Best Diablo 4 Season 1 Barbarian build – Whirlwind Barbarian best skills, aspects, and gear

Looking for the best Diablo 4 Season 1 Barbarian build? Then you’ve come to the right place. The best Diablo 4 Barbarian build transforms your bulky melee fighter into a ballerina of doom. No, we’re not exaggerating; the so-called Whirlwind Barbarian build has you twirling across the battlefield like a mini-vortex, destroying absolutely anyone and anything unfortunate enough to stand in your way.

While many Diablo 4 fans may flood to the Necromancer build, mainly because it knows how to summon a golem, or perhaps a Sorcerer build or Rogue build, the Barbarian class is not to be overlooked and with the right tweaks could well be one of your favourite classes in the game. Right, now let’s kick off with the best Barbarian build in Diablo 4.

Diablo 4 Season 1 Whirlwind Barbarian build explained

In short, the Whirlwind Barbarian build is designed to hit as many opponents as possible with a single skill: Whirlwind. This makes it incredibly effective against large groups of enemies. You’ll be relying on a variety of shouts to buff this skill, plus a basic attack to bridge the “I’m running out of fury” gap and activate a certain ultimate effect (more on that below).

As Whirlwind consumes the Barbarian’s fury, it’s very important to unlock passives and skill enhancements to make sure you’ve got a very high fury regeneration. 

Best Season 1 Barbarian skills

While the full Barbarian skill tree is extensive, these are the skills you must unlock:

• Whirlwind (core skill): your Barbarian twirls across the battlefield while repeatedly hitting all nearby enemies. This skill costs 25 Fury per second and has a 25% lucky hit rate.
• Lunging Strike (basic skill): you quickly jump forward, striking enemies and regenerating 9 Fury. This skill has a 50% lucky hit chance.
• Rallying Cry (shout): increases your movement speed and (with upgrades) helps you regain fury.
• War Cry (shout): increases your damage dealt for a duration of six seconds.
• Challenging Shout (shout): taunt nearby enemies and gain a high damage reduction for six seconds.
• Wrath of the Berserker (ultimate): knock back surrounding opponents and activate both berserker and unstoppable mode for five seconds. After the buff has ended, quickly use a basic skill (Lunging Strike, in this case) to enter berserker mode for an additional five seconds.

As mentioned above, this Barbarian build uses Whirlwind as the main attack, while the remaining active skills are there to boost its damage. Make sure you use your shouts (Rallying Cry, War Cry, and Challenging Shout) before initiating Whirlwind.

Lunging Strike is a great way to position yourself in the midst of battle while simultaneously regaining fury. Try to use it within ten seconds after initiating Wrath of the Berserker (once the initial effect has ended) to activate Berserker mode again. As Wrath of the Berserker has a long cooldown, you might want to save it for tough opponents.

Barbarian Season 1 skill points distribution

• Lunging Strike: rank 1. Unlock Enhanced Lunging Strike to deal extra damage, receive a bit of healing, and most importantly; reach the next skill tree tier.
• Whirlwind: rank 5. Unlock Enhanced Whirlwind to regain fury whenever you attack an enemy, and Furious Whirlwind to deal additional bleeding damage (beware that the latter requires a slashing weapon).
• Pressure Point: rank 3. Lucky hits from your Whirlwind attack make your opponent vulnerable for two seconds.
• Rallying Cry: rank 5. Unlock Enhanced and Tactical Rallying Cry to regenerate 20 Fury when using this skill. This will also greatly improve your overall fury generation.
• Challenging Shout: rank 5. Unlock Enhanced and Tactical Shout to increase your maximum HP and gain extra fury each time you take damage.
• War Cry: rank 5. Unlock Enhanced and Power War Cry for extra damage.
• Booming Voice: rank 3. This will increase the duration of all your shout effects. Unlock the linked passive Guttural Yell as well to reduce your opponent’s damage output after using a shout.
• Pit Fighter: rank 3. Deal extra damage to nearby enemies.
• Heavy Handed: rank 3. This will allow you to deal extra critical strike damage while using two-handed weapons.
• Wrath of the Berserker: rank 1. Also, upgrade Prime and Supreme Wrath of the Berserker to gain even better fury regeneration and a movement speed boost.
• Unbridled Rage: rank 1. Your core skills (Whirlwind) deal 135% more damage but also cost 100% more fury.

This list shows the recommended Whirlwind Barbarian skill point distribution in the same order as their tiers on your skill tree. It’s typically best to fully upgrade the active skills and unlock their corresponding passives to maximise their potential. As for separate passives, be sure to get a lucky hit effect (Pressure Point) and plenty of fury enhancements.

Here’s a table with skill point distribution for the Whirlwind Barbarian in Diablo 4 Season 1:

Level	Skill
2	Lunging Strike
3	Enhanced Lunging Strike
4	Whirlwind
5	Enhanced Whirlwind
6	Furious Whirlwind
7	Combat Lunging Strike
8	Rallying Cry
9	Enhanced Rallying Cry
10	Tactical Rallying Cry
11-14	Whirlwind
15	War Cry
16	Enhanced War Cry
17	Power War Cry
18	Leap
19	Enhanced Leap
20	Power Leap
21	Hamstring
22-23	Booming Voice
24	Raid Leader
25	Call of the Ancients
26	Prime Call of the Ancients
27	Supreme Call of the Ancients
28	Aggressive Resistance
29-31	Prolific Fury
32-34	Pit Fighter
35	Unbridled Rage
36-39	Rallying Cry
40-41	Raid Leader
42	Booming Voice
43-45	No Mercy
46-48	Heavy Handed
49-50	Pressure Point
Renown	Skill
1-2	Pressure Point
3-5	Guttural Yell
6-7	Thick Skin
8-10	Counteroffensive

You may want to change some of the passive skills suggested above to gain a damage bonus for a specific weapon type, to make your build more defensive, or to offer your teammates better support. Using the Raid Leader passive is a great way to accomplish the latter. Expertise builds up as you use a certain weapon, granting you even more bonuses by weapon mastery.

Best Barbarian Season 1 stats and gear

Our best Diablo 4 Barbarian build mostly relies on the strength stat (to increase skill damage and armour strength), followed by dexterity (increasing critical strike chance). You also need willpower to boost your resource generation, but if you already have enough fury to keep your whirlwind rotation going, it’s not as important as the other two.

As for your gear, try to equip armor and weapons that favour your Whirlwind ability. Anything that reduces cooldowns, improves speed, improves resource regeneration, or increases critical strike chance is most welcome.

While choosing your weapon, keep in mind that the Barbarian class uses the ‘arsenal’ quick-swapping system with four weapon slots. If your weapon grants a bonus related to weapon swapping, be sure to use it. However, do keep in mind that you’ll need to swap to a slashing weapon before activating Whirlwind, or the Furious Whirlwind passive effect won’t work. 

Whirlwind Barbarian tips in Diablo 4 Season 1

Here are the aspects we’d recommend for the Whirlwind Barbarian in Diablo 4 Season 1:

• Utility Aspect of Grasping Whirlwind: periodically pulls enemies towards you.
• Offensive Aspect of the Dire Whirlwind: increases Whirlwind’s critical strike chance for every second it is channelled, with a maximum increase of 40%.
• Bold Chieftain’s Resource Aspect: reduces the cooldown time of your shouts depending on the number of nearby enemies.
• Resource Aspect of Echoing Fury: generates fury while your shouts are active.
• Wind Striker Mobility Aspect: critical strikes increase your movement speed.
• Gohr’s Devastating Grips (unique gloves): Whirlwind explodes after the duration ends, dealing part of its base damage as fire damage to nearby opponents. 

This won’t come as a surprise by now, but we’ll say it nonetheless: you need to prioritise Diablo 4 aspects capable of enhancing your Whirlwind attack. We recommend the ones above, but many other legendary aspects will also fit the Whirlwind Barbarian build as long as they focus on things like your critical strike ability, fury, and core attack. Since they’re absolutely perfect for this build, always use Gohr’s Devastating Grips if you’re able to do so. Rage of Harrogath, Ramaladni’s Magnum Opus‍, and Penitent Greaves are excellent Diablo 4 unique items that work with this build too.

Here are the Diablo 4 Malignant Hearts we’d recommend for the Whirlwind Barbarian in Diablo 4 Season 1:

• ‍Caged Heart of Focused Rage: After spending 100-60 Fury within 2 seconds, your next Non-Basic Skill’s Critical Strike Chance is increased by 20-30%.
• ‍Caged Heart of Revenge: 10-20% of incoming damage is instead suppressed. When you use a Defensive, Subterfuge or a Macabre skill, all suppressed damage is amplified by 250% and explodes, dealing up to 1360-2040 Fire damage to Nearby enemies.
• ‍Caged Heart of The Barber: Critical Strikes and all subsequent damage within 2.0-4.0 seconds is absorbed by your target. The absorbed damage erupts onto surrounding enemies. Stored damage is increased by 10% per second.

And these are the Paragon boards you need to prioritize for the Whirlwind Barbarian in Diablo 4 Season 1:

• Starting board
• Blood Rage board
• Decimator board
• Warbringer board
• Flawless Technique board

As for what Glyphs to slot into the Paragon board, here are the ones that make the most sense for the Whirlwind Barbarian:

• Exploit
• ‍Wrath
• ‍Territorial
• ‍Might
• ‍Undaunted
• ‍Marshal

Many Gear items in Diablo 4 will come with Gem Sockets, into which you can insert Gems for more passive bonuses. Gems will have different effects depending on whether they are inserted into Weapons, Armor, or Jewellery. Emeralds and Skulls are great but here are the best gems for a Barbarian brawl.

For your Weapons, we’d recommend using Amethysts to boost your damage over time. Using Amethysts in Weapon Gem Sockets could offer up to an 8% increase to that Whirlwind damage.

For your Armor, use Rubies to boost your Maximum Life. The extra Life offered by Rubies will come in handy if you suddenly find yourself without any minions left standing to soak the hits.

For your Jewellery, find Diamonds to use in empty Gem Sockets. When placed in Jewellery, Diamonds offer increased resistance to all elements, giving you some extra defence against whatever your enemies throw at you.

Is the Barbarian good in Diablo 4?

In short, yes. So long as you follow this build advice, the Barbarian is an exceptionally effective tank capable of devastating large groups of weaker enemies, and really causing a nuisance to more powerful ones. It’s arguably one of the easiest classes in the game, making it great for those who are trying Diablo for the first time, or for those who find the more complicated Necromancer class a bit intimidating. Crack skulls and rend foes apart, even at higher world tiers.

That covers just about everything with respect to the Diablo 4 Season 1 Whirlwind Barbarian build. Want more Diablo 4 help? We’ve got all the Diablo 4 bosses covered in a dedicated guide, along with all of the Diablo 4 quests throughout the story. Slotting Paragon Glyphs into your Paragon Board nodes is an important Diablo 4 balancing act too. Remember to earn Diablo 4 renown as you start off with a new Seasonal character in Season 1.

Is Whirlwind good in Diablo 4?

Whirlwind is great in Diablo 4 as it lets the Barbarian do damage while moving.

What weapon to use for whirlwind d4?

The Two-Handed Sword is the weapon of choice for this best Diablo 4 Season 1 Whirlwind Barbarian build.