For the average viewer, the antics of speedrunners inspire awe. For those unfamiliar with the concept, speedrunners aim to beat games in as little time as possible, using skills, glitches, and community support to test the limits of the games they play. A skilled speedrunner can carve a large, sprawling game The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wildwhich normally takes about 50 hours to complete, down to a sprint of just 30 minutes.
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What makes the top runs entertaining isn’t just these players displaying technical prowess, though it’s always nice to see someone good enough to fight to beat the final boss in Link’s underwear. It’s that they change how we see the world of the game itself. Watching them play shows us that Hyrule Castle is not an impregnable fortress. The walls are made of code, not stone, and as a result, the best players can simply work their way through to uncover a vast inner space filled with absolutely nothing. A tool such as a bomb is not used to blow up walls and enemies, but to fly across Hyrule with a simple flick of the wrist.
Due to new discoveries and people improving their craft rush in quickly Breath of the Wild constantly changing. This list rounds out the top Breath of the Wild speedruns from spring 2023, but we will update it occasionally as new runs appear. To be more specific, we’re only looking at ‘Any%’ world records, which means that players can use any glitch to beat the game from start to finish, without having to complete any of the tasks you would for some from the other run categories (such as All Dungeons, All Main Quests, 100%, etc.). Here are the five fastest Breath of the Wild Any % speedruns.
Player5
Execution date: January 2, 2023
Duration: 23m 51s
Speedrunner player5 set the world record for the fastest any% speedrun of Breath of the Wild in January 2023. As the leaderboards scramble, Player5 very consistently sets the bar as a top speedrunner, often taking first place even as the community messes up overall playtime. Since each world record is the result of countless attempts and hundreds of hours of streaming, the stream feels casual and the streamer just talks about their favorite drinks. As Player5 describes it, this run missed some goals in the early playing time, but had a clean end game. The final run lasts 23 minutes and 51 seconds, making it the fastest run at the time of publication.
Trevor SR
Execution date: March 15, 2023
Duration: 24m 9s
TrevorSR has a very vibe-like stream – during this stream, the competitor plays the soundtrack Neon White as Link zooms through the game. At the start of the stream, TrevorSR says they played well and want to try again after a series of solid attempts prior to this run. This run is largely defined by a solid performance in the early parts of the game. Clock in at At 24 minutes and 9 seconds, TrevorSR’s run is within 20 seconds of the world record, beating the No. 3 spot by just one second.
koroks
Execution date: June 17, 2022
Duration: 24m 10s
Koroks is no stranger to the top of the speedrunning list. This run, the world record at the time, lasted 24 minutes and 10 seconds. At the time of publication, it is number 3 on the top run list. This run has no commentary or chat, so viewers are largely left to themselves to dissect what’s going on. In the video’s description, Koroks mentions that fighting the Blight Ganons sucked, but everything else went “nearly perfect”.
XiaoXiaMi
Execution date: December 24, 2022
Duration: 24m 25s
XiaoXiaMi is a Chinese speed runner who currently has the fourth fastest run on this list. You can’t watch the record’s actual video, which has been certified by Speed run. com, but you can watch videos of XiaoXiaMi participating. Instead of the video, we chose to share a fun run where the streamer competes in a race against TrevorSR, who is the runner-up. XiaoXiaMi brings a heady energy and screams as they play, so it certainly makes for an engaging, fun viewing experience.
Player5
Execution date: October 21, 2022
Duration: 24m 41s
As usual, Player5 brings a relaxed and casual feel to these intricate runs. Like other runs on this list, this run previously held the world record, but was bumped back to fifth spot due to leaderboard shuffling. Player5 seemed pretty happy with the run overall, but had some bad luck fighting Calamity Ganon and then missed a shot at the dark beast. The run lasted 24 minutes and 42 seconds and helped set the stage for when Player5 would improve it and take the number one spot.
Update (March 21): This article has been edited to reflect all leaderboard changes that have occurred since its original publication in March 2022.
