Ten men and one woman, a black cloak with red clouds, one ring per finger, and a goal that almost none of them truly understand: Akatsuki is the most famous criminal organization in manga, and arguably the best written. But who exactly are its ten members? Where do they come from, what are their strengths, who brought them down—and most importantly, which one is the most powerful? Here is our complete ranking, from 10th to 1st, based on what Naruto and Naruto Shippuden actually show, along with a summary table, the history of the organization, the fate of each tailed beast, and an FAQ. The story ended a long time ago: this article tells everything, right up to the end.
The essentials in brief
- Akatsuki ("dawn" in Japanese) was founded in Amegakure by three war orphans — Yahiko, Nagato, and Konan — to end conflicts without violence. It evolved into a mercenary organization, then into hunters of tailed beasts.
- At its peak, it had ten official members, organized into pairs, each wearing a ring engraved with a character.
- Its stated goal: to capture the nine tailed beasts. Its real goal, known to only two people: the Eye of the Moon plan of the one who calls himself "Madara."
- It captured seven out of nine beasts. The last two — Hachibi and Kyūbi — escaped them, and that is what brought about its downfall.
- Our No. 1 is neither Itachi nor Pain — and the debate between those two is settled in the body of the article, supported by arguments.
- Each member has their own figurine in our catalog: we have linked them to the right spot in the ranking.
Table of contents
- Where does Akatsuki come from? Three orphans in the rain
- How the organization works: pairs, rings, statue
- The ranking, from 10th to 1st
- Summary table of the ten members
- Those believed to be members — but who aren't, or no longer are
- Tailed beasts and jinchūriki: the hunting record
- How each member fell, in order
- Why Akatsuki is so fascinating
- Frequently asked questions
- To go further
Where does Akatsuki come from? Three orphans in the rain
It all starts in Amegakure, the Hidden Rain Village. Trapped between the great nations, it serves as a battlefield for every war that doesn't concern it. It is there that three children survive by stealing food: Yahiko, the orange-haired leader; Nagato, the shy redhead hiding his eyes; Konan, the girl with the origami. One day, they run into three ninjas from Konoha on their way home. One of them, Jiraiya, decides to stay for three years to teach them how to defend themselves. He discovers that Nagato carries the Rinnegan, the legendary eye of the Sage of the Six Paths, and leaves thinking he may have met the child of prophecy.
Once grown, the three found an organization. Its name, Akatsuki, means "dawn." Its program at the time: to stop wars without bloodshed, through dialogue and the protection of civilians. It attracts dozens of young ninjas from Ame tired of being collateral damage. This initial Akatsuki is anything but a gang of criminals: it is a pacifist movement, and Yahiko is its face.
The ruling power, Hanzō of the Salamander, sees it as a threat. With the support of Danzō, the head of Konoha’s Root, he sets a trap: Konan is taken hostage, and Yahiko must die at Nagato's hand for her to live. Yahiko impales himself on his friend's kunai. That day, Nagato fully awakens his Rinnegan, summons a monstrous statue, and massacres Hanzō's men. He loses the use of his legs, but gains a conviction: peace through words is a lie; only pain teaches. He takes the name Pain and makes Yahiko's body his face.
This is where a masked man enters the scene, presenting himself as Madara Uchiha. He had already approached Yahiko, who had turned him away. Nagato, broken, listens to him. The nature of Akatsuki changes: it becomes a mercenary organization renting out its elite ninjas to small countries at low prices until the great nations become dependent—and then a machine for capturing the nine tailed beasts. The plan that Pain presents to his members can be summed up in one sentence: gather all the tailed beasts, and turn them into a weapon so terrifying that the world will stop fighting. The plan that the masked man keeps to himself is entirely different, and we will get to that.
How the organization works: pairs, rings, statue
The Akatsuki of Shippuden is small: ten active members, never more. This number is not a coincidence; it corresponds to the ten rings passed down among members and the ten fingers of the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path — the "Gedō Mazō" — upon which they stand as holograms during the ritual to extract a tailed beast. Without their ring, a member cannot participate in the sealing. This is why Deidara refuses to give his up, and why Orochimaru, when leaving the organization, takes his with him: it is an act of sabotage.
The members operate in pairs, formed less by affinity than by complementarity — a melee fighter with a long-range specialist, an immortal with an old calculator who needs an indestructible partner. Each duo is assigned to a tailed beast. The black cloak with red clouds represents, according to the author, the rain of blood that fell on Ame during the wars; the conical straw hat and dark nail polish complete the most recognizable silhouette in manga. Each member remains a rogue ninja from their village, listed in the Bingo Book, making Akatsuki a collection of the most wanted criminals in the shinobi world.
The true headquarters is in Ame, under the constant surveillance of Pain, whose rain "senses" any intrusion. The temporary hideouts are sealed caves. And the spy for the whole group is called Zetsu, who listens, reports, and eats what remains from the battles. That’s the mechanics. Let’s move on to the ten.
The ranking, from 10th to 1st
A word on the method. We are ranking the ten official members of the Shippuden Akatsuki — those who hold the ring at the time the organization is hunting the tailed beasts. The deceased founders, former members, and temporary allies have their own section below. The criterion is combat power as shown in the work: opponents defeated, the opponents necessary to take them down, and what their peers say about them. Their importance to the narrative does not count, otherwise Zetsu would be on the podium.
10. Zetsu — the spy who wasn't what he seemed
Let’s start with the paradox. In combat, Zetsu is the weakest member: he almost never fights; he observes. His signature technique, Mayfly, allows him to melt into the ground or trees and cross a continent in silence. He witnesses Sasuke's battles against Deidara and then Itachi, reports back, and makes the bodies disappear — he is the one who "cleans up" after every victory for the organization. His white half is talkative and childlike; his black half is dry and calculating. He holds the key to the seal of Naruto's Kyūbi for a time, which speaks to the trust placed in him.
But Zetsu is two beings. The White Zetsu is a creature born from Hashirama’s cells, capable of duplicating itself by the thousands: the army of one hundred thousand clones in the Fourth Great War is him. The Black Zetsu is infinitely older — it is the will of Kaguya Ōtsutsuki, the mother of chakra, who for centuries has manipulated Madara, then Obito, then Nagato to resurrect its creator. The true mastermind behind the entire history of Akatsuki is him. Nevertheless, weapon in hand, he is the weakest of the ten: his white half is killed by Sasuke, and his black half ends up sealed with Kaguya by Naruto and Sasuke.
In stock: Zetsu and Yamato in the same scene, in a 38 cm figurine, and the chibi Zetsu to complete the set of ten.
9. Hidan — the immortal who never learned how to fight
Hidan comes from Yugakure, a village of hot springs converted into a tourist destination — a renunciation he never forgave. Converted to the cult of Jashin, he derives near-absolute immortality and a terrifying ritual from it: taste an opponent's blood, draw the symbol on the ground, and every wound he inflicts upon himself strikes his victim. This is how he kills Asuma Sarutobi, an elite jōnin of Konoha, without ever touching him directly. His triple-bladed scythe connected to a cable is used to open skin, not to slash.
The problem is everything else. Hidan is slow, impulsive, a poor tactician, and immortality has spared him the need to learn how to dodge. Kakuzu, his partner, openly despises him. Facing Shikamaru Nara, a sixteen-year-old, he allows himself to be lured into the clan's forest, trapped by explosive tags, dismembered, and buried alive under tons of rock, where he still lies. Technically undefeated, actually neutralized by a brain rather than a jutsu. This is the definition of a bottom-of-the-ranking member who is not the physically weakest — a rank he shares, in another work, with certain Pillars from our Demon Slayer ranking.
In stock: Hidan in the middle of a Jashin ritual, 36 cm, the chibi version with the scythe, and the complete pair in a 44 cm Kakuzu & Hidan diorama.
8. Kakuzu — five hearts, ninety years, one motivation
Kakuzu is the elder of the organization, by far. A ninja from Takigakure, he faced Hashirama Senju, the First Hokage, decades ago — and survived. Punished by his village for failing, he took revenge by stealing a forbidden technique that turns his body into a bag of black threads capable of housing five hearts stolen from his victims. Each heart provides him with a chakra nature; he projects them in the form of autonomous masks that spit fire, wind, lightning, or water. To kill him, you have to kill him five times.
He is also the treasurer of Akatsuki, obsessed with bounties, and the only member who regularly changes partners — because he eventually kills the previous ones. Hence Hidan, whom he cannot kill. His downfall summarizes his position: it takes Kakashi, Shikamaru, Ino, Chōji, and then Naruto with his brand new Wind Style: Rasenshuriken to overcome his five hearts — one by one. Formidable, methodical, but lacking the decisive technique that allows the next seven to turn a fight around.
In stock: the chibi Kakuzu with threads and masks, and the pair diorama.
7. Sasori — the puppeteer who became a puppet
Sasori of the Red Sand left Sunagakure after turning his dead parents into puppets, and then transforming himself: of his human body, only a cylinder of flesh containing his heart remains, housed in a wooden carcass. He no longer ages. His collection includes the finest pieces ever made, including the Third Kazekage himself — he kidnapped and killed his own village's leader to turn him into a puppet — and his ultimate technique deploys one hundred puppets at once, as many as it took to "take an entire country." His blades are poisoned, his threads invisible.
He falls against Sakura Haruno and his own grandmother, Chiyo, in one of the most refined fights of the series. Technically, he loses because he no longer wants to win: he lets the two puppets of his parents pierce his heart. A member capable of defeating a Kage, but one who needs an opening; and a man who, until the end, wondered what it would feel like if he could still feel something. He was the first to share a pair with Orochimaru, then with Deidara, whom he treats like a student.
In stock: Sasori master of puppets, 35 cm, or his combat shell in a chibi Hiruko version.
6. Deidara — art is an explosion
Deidara of Iwagakure is an artist. His hands — and his chest — have mouths that chew clay he molds into birds, spiders, dragons, and then detonates. His creations range from C1 (small insects) to C3 (a bomb capable of leveling a village), to C4 (a cloud of nano-explosives that disintegrate cells from within), and to C0, his own body turned into a bomb. He is the youngest member, the loudest, and the only one who treats Akatsuki like a gallery for his works.
His feats are real: he kidnaps Gaara, the Fifth Kazekage, by beating him in an aerial duel above his village. He holds his own against Kakashi and a fleeing Naruto. Facing Sasuke, he pushes the young Uchiha to his breaking point — the Sharingan neutralizes his explosives, so he invents C4 to bypass it — before choosing to die as a masterpiece rather than as a loser. Sasuke only survives by summoning Manda as a shield. Deidara loses, but he is the only one in the bottom half of the ranking to have brought two members from the top of the shinobi hierarchy to their knees.
In stock: Deidara and his clay birds, 41 cm, one of the largest Naruto pieces in the catalog, and the chibi Deidara.
5. Konan — the paper angel who almost stopped everything
Konan is the only woman in the Akatsuki, one of its three founders, and the one Pain calls "the Angel." Her entire body can dissolve into sheets of paper—thousands of them, which she folds into wings, spears, shuriken, and clones. She is the voice of Amegakure to its inhabitants, the one who speaks when Pain remains silent. Throughout most of the story, she is rarely seen fighting, which is why she is underestimated.
Then comes her final battle. After Nagato's death, she leaves the Akatsuki, hides her friend's body, and faces the masked man who comes to claim the Rinnegan. She had prepared the battlefield for days: an entire lake transformed into six hundred billion explosive tags, ten minutes of continuous explosion, calibrated to her opponent's only flaw—the five seconds during which he cannot make himself intangible. Obito only survives by sacrificing an eye with Izanagi, the Uchiha's forbidden technique that rewrites reality. Konan is killed, but she pushed the future #1 of this ranking further than Minato, Kakashi, and Naruto did before the war. Fifth place, and a notch higher in the hearts of readers.
In stock: Konan the Paper Angel, 35 cm, Konan the Angel of Amegakure, 33 cm, and the Pain and Konan diorama which reunites the last two founders.
4. Kisame — The Monster without a Tail
Kisame Hoshigaki, one of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist, left Kirigakure after killing his own comrades to protect a state secret—loyalty pushed to the absurd, which would become his trademark. His sword, Samehada, is alive: bristling with scales, it devours the opponent's chakra and transmits it to its wielder. Kisame himself has such colossal reserves that the Akatsuki nicknames him the "tailless tailed beast." He turns a battlefield into an ocean, merges into it as a shark, and drowns his opponents.
His results speak for themselves: he single-handedly neutralizes the Yonbi jinchūriki, keeps Killer B, the host of the Hachibi and one of the world's strongest ninjas, at bay until he must be stopped by Samehada itself, which switches sides. To defeat him, it takes Might Guy and his seventh gate, the Afternoon Peacock, a technique Guy only uses against monsters. Captured, Kisame refuses to surrender any information and takes his own life by summoning his sharks. Itachi was right to say that they were two of a kind: two men who gave everything to a cause that didn't deserve it.
In stock: Kisame and Samehada, 35 cm, Kisame and his water sharks, 35 cm, and the water shark chibi.
3. Itachi Uchiha — The Genius Who Chose to Lose
Itachi is the most famous member of the Akatsuki and, for many, the most beloved character in Naruto. A Konoha prodigy, ANBU captain at thirteen, he massacres his entire clan in one night—on secret orders from the village, to prevent a coup—and spares only his little brother Sasuke, whom he lies to so that he will hate him and grow strong. He joins the Akatsuki as a spy, to monitor the organization and the masked man leading it from the inside.
His arsenal is the most complete in the ranking: the Tsukuyomi, an illusion where three days of torture happen in a second; Amaterasu, black flames that burn until the target no longer exists; the Susanoo, a spectral warrior armed with the Sword of Totsuka, which seals everything it pierces—it is what ends Orochimaru—and the Yata Mirror, which nullifies any attack. On paper, no one gets past him. So why third place? Because Itachi fights while sick, nearly blind, rationing every technique; because he loses voluntarily against Sasuke before the illness claims him; and because he himself tells Naruto that Nagato is stronger. Resurrected during the war, freed from Kabuto's control by Shisui's Kotoamatsukami, he seals Nagato, puts an end to the Impure World Reincarnation—and leaves. We don't rank what Itachi could have done, only what he did. It was already immense.
In stock: our favorite piece, Itachi with crows, 28 cm; Itachi in travel attire with his Susanoo, 35 cm; Itachi Edo Tensei and crow, 27 cm; and for the desk, Itachi Akatsuki chibi. The Itachi at twilight iPhone case captures the same scene.
2. Pain — Six Bodies, One God, One Pain
What the world calls Pain are six corpses pierced by black rods, remotely controlled by Nagato, who remains motionless in his machine somewhere in the highest tower of Ame. Each body embodies a "path" of the Rinnegan: the Deva Path—Yahiko's body—pushes and pulls everything that exists; the Asura Path is a living armory; the Human Path reads souls by ripping them out; the Animal Path summons monsters; the Preta Path absorbs all ninjutsu; the Naraka Path judges and repairs. Six pairs of eyes sharing a field of vision: it's impossible to catch him off guard.
The track record is unmatched in the organization. Pain kills Hanzō and takes Ame. He kills Jiraiya, one of the three Sannin, his own master. He razes Konoha with a single Shinra Tensei—the only time in history a hidden village is destroyed by one man—and follows it up with Chibaku Tensei, which rips the earth apart to imprison a jinchūriki in an artificial moon. It takes Naruto in Sage Mode, trained precisely for this, with the support of all of Mount Myōboku, to take down the six bodies one by one. And then it takes words, not blows, for Nagato to resurrect everyone who died in Konoha at the cost of his own life. If he isn't in first place, it's because his eyes didn't belong to him—they were given to him as a child by the person who occupies the next spot.
In stock: Pain Akatsuki, 22.5 cm, the confrontation in Naruto vs Pain diorama, the Pain chibi, and the Assault on Konoha iPhone case.
1. Obito Uchiha, a.k.a. Tobi — The One Who Pulled All the Strings
For hundreds of chapters, Tobi is the comedian of the Akatsuki: the newcomer in the orange mask, clumsy, infuriating Deidara. It's a role. Under the mask is Obito Uchiha, Kakashi's comrade, left for dead under a boulder during the Third War, rescued by the real Madara on his deathbed, and broken by Rin's death. He is the one who introduces himself to Nagato as Madara. The one who unleashed the Kyūbi on Konoha on the night of Naruto's birth. The one who, chapter after chapter, made the Akatsuki the instrument of the Eye of the Moon plan: gathering the nine bijū, resurrecting the Ten-Tails Demon, and projecting a genjutsu onto the moon that will plunge all of humanity into an endless dream.
His strength boils down to one word: Kamui. His Mangekyō Sharingan allows him to make any part of his body intangible and teleport anything he touches into his own dimension. Blows pass through him, explosions pass through him, Konan's six hundred billion tags pass through him—almost. Add Nagato's Rinnegan, recovered from his corpse, an army of White Zetsu, control of the Kyūbi, and finally his status as Ten-Tails jinchūriki. It takes Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Minato together to reach him, and even then, he is only defeated from within, by a Naruto who reminds him of who he once was. He eventually redeems himself and dies protecting Naruto and Sasuke from Kaguya. The strongest of the ten isn't the one with the best jutsu: it's the one who made everyone else fight for him, without them even knowing it.
In stock: Tobi Obito Uchiha and the Demonic Statue, 42 cm, the most ambitious piece in the series; Tobi sitting, 32 cm; Obito and his blue Susanoo, 40 cm; and the Tobi chibi with the spiral mask.
Summary Table of the Ten Members
| Rank | Member | Origin Village | Partner | Ring | Signature | Defeated by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Obito Uchiha (Tobi) | Konoha | Deidara, then Zetsu | 空 (kū) — left pinky | Kamui: intangibility and teleportation | Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Minato; redeems himself against Kaguya |
| 2 | Pain (Nagato) | Amegakure | Konan | 零 (rei) — right thumb | Six Paths of the Rinnegan, Shinra Tensei | Naruto in Sage Mode; sacrifices himself to resurrect Konoha |
| 3 | Itachi Uchiha | Konoha | Kisame | 朱 (shu) — right ring finger | Tsukuyomi, Amaterasu, Susanoo (Totsuka, Yata) | Sasuke, by letting himself be defeated; succumbs to illness |
| 4 | Kisame Hoshigaki | Kirigakure | Itachi | 南 (nan) — left ring finger | Samehada, water prison, colossal chakra reserves | Might Guy (seventh gate); takes his own life |
| 5 | Konan | Amegakure | Pain | 白 (byaku) — right middle finger | Paper body, six hundred billion tags | Obito, who must sacrifice an eye (Izanagi) |
| 6 | Deidara | Iwagakure | Sasori, then Tobi | 青 (shō) — right index finger | Explosive clay, from C1 to C0 | Sasuke; blows himself up |
| 7 | Sasori | Sunagakure | Orochimaru, then Deidara | 玉 (gyoku) — left thumb | Hundred Puppets, poison, Third Kazekage | Sakura and Chiyo; lets himself be pierced |
| 8 | Kakuzu | Takigakure | Hidan | 北 (hoku) — left middle finger | Five hearts, black threads, elemental masks | Kakashi, Naruto, and Team 10, one heart at a time |
| 9 | Hidan | Yugakure | Kakuzu | 三 (san) — left index finger | Immortality, Jashin ritual, triple-bladed scythe | Shikamaru; buried alive, never killed |
| 10 | Zetsu | None (creature) | Tobi, occasionally | 亥 (gai) — right pinky | Espionage, Mayfly, white clones | Sasuke (white half); sealed with Kaguya (black half) |
The 空 ring belongs to Orochimaru: he takes it with him when he leaves the organization, and it is Tobi who wears it afterward. Others are passed on to replacements—Deidara inherits the one belonging to Sasori's former partner. Finally, note that the ten are never gathered in the flesh: they only see each other as holograms on the statue's fingers.
Those we think are members — and who are not, or are no longer
Orochimaru was indeed a member: after fleeing Konoha, he joins the Akatsuki and pairs up with Sasori. He leaves when his attempt to steal Itachi's body turns into a disaster—the Sharingan repels him with a glance—and he takes his ring with him, which blocks one finger of the statue for years. Therefore, he is not a member of the Shippuden Akatsuki, but a former member who became an enemy of the organization, whom Sasori has Kabuto spy on. He ends up sealed by the Sword of Totsuka of Itachi's Susanoo… before returning much later, as always.
Madara Uchiha, for his part, never wore the cloak. He is the true mastermind: it was he who implanted his own eyes into Nagato as a child, he who trained Obito, and he whose name serves as a mask for the masked man. Resurrected during the war, he takes the plan for himself, until Black Zetsu betrays him for Kaguya's benefit. He dominates all the members in the ranking in combat—which is precisely why he is not included: he wasn't one of them. His 42 cm Susanoo figure and his throne version are in the Naruto collection, not the Akatsuki series, and that makes sense.
Yahiko is the founder and the first leader, who died before the organization became what we know; his body, however, is in every fight—it is the Deva Path of Pain. Kabuto Yakushi was never a member: a spy, then an ally of Obito during the war, in what the story calls "the new Akatsuki," reduced to two men. Sasuke and his team Taka wear the cloak for a few weeks, the duration of a failed mission against the Hachibi—enough for the world to mistake them for members, but not enough to be one. As for Juzo Biwa, Itachi's first partner, he belongs to the novels and the anime: he dies before the start of the hunt for the bijū.
The bijū and the jinchūriki: The tally
The question that comes up most often after "who are the ten members" is "how many demons have they caught." Answer: seven out of nine, before the organization fell apart. "Captured" here means the demon was torn from its host and sealed into the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path—a three-day ritual, fatal for the jinchūriki. Here is who did what, in the order the work shows or reports it.
| Bijū | Jinchūriki | Village | Captured by | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ichibi — Shukaku | Gaara | Suna | Deidara and Sasori | Captured and sealed — Gaara dies during extraction, then is brought back by Chiyo |
| Nibi — Matatabi | Yugito Nii | Kumo | Hidan and Kakuzu | Captured and sealed in the Statue |
| Sanbi — Isobu | No host (wandering) | — | Deidara and Tobi | Captured and sealed in the Statue |
| Yonbi — Son Gokū | Rōshi | Iwa | Kisame | Captured and sealed in the Statue |
| Gobi — Kokuō | Han | Iwa | Off-screen | Captured and sealed in the Statue |
| Rokubi — Saiken | Utakata | Kiri | Pain (in the anime) | Captured and sealed in the Statue |
| Nanabi — Chōmei | Fū | Taki | Off-screen | Captured and sealed in the Statue |
| Hachibi — Gyūki | Killer B | Kumo | Sasuke and Taka, then Kisame | Failure — never captured |
| Kyūbi — Kurama | Naruto Uzumaki | Konoha | Pain | Failure — never captured |
The seven captured demons are sealed in the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path — which is none other than the empty shell of the Ten-Tails Demon. During the Fourth Great War, Obito reunites them there with a fragment of the Hachibi and the Kyūbi, enough to resurrect the monster. The Akatsuki's plan, started by three orphans to stop the war, resulted in the greatest war in shinobi history. That is the irony of the organization, and one of the reasons people continue to talk about it.
How each member fell, in order
For those who want to re-watch the series — or read it — in the right order, here is the order of their downfalls. It says a lot about the narrative construction: the weakest members fall first, facing heroes of their own age, and the top tier only falls during the war.
- Sasori — Gaara rescue arc, facing Sakura and Chiyo. The first member defeated on-screen, and already a lesson: the Akatsuki is not invincible, but every victory comes at a cost.
- Hidan and Kakuzu — Immortal arc, facing Team 10 reinforced by Kakashi then Naruto. Two members in one go, and the birth of the Wind Style: Rasenshuriken.
- Deidara — facing Sasuke, on his way to Itachi. Artistic suicide.
- Orochimaru (former member) — sealed by Itachi's Susanoo when he tries to exit Sasuke's body.
- Itachi — facing Sasuke, in the fight he orchestrated. Dies of his illness, a finger placed on his brother's forehead.
- Pain — facing Naruto, on the ruins of Konoha. Nagato dies while restoring the lives of those he killed.
- Kisame — facing Might Guy, after the failed capture of Killer B. Takes his own life.
- Konan — facing Obito, in Ame. Dies while defending Nagato's body.
- White Zetsu — facing Sasuke, during the war; the clone army is wiped out by the Alliance.
- Obito — facing Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Minato; finds redemption and dies facing Kaguya. Black Zetsu is sealed along with her by Naruto and Sasuke: that is the very last trace of the Akatsuki to disappear.
Why the Akatsuki is so fascinating
First, there is the design: ten identical silhouettes, a cloak that everyone recognizes from behind, a pattern — the red clouds — which has become one of the most worn symbols in manga culture, from the bucket hat to the phone case. Then there is the writing: no member is a generic villain. Nagato is a child of war, Itachi a martyr, Konan a loyalist, Sasori an orphan who refused to grow old, Kisame a loyal servant without a cause, Obito a boy who couldn't bear the loss. Even Hidan and Kakuzu have a village that betrayed them. The Akatsuki is what the shinobi world produces when it abandons its children — and that is exactly what Naruto, the orphan who wasn't abandoned, is written to contradict.
Finally, there is the collector's pleasure: ten characters, ten silhouettes, ten pieces. Few fictional organizations lend themselves as well to a complete shelf, in large format or chibi. That is also why we built this ranking entry by entry.
Sources: Masashi Kishimoto's manga and the Naruto Wikipedia page.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who are the 10 members of the Akatsuki?
The ten official members of the Naruto Shippuden Akatsuki are Pain (Nagato), Konan, Itachi Uchiha, Kisame Hoshigaki, Deidara, Sasori, Hidan, Kakuzu, Zetsu, and Tobi (Obito Uchiha). Orochimaru was part of it before leaving; Deidara replaced him, and Tobi took Sasori's place after his death.
Who is the strongest member of the Akatsuki?
At the top of our ranking is Obito Uchiha, alias Tobi: Kamui makes him practically untouchable; he recovers Nagato's Rinnegan, controls an army of Zetsu, and becomes the jinchūriki of the Ten-Tails. It takes Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Minato together to reach him. Pain and Itachi round out the podium, in that order — the article details why.
Who is the woman in the Akatsuki?
Konan, nicknamed the "Angel" of Amegakure. She is one of the three founders of the organization along with Yahiko and Nagato, and the only woman among the ten members. Her body dissolves into sheets of paper that she folds into wings, weapons, or explosive scrolls — six hundred billion at once against Obito.
What does "Akatsuki" mean and why the red clouds?
Akatsuki means "dawn" in Japanese — the name chosen by Yahiko for an organization meant to bring peace to a devastated country. The red clouds on the cloak evoke the rain of blood that fell on Amegakure during the wars for which the village served as a battlefield.
How many bijū did the Akatsuki capture?
Seven out of nine: Ichibi, Nibi, Sanbi, Yonbi, Gobi, Rokubi, and Nanabi, all sealed in the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path. Killer B's Hachibi and Naruto's Kyūbi were never captured — it is Pain's failure in Konoha and Kisame's failure against B that doomed the organization.
Was Orochimaru part of the Akatsuki?
Yes. After fleeing Konoha, he joined the Akatsuki and was paired with Sasori. He left when his attempt to take over Itachi's body failed, taking his ring with him. He was therefore not a member during the bijū hunt in Shippuden, but a former member who became an enemy of the organization.
Did Sasuke join the Akatsuki?
Briefly. After Itachi's death, Sasuke and his team Taka accepted Tobi's offer and wore the cloak for one mission: capturing the Hachibi. The mission failed, Killer B escaped, and Sasuke was never officially one of the ten. He left the organization when he learned the truth about his brother.
Was Madara Uchiha a member of the Akatsuki?
No, he never wore the cloak or the ring. The "Madara" leading the Akatsuki from the shadows was Obito, who used his name. The real Madara was the distant sponsor of the plan: he gave his eyes to Nagato as a child and trained Obito before dying. He only returned during the Fourth Great War, resurrected.
In what order do the Akatsuki members die?
Sasori, then Hidan and Kakuzu, Deidara, Orochimaru (sealed), Itachi, Pain, Kisame, Konan, White Zetsu, and finally Obito and Black Zetsu during the Fourth Great War. Hidan is technically not dead: he is buried alive in the Nara clan forest.
Going further
In terms of accessories, two pieces extend the organization beyond the display case: the orange spiral Tobi mask, with a single eyehole, and the red cloud bucket hat to wear the pattern without the cape.
All the pieces mentioned in this ranking — and others — are gathered in our collection of Naruto figurines; the complete series of the ten members also exists in Naruto chibi figurines, the ideal format for lining up the entire organization on a shelf. As for accessories, the Naruto iPhone cases feature the Akatsuki, the Uchiha emblem, and Pain's assault.
To re-watch the series without filler episodes — the Akatsuki gains a lot in pacing — see our list of Naruto episodes without filler. And if you like rankings, our 9 Pillars of Demon Slayer and our One Piece tier list are built on the same method.
