Avatar: The Last Airbender — Ranking the Best Character Designs

Avatar: The Last Airbender features a world populated with lively characters, each with a distinct design that informs who they are. The series’ story centers around four diverse, major cultures, the Air Nomads, the Water Tribe, the Earth Kingdom, and the Fire Nation, with many unique sub-cultures featured throughout. The character designs featured in the series not only inform who each character is as an individual, but also the culture they belong to.

The characters of Avatar: The Last Airbender each received multiple iconic looks throughout the series. Some designs are more stylish than others, and the most representative of who they are and where they’re from.

Jet’s Design is Unique Among Earth Kingdom Citizens

Jet was the leader of the Freedom Fighters, a group of orphaned Earth Kingdom children doing what they could to fight back against the Fire Nation. Living on their own in the woods, away from society, their clothes still resemble Earth Kingdom fashion, while also feeling right as to how a group of kids dressing themselves in this world would look.

Jet’s role in his singular Book One appearance is to serve as a foil to Sokka, with him wearing more form-fitting clothes and being portrayed as generally more attractive. His makeshift, colorful armor informs how long he’s been fighting despite his youth and gives his design a memorable palette. His hook swords are awesome weapons that allow for a creative fight between him and Aang, and his trademark chewing straw is the perfect touch to show just how hard Jet is trying to seem cooler than he is.

Iroh’s Jolly Design Masks His True Power

While a range of body types are represented in Avatar: The Last Airbender, the vast majority of the cast is on the slimmer side. The most notable exception to this is the fan-favorite Dragon of the West, Iroh. His more shapely body leads enemies to underestimate him, as it isn’t what anyone would expect from one of the most powerful firebenders in the world. Even towards the end of the series, when Iroh muscles up, he retains a distinct build from those around him.

Iroh’s Book One design is his best. He travels around the world in style in his long, flowing Fire Nation robes, with his neatly trimmed hair, benefiting from the luxuries of his status as the Fire Lord’s brother. At the same time, his warm eyes, easygoing posture, and visible age accurately give the impression of a kind old man with years of experience, happy to offer advice to those who need it.

Bumi’s Design Reflects His Mad Genius

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Scenes from fan-favorite Avatar The Last Airbender episodes, with Aang in the middle

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King Bumi is the 112-year-old King of Omashu, as well as the former greatest earthbender in the world, and everything about his design represents these aspects of his character perfectly. His wrinkled skin, wild hair, and hunched back, as well as the missing tooth and large bag under his eye that he’s had since he was a child, give Bumi one of the most eccentric looks in the series.

As a king, Bumi dresses in ornate, bordering on gaudy, robes, and decks himself out in jewelry. His robes hide what’s underneath and serve to make him look weak, when this couldn’t be farther from the truth. Bumi is a mountain of muscle and, without his robes, it’s easy to believe he’s strong enough to retake Omashu from the Fire Nation by himself during Book Three.

Sokka’s Season 3 Armor Shows His Growth

As one of the original three members of Team Avatar, Sokka gets more designs throughout the series than almost any other character. Out of all of them, his armored-up look from the latter half of “Book Three: Fire” is his strongest.

Wolf armor is traditional attire among Water Tribe warriors, and Sokka wears his for the first time as he steps up and leads the invasion of the Fire Nation on the Day of Black Sun. The armor pays respect to several important aspects of War Tribe culture, with its wolf motif, implementation of animal fur, and lunar pattern. The armor not only looks badass on Sokka but it also represents his growth as a man and a warrior, in contrast with his childish attempts at playing warrior early on.

Katara’s Season 3 Outfit is Her Best Look

All of Katara’s designs throughout the series are gorgeous, but her final look is her absolute best. After ditching her Fire Nation disguise before the Day of Black Sun, Katara returns to dressing as a Water Tribe member with more style than ever.

Katara’s Book Three design has a lot in common with her previous designs, including her color scheme, her braids, her mother’s necklace, and even parts of her outfit. The major differences that set this design apart from her Book One and Book Two designs are her long hair, her dress now having shorter sleeves, but her arms still being covered by gloves, and her pants and boots being better suited for combat. With this design, Katara no longer looks like a waterbender traveling the world, but a hardened warrior fighting to save it.

Ty Lee Never Forgets Where She Was Happy

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Avatar The Last Airbender’s Sokka, Iroh and Azula

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Ty Lee is the daughter of Fire Nation nobility, but life among the upper echelons of her home country never satisfied her. Instead, she found a place to put her unrivaled skills as a gymnast to use as a part of a traveling circus.

Throughout her travels with Azula and Mai, Ty Lee remains in her circus acrobat attire. The outfit’s red and pink color scheme keeps her from feeling out of place among her fellow Fire Nation elites, while the silhouette it gives her is all hers. Ty Lee being among the skinniest characters in the series makes sense given her career, her eyes are large and full of life, reflecting her bubbly personality, and her long, single braid is a distinctive hairstyle.

Zuko Finds His True Self in Season 3

While the changes in the rest of Team Avatar’s outfits are primarily based on the territory they find themselves in, Zuko’s outfits are more directly influenced by his ongoing character arc. Especially with the significant change in animation style between seasons, he might not even look like the same character at the end of the series that he was at the beginning, if not for his all-too-iconic scar.

Upon leaving the Fire Nation behind and joining Team Avatar, Zuko looks better as a hero than he ever did as a villain. Zuko’s shaggy mop suits him better than any of his previous hairstyles, and his simple, but elegant Fire Nation robes make clear that while he’s turned against his Fire Lord Ozai, he remains loyal to his country. His season three design is directly built off his previous ones, as he still bears the scar over his eye given to him by his father, and he remains notably skinny following his time as a poor and starving refugee during Book Two.

Azula’s Flawless Appearance Shatters Overtime

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Azula is the Crown Princess of the Fire Nation, and her design befits her regal status. Priding herself on her perceived perfection, Azula spends the majority of the series looking the part, with perfectly fitting fancy outfits, and flawless hair and makeup.

While Azula’s more armored Book Three design is cool, the Book Two design in which she was introduced is what most fans remember best. Her sharp bangs, dark lips, and flashy hairpiece come together with her combat-ready robes to create a far more intimidating design than Zuko had in Book One. Azula’s consistently unblemished appearance makes her ultimate fate all the more striking, as she ends the series with ragged hair, bags under her eyes, and hysterical tears smearing her makeup.

Aang’s Season 3 Outfit Displays His Maturity

Split Images of Appa Avatar The Last Airbender

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Aang’s original design is perfect, but it also speaks purely to who he is at the beginning of the series: a goofy kid. It isn’t until Aang dons his final outfit of the series in preparation for the Day of Black Sun that it becomes visually clear just how much he has changed and grown throughout the show.

Aang in the back half of Book Three sports a similar color palette to the one he had during the first two seasons, as well as his standard arrow tattoos. By this point, however, he’s noticeably taller and more muscular, which he shows off by leaving a single shoulder exposed, the colors on his clothes are darker and more faded, and his new boots are better suited for combat. The evolution of Aang’s designs throughout the series beautifully reflects his growth as a hero.

Toph Beifong is One-of-a-Kind

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A well-known piece of Avatar: The Last Airbender behind-the-scenes information is that Toph was initially conceptualized as a very different character. Aang’s earthbending master was originally going to be the stereotypical earthbender: an extremely muscular man. During development, Toph was changed into a completely different character, with the best design in the series.

Toph Beifong is a small, twelve-year-old blind girl who’s also the greatest earthbender to ever live. In contrast to the frilly and restraining dress she wore while living with her wealthy parents, Toph’s preferred outfit, originally put together for her Blind Bandit persona, speaks to who she really is: a warrior.

Toph never wears shoes, as she uses the vibrations in the Earth to see, her hair puffs are a cute, purely aesthetic choice, and her short height not only makes her stand out but gives the false impression that she’s weak, standing in contrast to most other earthbenders. Toph’s glazed-over eyes are an unforgettable design element, they’re completely unique to her, and they always remind viewers that it’s a little blind girl performing the incredible feats she achieves.

Avatar The Last Airbender TV Poster

Avatar: The Last Airbender

In a war-torn world of elemental magic, a young boy reawakens to undertake a dangerous mystic quest to fulfill his destiny as the Avatar, and bring peace to the world.

Release DateFebruary 21, 2005CastJack De Sena, Dante Basco, Mae Whitman, Dee Bradley BakerMain GenreAnimationGenresAnimation, Action, Adventure, FantasyRatingTV-Y7-FVSeasons3StudioNickelodeon Animation StudioFranchiseAvatar: The Last AirbenderCreatorMichael Dante DiMartino, Bryan KonietzkoNumber of Episodes61NetworkNickelodeon