Harry Potter Horcruxes Ranked By Difficulty Of Obtaining Them

If the Horcruxes were easy to obtain, the seventh film would have been a lot shorter. It's time to rank the Horcruxes by how hard they were to get.

As if defeating Lord Voldemort was already hard enough, Harry Potter was left reeling in the Half Blood Prince when he was informed that He Who Must Not Be Named had taken measures to ensure he was, pretty much, immortal. The Dark Lord had, years previously, chosen to create Horcruxes - tiny bits of your soul that are stored inside an object to ensure your survival.

Harry then spends the best part of 18 months tracking down the items, getting rid of them one by one before besting Voldemort himself during an epic final showdown at the battle of Hogwarts. We now rank each Horcrux by how difficult it was to obtain and destroy - starting with the easiest to the hardest.

7 Harry Himself

Obviously, finding out you’re a Horcrux is a pretty difficult thing to comprehend. And poor Harry Potter is left stunned at the end of Deathly Hallows: Part 2 when he discovers that, when Voldemort tried to kill him as a baby, a fragment of the Dark Lord’s soul had attached itself to him.

With that in mind Harry is willing to sacrifice himself at the end of the movie - only to survive when Voldemort’s killing curse merely destroys the piece of his soul rather than his own body. While agreeing to die is a difficult decision to make, it’s still the easiest Horcrux that’s discovered due to the fact it’s not hidden in a remote location or protected by a variety of creatures or spells. Ultimately, it becomes the easiest part of Voldemort to destroy and it helps pave the way for Harry’s victory over his enemy.

6 The Ring

By the time Harry Potter becomes aware of Voldemort possessing Horcruxes, one of them is already destroyed. In the Half Blood Prince book, Albus Dumbledore destroys an old ring that had belonged to Tom Riddle’s Grandfather, Marvolo. The movie skims over this - much like most of the sequences related to the Dark Lord’s past - but the destruction of the ring comes at a price.

Dumbledore, in his attempts to destroy the Horcrux, becomes struck down by a curse that will kill him within 12 months. Knowing that Draco Malfoy has been charged with the task of murdering him, the Hogwarts headmaster instead arranges his death with Severus Snape instead. The Horcrux is easy enough to destroy but its consequences are huge and, had it not been for Dumbledore’s wisdom, they could even have been worse.

5 Nagini

Nagini is Voldemort’s pet snake, one he came across during his time out of the spotlight. She’s difficult to kill for the most part due to the fact she barely leaves her master’s side and is a fiery opponent, nearly killing Harry Potter and Hermione Granger during a confrontation in the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 when the duo are in Godric’s Hollow.

But her death is easy in the end because of Neville Longbottom. Having been told by Harry to kill the snake, he does exactly that when the beast is about to swallow Hermione and Ron Weasley whole, chopping off its head. This sends Voldemort into a range but the fact Nagini’s demise was down to sheer fortune and good timing makes her a far cry from being the hardest Horcrux the gang had to obtain and destroy.

4 The Diary

The first Horcrux Harry Potter encounters is Tom Riddle’s old Hogwarts diary in the second book and movie, entitled the Chamber of Secrets. Not that he knows it at the time, however. The Boy Who Lived comes across it after Lucius Malfoy slips it inside Ginny Weasley’s cauldron during an altercation at the Diagon Ally book shop Florets and Blotts.

Because it’s given away, the Horcrux is actually pretty easy to obtain. But difficult to destroy. Tom Riddle very nearly returns as he tries to drain Ginny’s life for his own evil purposes but, thanks to Harry and Fawkes the Phoenix, he’s stopped right at the very last moment. Harry then drives a Basilisk fang into the diary, destroying it and weakening Voldemort in the process.

3 The Diadem

Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger return to Hogwarts and prepare for battle in the Deathly Hallows Part 2 while still looking for another of Voldemort’s Horcruxes, which they believe to have been placed within the castle when the Dark Lord sat down for a Defence Against the Dark Arts teaching job many years ago. After they finally coax the location from Rowena Ravenclaw, the trio head towards the Room of Requirement in a bid to obtain it.

And they very nearly die as a result. Upon entering the location, Draco Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle try to attack them and prevent them from escaping with the object they desire. Crabbe dies when he loses control of a spell he casts and it’s left to Harry, Ron, and Hermione to rescue their remains two enemies to prevent from them being burnt alive. They manage to do so and the Diadem is destroyed amid the flames.

2 The Cup

There’s a bit in the Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone book when Hagrid reveals that breaking into Gringotts is virtually impossible and you’d have to be ‘mad’ to try and steal anything from the wizarding world’s biggest bank. The Hogwarts groundskeeper’s words are forgotten in the Deathly Hallows Part 2, though, when Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger enlist the help of Griphook the goblin to get into the vault of Bellatrix Lestrange.

It’s a mission that very nearly costs them their lives. They’re nearly burnt to death by an angry dragon, come under fire from wizards in every direction and are nearly crushed to death when the contents of Bellatrix’s vault begin to multiply. Thankfully, the trio are able to get away with the cup of Helga Hufflepuff, which is later destroyed via a Basilisk fang held by Ron and Hermione inside the Chamber of Secrets.

1 The Locket

Of all of Lord Voldemort’s Horcruxes, Salazar Slytherin’s old locket is the most difficult to obtain and destroy.

In the Half Blood Prince, Harry Potter and Albus Dumbledore travel to an old cave where the Dark Lord would torture victims during his time as a teenager. Once there, they’re nearly destroyed by Inferi (zombie-like corpses bewitched to do evil) and, upon returning to Hogwarts, Dumbledore is killed by Severus Snape. Harry then discovers the locket to be a fake and is left with a feeling that their whole adventure and ordeal had been for nothing.

In the following movie, Deathly Hallows Part 1, they learn the truth about the locket: that it had been switched by Regulus Black, hidden away in the Black household before being sold to Dolores Umbridge. Harry, Ron and Hermione then break into the Ministry of Magic - with the biggest of bounties on their head - and manage to get it back. Destroying it is no small task either, due to the fact it tries to get inside Ron, but he’s eventually able to get the job done.