You’ve spent over a hundred hours dying to Malenia, navigating the architectural nightmare of Leyndell, and wondering why everyone is so obsessed with fingers. Now you’re standing before the fractured remains of a god. The choice is yours. But honestly, most players just pick the one that looks the coolest without realizing they might have just doomed the entire world to a cycle of eternal stagnation or, worse, literal madness. Elden Ring all endings aren’t just cutscenes; they are philosophical statements on how to fix a broken reality.
The Lands Between is a mess. Marika broke the Elden Ring, the Greater Will has basically ghosted everyone, and your job is to step into the vacuum of power. Depending on which NPC you listened to—or which secret basement you tumbled into—the credits will roll on a vastly different flavor of "victory." Some people call them "good" or "bad" endings. That’s a bit reductive. FromSoftware doesn't really do binary morality. Instead, we get shades of gray, gold, and a very disturbing shade of yellow-orange.
The Standard Flavors of Elden Lord
Most people end up with the Age of Fracture. It's the "I just played the game and didn't follow any weird side quests" ending. You mend the Elden Ring, sit on the throne, and things... go back to the way they were. Sorta. You're the Elden Lord, but the system is still fundamentally the same. It's the status quo. If you’re looking for radical change, this isn't it. You’re basically a glorified middle manager for a cosmic entity that might not even care you exist.
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Then you have the variations. These are the "Mending Rune" endings. They use the same basic cutscene but swap out the skybox and the underlying logic of reality.
The Age of the Duskborn is for the fans of Fia, the Deathbed Companion. By using the Mending Rune of the Death-Prince, you reintegrate "Proper Death" into the world. In the current state of the game, nobody really dies; they just get recycled through the Erdtree. Fia wants to stop the persecution of "Those Who Live in Death." It’s a somber, misty ending. You aren't necessarily making the world a happy place, but you are making it a more natural one where life and death aren't controlled by a golden parasite.
Goldmask’s ending, the Age of Order, is the intellectual’s choice. Goldmask is that weird guy T-posing on the bridge, and his conclusion is fascinatingly cynical. He realizes the gods (like Marika) are the problem because they are as fickle as humans. His rune attempts to "perfect" the Golden Order by removing the influence of emotional, volatile deities. It’s a world of pure logic and chilling stability. No more wars between demigods, but also, perhaps, no more room for human agency.
The Age of Stars: Why Ranni is the Fan Favorite
If you look at the achievement data on Steam or PlayStation, Ranni the Witch’s ending is consistently the most popular. It’s not just because she has four arms and a cool hat. The Age of Stars represents a total divorce from the Greater Will.
Ranni’s plan is complex. She wants to take the Elden Ring and head off into the dark of the moon, removing the "order" from the world entirely. For a thousand years, the inhabitants of the Lands Between would be left to their own devices, without a visible god hovering over them in the form of a giant glowing tree.
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It’s an ending about autonomy. It’s also incredibly lonely. You and Ranni leave the world behind. You’re the consort to a god who has decided that the best way to rule is to not rule at all. It’s the ultimate "hands-off" approach to governance. Most players see this as the "best" ending because it breaks the cycle of the Erdtree, but Ranni is very clear that the path will be one of "fear, doubt, and loneliness." You’re trading security for freedom.
The Chaos Factor: Lord of Frenzied Flame
This is the one that gets people talking. To get the Lord of Frenzied Flame ending, you have to strip naked, go through a hidden wall behind a chest in a sewer, and get hugged by a three-fingered hand made of fire. It’s a lot of work for a very nihilistic result.
The Frenzied Flame doesn't want to fix the world. It wants to melt it all back into one big, singular soup. No more distinctions. No more births, no more souls, no more suffering—because there’s no more "self." It’s the ultimate "reset" button. Melina, your maiden, will literally threaten to kill you if you go down this path. If you finish the game this way, she shows up in a post-credits scene looking very angry and very much alive (if you did things in a specific order).
Hyetta, the blind NPC who eats "grapes," acts as the mouthpiece for this philosophy. She argues that the Greater Will made a mistake by creating life and distinction, which led to suffering. The Frenzied Flame is the cure for the "sin" of existence. It’s visually spectacular and narratively devastating.
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The Ending Nobody Likes to Talk About: The Blessing of Despair
Dung Eater. The name alone says it all. If you follow the Loathsome Dung Eater’s questline, you get the Mending Rune of the Fell Curse.
This ending is objectively the most "evil" in a traditional sense. You aren't killing the world like the Frenzied Flame, and you aren't freeing it like Ranni. Instead, you are cursing every soul and their descendants for all eternity to be reviled and plagued. Why would anyone do this? From a lore perspective, Dung Eater believes that if everyone is cursed, then no one is cursed. If everyone is a "defiled" Omen, then being "defiled" becomes the new normal. It’s a twisted form of equality through universal misery. It turns the sky a sickly, brownish-green. It’s gross. It’s haunting. It’s uniquely FromSoftware.
Navigating the Choice: How to Actually Get These
You can't just stumble into most of these. Elden Ring all endings require specific, often obtuse, steps.
- Ranni’s Age of Stars: Requires completing her massive questline, killing Astel, and using her sign on the floor after the final boss.
- Frenzied Flame: Requires visiting the Three Fingers below the Subterranean Shunning-Grounds. If you do this before burning the Erdtree, Melina leaves you. If you do it after, you can still get it, but you have to use Miquella's Needle in the heart of the storm (Placidusax’s arena) if you want to back out.
- Mending Rune Endings: You must complete the respective quests for Fia, Goldmask, or Dung Eater to receive their specific runes. These are then selected at the very end when interacting with the Fractured Marika.
Understanding the Nuance of the Greater Will
A major misconception is that the Greater Will is a benevolent god. It’s not. It’s an Outer God, a cosmic parasite that found a fertile world and moved in. The Elden Beast is essentially its "vassal" or "police force." When you look at Elden Ring all endings through this lens, the choice becomes even more significant.
Are you serving the parasite? (Age of Fracture, Age of Order)
Are you changing the flavor of the parasite? (Duskborn, Blessing of Despair)
Are you kicking the parasite out? (Age of Stars)
Are you burning the house down so the parasite has nothing to eat? (Frenzied Flame)
The "best" ending is entirely dependent on your personal philosophy. Do you value order at the cost of freedom? Do you value freedom at the cost of safety? Or are you just so tired of the Boss Fights that you want to watch the whole world burn?
Actionable Insights for Your Next Playthrough
If you’re aiming for a specific conclusion, keep these mechanical triggers in mind. You can actually "lock" yourself into the Frenzied Flame ending unless you possess Miquella’s Needle, which is obtained by defeating Malenia and completing Millicent’s quest. This is the only way to "undo" the chaos path.
For those wanting to see multiple endings in one go, it's possible on PC and console by backing up your save file right after defeating the final boss (the Elden Beast) but before interacting with the statue or Ranni's summon sign.
- Defeat the final boss.
- Rest at the Site of Grace.
- Upload your save to the cloud or copy it to a USB.
- Trigger an ending.
- Reload the save and trigger a different one.
This allows you to see the fruits of your labor without another 80-hour commitment. However, to get the Mending Runes, you must have finished those NPC stories before the world state changes too much (specifically after defeating Maliketh). Check your inventory for the Mending Rune of the Death-Prince, the Mending Rune of Perfect Order, or the Mending Rune of the Fell Curse before you enter the Erdtree for the final time. If they aren't there, you're headed for a standard Age of Fracture.