook” Benn Beckman is almost as strong as Shanks! His card says that Benn is incredible powerful in terms of physical combat. The card even says that “Comparable to Red Hair’s, this man’s existence is feared by even the powerful warriors of the New World!!”
3 – MIHAWK
Mihawk is a world-famous pirate who currently holds the title of “Greatest Swordsman in the World”. He’s 43 years old.
Part of Mihawk’s reputation as the most powerful master swordsman in the world is also due to his tremendous superhuman physical power and fortitude which supplements his mastery of swordsmanship. He possesses an immense amount of skill in battle and has exceptional eyesight.
The fact that Mihawk used to be a rival of one of the Yonko implies that Mihawk might be one of the strongest characters in the series. Infact he has been known to have frequently fought with Shanks when they were younger. Their battles were said to shake the whole of the Grand Line and Mihawk often sought Shanks out for duels. However, Mihawk lost interest in him after Shanks lost his left arm. Mihawk has remained unharmed thus far throughout the entire series.
2 – KAIDO
Kaido of the Beasts is renowned as the “Strongest Creature in the World”. He attempted to take Whitebeard’s life, something few would dare, and subsequently clashed with Shanks. When Gekko Moriah was in his prime, Kaido fought him and emerged victorious, having killed his entire crew. In Wano, Kaido defeated Luffy with just one hit! Decades ago before the formation of his own crew, Kaido was part of the legendary Rocks Pirates as an apprentice. Kaido is supposed to be about 50 years old. According to Ace Novel, it was mentioned that while Whitebeard(72 years old when he died) and Big Mom(68 years old) are old generation, Kaido(unknown age) and Shanks(39 years old) are younger generation.
Kaido has eaten a Mythical Zoan-type Devil Fruit that allows him to transform into a massive, blue-scaled Eastern dragon.
Kaido has tremendous physical strength, but the greatest sign of his strength is his apparent inability to die due to his tremendous toughness and durability. He has been caught and tortured 18 times, and people as powerful as the Marines and other Yonko have attempted to execute him 40 times only to fail as Kaido survived every single attempt because every single execution weapon broke when being used on him. Most notably, Kaido has jumped from 10,000 meters from the sky onto the ground, creating a massive shockwave strong enough to sink a large ship nearby, and emerged only with a headache; it has even become a hobby for him to attempt suicide, only for it to fail.
Notably, Kaido has a bounty of 4,611,100,000 Berries, which is the highest of any pirate currently alive, surpassed only by the bounties of the late Whitebeard and Gold Roger.
1 – SHANKS
“Red Haired” Shanks is 39 years old. He is Luffy’s role model and the man that our main protagonist wants to surpass one day. It makes sense in the series that Shanks is powerful because he is that character that the main protagonist wants to fight last on his journey. Shanks’ full fighting potential hasn’t been explored yet but there is a lot of hints that indicates Shanks is an extremely powerful individual. For starters, he was able to scare off a massive Sea King just by staring at it (until we figured out he used Conquerors Haki: the strongest form of Haki). He also clashed evenly with Whitebeard, a fellow Emperor and even fought another, Kaido, and arrived at Marineford without a scratch on him. Additionally, he managed to ward off Ankinu where the savage admiral seemed a bit shocked at his presence and stopped going after Luffy after he came. Most of all, Blackbeard, who had the powers of the destructive Gura Gura no Mi Fruit and the evil Yami Yami no Mi Fruit chose not to fight Shanks saying “he is not strong enough to fight him yet”.
Shanks has mastered to full extent all 3 types of Haki. He’s the only character so far with an Haoshoku Haki that actually damaged physical things.
All that makes Shanks a force to be reckoned with and definitely one of the strongest guys in the series.
