Xayah has recently risen in priority in League of Legends after other meta ADCs got nerfed. Her biggest assets are her ultimate, which makes her untargetable, and high area-of-effect (AoE) damage in teamfights.
If you’re facing a Xayah, be prepared to have difficulties controlling her damage output in the later stages of the game. She is a hyper carry who can take over games if left uncontrolled. That’s why it’s important to draft properly from the get-go, so you don’t reach a point where she deletes your entire team in a couple of seconds.
While she does serve as a good teamfighting carry, she needs time to scale. You should use that time to exploit her weaknesses and shut her down.
Here are the best counter picks to beat Xayah in the bot lane.
General strategy
Xayah has a unique playstyle for an ADC, relying on her passive and abilities to land feathers in various directions. Once they’ve been landed, she can use her Bladecaller (E) to call them back towards her and do a lot of damage to enemies caught in the process. This micro-game is quite intensive and good Xayah players will always find ways to land the Bladecaller to do a lot of damage early on.
Early on, Xayah will look to use her abilities to land feathers behind you and your minions. If you step forward and don’t pay attention to them, you’re going to take a bit of damage while also giving her a possibility to freely farm the wave. You need to always be aware of the feathers and understand that you can get engaged on in any second.
She has decent burst damage due to Bladecaller, but that isn’t the only thing making Xayah strong. Her Deadly Plumage (W) ability allows her to gain increased attack speed and do additional damage with each attack, giving her the upper edge in most early trades due to how much damage she can output in a small period of time. Always keep track of when she uses her attack speed boost and try to engage her without it, while also avoiding the way of feathers.
Teamfights will be quite difficult if your teammates don’t pay attention to the feathers. Xayah can delete entire squishy teams with her combo of Bladecaller alongside her ultimate Featherstorm (R). If you get an opportunity to focus her down while she is overextending to land feathers, go for it, but be wary of her burst damage in close range. The safer play in teamfights is to avoid stacking up with your team so you don’t all get hit by her abilities.
Champions
Samira
Samira is one of the more popular Xayah counters. She has a great kit to counter Xayah thanks to the Blade Whirl (W) ability, which can prevent the burst from Bladecaller. With that ability on cooldown, Samira has the upper hand in early-game skirmishes and can dive Xayah head-on once that ability is on cooldown and force her flash or kill her.
Your mobility spell in Wild Rush (E) is a great tool against Xayah since she doesn’t have any mobility and will be at the mercy of her support’s utility. You can pay attention to when her Bladecaller or Deadly Plumage ability is on cooldown and go in with your dash to force her to play defensively. You should be able to force summoner spells out of her or get a kill since your damage early on is much higher.
Once you’re out of the laning phase, you should have a solid gold lead and be able to group with your team while Xayah is stuck farming creeps to get her power spikes. If you helped your team pick up some towers or objectives, feel free to move back into the bottom lane to farm up some experience alongside gold. If Xayah tries to engage onto you, use your Blade Whirl to negate her burst from Bladecaller and turn against her with your combo. Keep her under control and don’t allow her to freely farm her power spikes since she will become a huge teamfight nuisance.
Miss Fortune
Miss Fortune is a great champion who can deal with Xayah well in the bottom lane due to her higher range and lower build-up time to do damage. You can chunk Xayah down without exposing yourself to the feathers she has to land to do a lot of damage.
In the laning phase, you can look to snipe low-health minions to land a critical strike with your Double Up (Q). A couple of critical strike hits can be enough to force Xayah to back to base or be exposed to an all-in by you and your support. If she keeps playing aggressively with low health, you can look into freezing the wave on your side of the lane and zone her out from gold and experience. In this case, she will have two options: back away or fight to death. Both cases will be negative for her since she’ll be losing valuable gold and experience. By freezing waves, you can plan carefully your next movements and talk with your jungler to set up the dragon or an invade.
At level six, you get access to your ultimate and should be able to get kills if Xayah has no flash or ultimate. Your damage is brutal early on and can easily take down vulnerable targets if they’re not careful. By controlling the pace of the bottom lane, you can use that tempo to build up a lead for your allies in other lanes as well and get a clear path to victory.
Jinx
Jinx is one of the best hyper carries League has to offer with her attack-speed steroid and late-game scaling. She rivals Xayah well and while she isn’t as caster-heavy as Xayah with her abilities, she does have other tools to deal damage, namely her Q which switches between two modes.
During the laning phase, you can poke down Xayah with your Rocket Launcher (Q) and force her to play passively. If she decides to engage on you, you can switch to Pow-pow the Minigun (Q) to have increased attack speed to easily out trade her. On top of that, you can force her in a bad spot with your Flame Chompers! (E), which can root her and give you needed time to finish her off. The most important aspect to be wary of is her support and the feathers on the ground. If you overextend into a poor position and get hit by multiple feathers, you’re going to be in for a bad time.
You excel in later stages of the game like Xayah, so try to look into acquiring your power spikes before you group up with your team. But if you see the opportunity early on to get a gold lead, take it since it will accelerate your tempo and help you become stronger earlier on.
With your Mythic item completed, start looking to group for the early drakes or Rift Heralds and help your teammates if they’re being pushed in. Remember to keep up in farm on side lanes and don’t let waves crash into your tower since the gold and experience from them is crucial in the long run. In teamfights, sit behind your team and safely kill the opponents’ frontline until you get your passive stack from a takedown. Afterwards, you can roll over the remaining opponents due to the increased attack speed you’re getting.
Items to build into Xayah
Plated Steelcaps
This is an alternative boots option to the traditional Berserker Greaves if you want to reduce Xayah’s auto-attack damage. While it’s not recommended to forego the attack speed boots, if you’re in a difficult situation against a compositions with multiple AD champions, you can go for Plated Steelcaps to increase your survivability.
Galeforce
This is the offensive Mythic item you should aim to get in most of your games by default. The stats, damage, and dash effect make this the best option, outside of a couple of specific circumstances. You can use this item as an execute or to reposition yourself to do damage from a safe distance. The biggest upside against Xayah is that you can quickly get out of the feathers’ paths in teamfights. This item’s possibilities are endless and can be adjusted based on current game condition.
Immortal Shieldbow
This is a great Mythic item to stop Xayah from bursting you down from your full health pool in a couple of seconds. The effectiveness of this item will be much higher if the enemy team has multiple assassins in their composition. By buying it against an assassin-oriented team, you give yourself more leeway for mistakes. The stats granted by it are great and its lifesteal are also beneficial.
Bloodthirster
This is an amazing late-game item to make you harder to assassinate by giving you a huge shield on top of attack damage and lifesteal. While the item doesn’t have critical strike or attack speed, it’s still worth to be built solely for the additional survivability.
