Final Irelia Guide by Irelia Carries U

Introduction:

Hello, everyone, welcome to my Irelia guide. Her rework is upcoming but it is still far away so I
figured I should make one final kickass guide before the current one is gone. I made my original
guide in Season 4 on lolking and kept it updated until season 6. People loved it so I feel
compelled to make a final one on my favorite champion in this game. I was going to update it on
lolking but the site is very clunky compared to how it used to be. Anyways to put my Irelia
expertise into perspective, I have over 7000 games on Irelia and I have hit challenger multiple
times, season 4 (peaked at rank 70), season 5 (peaked at rank 19), almost hit challenger in s6
but could not due to time restraints and IRL conflicts and hit challenger in season 7 right after
the rewards (currently rank 90) I wish I could’ve started playing a little earlier into the season to
make it before rewards but whatever.

If you wish to check me out furthermore, my twitch, youtube and twitter channels are:

Twitch​:​ ​https://www.twitch.tv/ireliacarriesu
Youtube​:​ ​https://www.youtube.com/user/carryme2plat
Twitter:​ ​https://twitter.com/IreliaCarriesU
Discord: ​https://discord.gg/7HzQeEA

Thanks to yotimes for helping me edit this guide!

My OP.GG​:

http://na.op.gg/summoner/userName=Irelia%20Carries%20U

General Outline of the Guide

Irelia can be played in many ways depending on the build. However, the build and play style I
will recommend will be the most standard and what I will be focused on when explaining how
you should play her. Any other playstyles I will mention at the end because they are a lot harder
to pull off and even when I can do them, for example, will still be inferior in some way or form.
Anyhow I have added in an outline of the guide to make for easier navigation since it will be
quite long. ​If you want to search through points easier, go to view>document outline OR
ctrl+f items instead.
Table of Contents
Introduction:

Table of Contents

Executive Summary

0. What kind of a champion is Irelia?

0a. What are Irelia’s strengths?
0b. What are Irelia’s weaknesses?
0c. How can I improve at Irelia?

The Laning Phase

1. Early Game [0-15 Minutes]
Summoner Spells:
1a. Rune Page (will keep updated as consistently as possible here):
Reasons for Running This Page:
1b. Max Order: R > W > Q > E
1c. Starting Item/ Items To Build in Lane:
1d. Levels
Levels 1-2
Level 3
How To Properly Trade as Irelia Post level 3 and Pre-Level 6 (Before We Cover the Next
Few Levels in the Laning Phase)
Levels 4-5 (The Sweet Spot)
Level 6
Levels 7/9
Level 8
Levels 10-11

Post Laning Phase

2. Mid Game (Levels 10-15) [15-30 minutes]
2a. Team Fighting in Mid Game
2b. The Build in Mid Game
Titanic Hydra
Guardian Angel
Mercurial Threads vs Ninja Tabi

3. Late Game (Levels 15-18) [30+ Minutes]

3a. Team Fighting in the Late Game
3b. The Build in the Late Game
4. Matchup Section
Akali: Difficulty Rating: 3/10
Aatrox: Difficulty Rating: 4/10
Camille: Difficulty Rating 5/10
Cho’gath: Difficulty Rating: 5/10
Darius: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Mundo: Difficulty Rating: 2/10
Fiora: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Gangplank: Difficulty Rating: 2/10
Garen: Difficulty Rating: 5/10
Gnar: Difficulty Rating: 4/10
Gragas: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Heimerdinger: Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Illaoi: Difficulty Rating: 9/10
Jarvan: Difficulty Rating: 3/10
Jax: Difficulty Rating: 7.5/10
Jayce: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Ornn: Difficulty Rating: 8/10
Olaf: Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Kayle: Difficulty Rating: 2/10
Kennen: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Kled: Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Malphite: Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Maokai Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Mordekaiser Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Nasus: Difficulty Rating: 5/10
Pantheon: Difficulty Rating: 8/10
Poppy: Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Renekton: Difficulty Rating: 8/10
Riven: Difficulty Rating: 1-9/10
Rumble: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Shen: Difficulty Rating: 8/10
Singed: Difficulty Rating: 4/10
Sion: Difficulty Rating: 5/10
Swain: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Tahm Kench: Difficulty Rating: 10/10
Teemo: Difficulty Rating: 7/10
Trundle: Difficulty Rating: 8/10
 Tryndamere: Difficulty Rating: 6/10
Urgot: Difficulty Rating: 4/10
Vayne: Difficulty Rating: 3/10
Vladimir: Difficulty Rating: 2/10
Wukong: Difficulty Rating: 4/10
Yasuo: Difficulty Rating: 2/10
Yorick: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

5. Conclusion

Anyhow, let us begin. I will first talk about how Irelia should be played during the laning phase
(early game), mid game and late game. What her key strengths are and so on and discuss
builds during each of those segments before moving on to the matchup sections. There will also
be included the runes and spells you should be running before I get into the laning phase.
Everything you need to know will be there.

0. What kind of a champion is Irelia?

Irelia is a quite unique champion in my opinion. I haven’t really found a champion that is similar
to her because she fits a bruiser-assassin role that no other champion fits like she does. She
gets a lot of burst/assassination potential as soon as she completes trinity. She can destroy any
squishy champion as soon as that item is completed unless she is behind. Over time she builds
tanky items and shifts over to an off-tank/bruiser role. It means you spike during the mid game
(15-30 mins) when you get trinity and a little tanky to survive diving in and killing squishies but
over time you start falling off and will become more team reliant as you transition from an
assassin role into more a disruptor role in team fights. Her laning phase is quite safe as she
does not have any hard counters. She still has harder lanes meaning soft counters. This means
she is quite easy to first pick without feeling like you will be completely destroyed in lane if they
pick any champion to ‘counter’ you because there will eventually be a point where you beat said
champion.

0a. What are Irelia’s strengths?

Irelia’s strengths are that she has the safe laning phase as mentioned before and that she fits
dive comps extremely well. She does not do that well with peel comps because Irelia is meant
to go in and dive people with her short cd Q and her ability to destroy squishy champions. So,
any team comps that enable Irelia to do what she is supposed to do will make her life a lot
easier. Champions like Orianna, Jarvan, Rek’sai, Vayne and so on will be good fits for her
because it means that they can dive in with her or capitalize off her dive potential. Since she is a
single target damage champion, anything that provides aoe and dive potential/utility will help a
lot. She does not do well with teams that are mostly single target damage because that means it
is quite likely that your team will end up killing one champion and not have anything left to finish
everyone else off. If Irelia and Akali (assuming she is being played in the mid lane while you are
playing Irelia top) jump on the adc and one shot the adc it means that you have 2 people
explicitly focusing one champion while they have 4 champions to dive the rest of your team or
peel you off. Essentially, killing two birds with one stone. So, in conclusion Irelia fits comps best
that have AOE damage and not as much single target damage since that is what she will be
providing. This also applies to any other single target champions in mid or top lane.

0b. What are Irelia’s weaknesses?

Irelia is weak when she is put up against teams with a lot of revive passives and or ability to
revive others (anivia, aatrox, zilean) because she is mostly single target damage. When there is
a lot of potential revives, it means that her entire focus will be made useless if that said person
will get revived. She also does poorly versus teams with a lot of knock ups since knock ups tend
to cancel her Q. It is also extremely hard for her to do anything vs teams that are naturally tanky
(eg. malphite top, swain mid, xayah+janna, Rek’sai jg would make her life completely
miserable). She is not good vs teams that get naturally tanky or have a lot of innate peel (more
knock ups the better for the opposing team because it makes her gapcloser quite useless).
Furthermore, Irelia is also quite easy to gank during the laning phase and if she falls behind
during her laning phase she tends to have a hard time being useful for the rest of the game
unless her team comp is quite good at enabling what she is supposed to do. She also gets
countered by items like Quicksilver Sash and Mikael’s crucible because they get rid of her long
stun and allow the ADC to continue auto attacking her and lifestealing her damage away. My life
gets much harder once those items are built by the enemy team and I feel like her usefulness
drops significantly as soon as those items are built.

0c. How can I improve at Irelia?

This is going to be the same as any champion. However, I believe that the best way to improve
is getting comfortable with the champion by playing them as much as possible. It is going to be
a grind but it will be worth it in the end. You should be focused on learning matchups and how
Irelia does against certain champions (luckily for you, a bulk of the work will be done for you in
this guide [queue match up section]). After you have a general outline of how her matchups go
and have acquired some experience in them you should start focusing on what Irelia’s role is in
team fights and how she works outside of lane. Knowing when to roam, knowing when you can
net a few kills and when you cannot. Knowing the right time to go in or to disengage and so on
should come AFTER you learn your matchups. It is okay to not understand what you are doing
at all during the first 50+ games. It took me 150+ games before I started having a positive win
rate with Irelia when I first started playing her in season 3. Just remember to be persistent and
keep an open mind while you play the game. Keep your ego in check and try to learn from your
mistakes and don’t blame your teammates (well sometimes it is fine to blame them).

1. The Laning Phase (Early Game) [0-15 Minutes]

Summoner Spells:

You should always take teleport and flash on Irelia. This is because her early game isn’t strong
enough to warrant ignite to try and kill your opposing lane opponent early. Having teleport
allows you to safely get to her later levels (lvl 4+) without getting smashed too hard early on.
Flash makes up for her lack of mobility in team fights and is quite necessary because she does
not have a reliable way of getting out of ganks as her Q relies on minions being positioned right
in order to escape.

1a. Rune Page (will keep updated as consistently as possible here):

Reasons for Running This Page:

Precision Primary:
The reason I run this page is because press the attack allows Irelia to get a lot of damage off. It
also makes her scale a little better because it also amplifies your team’s damage by 12% on the
target that you proc it on. It also helps you in lane because it adds in a bit of extra damage.
Triumph allows for clutch plays and it is also strong in team fights just because an assist will
easily give you a lot of hp back which might make a huge difference in the game. Alacrity helps
you acquire a lot of free attack speed which adds up to 18.5% which is quite a lot of extra
damage on your W. The reason I run coup de grace over last stand is because it will be a lot
more consistent than last stand. I do not need to be a certain HP and Coup de Grace offers 10
AD whenever I get a kill or an assist for a few seconds which can increase my damage much
more than Last Stand.

Domination Secondary:

The reason for running domination secondary is because getting sudden impact boosts Irelia’s
damage quite considerably. Especially once you have some CDR and a maxed Q. This is
because she can permanently apply it and get the bonus lethality and magic penetration. She is
a mixed damage champion so this helps her damage output immensely. To put it into
perspective I average between 700-1.5k damage boost from sudden impact. I also run zombie
ward because it increases your vision quite substantially and keeps you safe during the laning
phase. It also helps your team out because hey you cannot go wrong with more vision!

1b. Max Order: R > W > Q > E

I would recommend always doing this max order. I have fiddled with other max orders (i.e.
maxing E in lane or maxing E after W), however, I have had the most consistent success with
this max order vs every match up. CDR is quite accessible to Irelia and Q cd goes down by 2
seconds with every point which means that you will get a ton of extra damage off by being able
to spam it and also have insane stick potential.

Start Order: Q > E > W (Versus Ranged matchups)

E > Q > W (Versus Melee matchups except for Gangplank)

You want to start Q at level 1 versus ranged champions because it will allow you to get in their
face if you need to and safely farm by being able to Q minions and quickly run away after
getting them. Since ranged champs tend to push you in early it will also allow you to far under
tower very efficiently

1c. Starting Item/ Items To Build in Lane:

Corrupting Potion (there is nothing better than starting corrupting potion, this is because Irelia
has decent base stats so she doesn’t need a dorans item and corrupting potion adds damage
anyway. The 3 charges also allow you to trade and sustain much more efficiently than a dorans
item stat or anything else and saves you money over time since by the time you sell corrupting
potion, you’d have used it many many times over the duration of the game).

Items to build in lane:

Ninja Tabi​- You typically want to aim for this item vs most if not all ad lane opponents if you
can. It is a must rush item versus champions like Riven, Renekton and when they have an ad
top and jungler.

Mercurial Threads- ​I only recommend rushing these versus a champion like Kennen otherwise
I believe that they aren’t worth rushing in lane. They may be worth it if you are against an AP top
and an AP jungler though! In that case especially if you are getting camped they will definitely
be worth getting.

Doran Blades (1-2x) ​- Doran items are extremely strong in lane. I do not prefer to buy them
because they delay your extremely important item (trinity force). However, it is up to preference.
They amplify your level 4/5/7/9 power spikes because of how much sustain and AD/HP you gain
out of them. I would suggest never building these when ahead because it means you are getting
laning phase power in a lane which you have already won. They however are great when you
wish to fight after getting set behind (eg. after getting ganked) if you are confident in your ability
to win lane when building them. I would not recommend getting more than 2 Doran Blades.
Anything more will always be overkill.

Double Daggers​- I typically purchase 2 daggers when i have around ~600 gold because it
gives you the best bang for your buck. It is extremely offensive and will give you a lot of power
during lvl 4/5/7/9 (W levels). I recommend getting it instead of doran items if you go back with
more than 600g

Phage​- This item is the most consistent item to build. It gives you AD, HP and a movement
speed passive when you kill/damage enemy champions and or minions. This will allow you to
get more autos off and take a beating. I recommend rushing this item especially if you base with
more than 750 gold because it means you can get the longsword+ruby. Remember to do double
dagger if you have less than 750g. A lot of the time I end up getting a phage on the second back
since I will have ~1400 gold whereas I normally have a lot less when I base the first time hence
the double daggers unless I am vs a champion I cannot delay tabi against (i.e Riven).

Sheen​- I recommend getting this item after phage vs squisher champs. There was a time when
it was an amazing item to rush in lane but that is no longer the case. You will be missing a lot of
power that you’d get out of phage by doing this. It is still great versus range champs but even
then I prefer rushing phage. Sheen will allow you to 1 shot squishier champions however it also
leaves you quite exposed to getting exploded yourself which is why I do not like rushing it. I
much rather get the consistency out of phage instead.
Stinger​- I never straight up intend to rush this item. However it is quite good as a secondary
item when you have completed phage. I recommend getting it second versus tankier champs in
lane as it will mean that you will get more autos with your W in meaning that you ignore their
resistances. I end up getting it as a first item when I base with less than 500 gold after I have
went double dagger. In that case it is fine to get it as a first item. It is still quite potent with the
10% cdr and 35% attack speed.

The Ultimate Item You Should Be Aiming for:

TRINITY FORCE

A lot of the time you should try to focus on finishing this item before 14 minutes. It makes Irelia
absolutely insane in lane and gives her the potential to 1v1 almost any champion if you
complete it before 14 minutes. The only champion that can fight her when they both have trinity
is only Jax. I recommend trying to roam as soon as you get this item as it is quite easy to net
yourself free kills by 1 shotting casters with your Q to jump on the enemy mid laner or when
doing a teleport gank bottom lane. I typically avoid making a teleport play before I complete this
item because it makes Irelia so much more mobile and hard to 1v1 once you complete it. It
makes Irelia, Irelia in a way. There is absolutely no item that comes close to how core this item
is on her. I would not recommend building any other item first other than trinity force (unless you
need to rush tabi in lane).

1d. Levels

Level 1-2

So, typically when you start out the game Irelia tends to be weak lvl 1-3 unless versus very
specific champions. The champions you can be aggressive against during these levels tend to
be ranged champions. This is because Irelia’s Q (which is also what you should level up first if
you are against a ranged champion) allows her to jump right on top of them. Typically melee
champions like Irelia will have higher base damage and base states than ranged champions so
as long as she is right on top of them she will be able to outtrade them. I usually q right on them
starting at level 1. I continue auto attacking until they are too far from me and then I walk in the
bush to drop minion aggro. This will get the lane to push and whenever my Q is up again I jump
on them yet again. I try to focus on hitting level 2 first in order to net myself an easy kill or to
burn their flash and force them to go back first. Essentially winning lane right off the bat and not
giving them a chance since ranged champions tend to suffer versus Irelia in the later levels. If I
beat them during this time the lane is over. Versus melee champions, I tend to start E first and
focus on stunning them when they auto attack me in my creep wave (creeps hurt a lot early
on!), and getting an auto attack before the stun wears off and backing away. I only fight them at
level 2 if I hit it first. Even then, there will be champions that can fight you when they are level 1
while you are level 2 (like Ornn, yikes). But generally versus melees, I recommend being
passive during this time unless they offer a good opportunity to trade with them (eg. stunning
them in your minion wave when they aggro it) and letting them push you in until later levels.

Level 3

Irelia’s level 3 is one of the weakest in the game. I’d recommend being very careful when
fighting people at this level. I only recommend fighting people during level 3 when you are much
healthier than they are from fighting them before or if you are level 3 when they are level 2. This
is because 15 true damage is very insignificant addition to your auto attacks whereas other
champions get a major ability that adds a lot of power. For example Fiora typically will get her E
at level 3 which means that she gets an auto attack reset and a crit. In comparison to this Irelia’s
W is quite measly for what it gives you. So avoid fighting at level 3 at all costs unless they screw
up majorly or you hit this level first.
How To Properly Trade as Irelia Post level 3 and Pre-Level 6 (Before We Cover the Next
Few Levels in the Laning Phase)

Irelia has a very particular trading pattern that you should always follow before level 6. The way
you should go about things before level 6 and after level 3 is by either q’ing a low hp minion
right beside them or walking up and pressing E. The next thing you should do is turn your W on
and start auto attacking. Before your W ends make sure to use your Q or if you plan to Q make
sure your W is on. This is because her W will apply to her Q meaning that you get the extra
healing and true damage on your Q. After this you should back away and wait for your
cooldowns because continuing the trade will put you at a major disadvantage unless you are
extremely confident that you can finish them off. This is because Irelia is extremely reliant on her
W and will put you at a major disadvantage to fight without it. It is quite easy to suddenly lose an
all-in when your W is down even if u are 50%+ healthier than they are.

Level 4-5 (The Sweet Spot)

If you survived to these levels, congratulations! This is where Irelia starts hitting her first power
spike in lane. She tends to beat a good portion of champions during these levels with the
exception of extremely strong lane-phase type champions (Jayce, Renekton, but even these
can be beaten during these levels given the right circumstances). This is because at level 4, her
true damage doubles in comparison to level 3. This means that if you hit the enemy champion
3-4 times in lane you gain an addition of 90-120 damage and heal 30-40 HP and another proc of
the same thing when you use your Q (since your Q applies W). This is insane amounts early on
in the lane. Even more so at level 5/7/9. If its a ranged champion, Q’ing a low hp minion or
simply walking up to them and stunning them means that you can 100% outtrade them during
this time. Make sure to abuse these levels as much as you can, because Irelia’s ultimate, while
strong in lane, does get outclassed by other champions’ ultimates during the laning phase.It is
also situationally strong, the reasons for which will be covered in the upcoming segment.

Level 6

Irelia’s level 6 can be either extremely powerful in lane or next to useless. This is because it
does not do a lot of damage for an ultimate but it is quite powerful when it hits both the opposing
champion and minions. The heal can be quite ridiculous if you are hitting a large minion wave+
the enemy champion. So as long as you are in a good position to use it, it may be a good idea
to go for an all in with the enemy champion as long as you have the right set up. Furthermore, if
you get ganked it is quite a good tool for setting up minions so that you can escape.

Example of using it to set up minions for escaping:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_p7hXOnkO0
Level 7/9

Levels 7 and 9 are other good power spikes for Irelia, they are very good power spikes versus a
lot of tanky champions because at this point you start doing 60/75 true damage per auto attack
which will rip right through any resistances. I would recommend using these levels to fight
tankier champs like Renekton, Malphite, Ornn, Sion and so on so forth. They are still very good
levels even against squishier champions because the damage increase is still quite substantial
from earlier levels however I do recommend being careful when fighting champions that scale
similarly at these levels such as Riven Fiora Jax Nasus and so on.

Level 8

This level is comparable to how her level 3 is. She does not get much out of being level 8
compared to a lot of other champions so I recommend to avoid fighting during this time unless
you are jumping on someone with a level advantage (eg. they are level 7). This is because
decreasing her Q cd by 2 seconds or if you decide to go an alternate max order where you max
E after W (gaining .25 on your stun), won’t help much at all when fighting another champion.

Level 10-11

At this point you should have trinity completed and the laning phase should be over or close to
over. If the laning phase is not over you should use this opportunity to net yourself a kill on your
lane opponent unless it is a champion that scales similarly with trinity force or if you are behind.
If you are behind or against Jax (and not ahead of him) I would recommend avoiding any all ins
because trinity does a lot less when you are behind your lane opponent, especially in levels. So
at this point if your turret is down or you have just taken theirs down I would no longer focus on
the laning phase since it is now effectively over. It is time to start looking into potential roams,
skirmishes and possible splitting bottom lane if your teleport is up.

Post Laning Phase:

2. Mid Game (Levels 10-15) [15-30 minutes]

This is when Irelia is pretty much at her peak. You probably have trinity and tier 2 boots (tabi or
mercs) completed and you are ready to start influencing the game. What I recommend after you
take or lose the top turret is rotating to bottom lane if your teleport is up. Splitting bot lane allows
you to easily access mid lane and dragon while also being a bit safer when pushing up because
generally it is a lot easier for your team to help you than top lane because most of the action
goes on in the bottom side of the map post laning phase. It is also quite easy to start ganking
mid lane by running through lane and one shotting a caster to get to the enemy mid laner. Since
mid laners will be squishy at this time it usually means a free kill if you get a good jumping
opportunity on them. The same applies when ganking bottom lane.

2a. Team Fighting in Mid Game

Furthermore, in team fights during this time what you want to do is to dive their back line at the
right time. By the right time, I mean do not go in first. You want to let stuff unfold a little bit first
before you go in. Once people are focused on whatever is going on in the unfolding team fight,
you now are going to be in a good position to dive their backline. If you get even TWO seconds
alone with their adc you will most likely be able to one shot the ADC. I recommend going for the
ADC unless they are extremely behind or their mid laner is extremely fed. If their mid is
extremely fed then I recommend going for them instead. Or if the have a squishier top laner that
may be causing problems for your team then I recommend going for them first instead. It all
depends on your judgment on who appears to be the biggest threat. Taking them out first
should always be your priority. Is it better to take out a 0/4 caitlyn with 1 item or is it better to
take out the 5/0 Riven with 2 items? It all depends on your decision making.

Another thing is paying attention to HP bars. Irelia is very good at cleaning up or finishing off low
HP enemies. If their Support is low and looks quite burstable, then its worth it to go for them first
because in this meta Supports tend to enable ADCs to do a lot. So if you see an opportunity to
instagib a low hp enemy no matter what they are, GO FOR IT. Finishing off people with your Q
also means that you just got a free reset to whoever they were close to allowing you to continue
fighting as if nothing happened. That being said if you know that you can execute enemies with
your Q, try to time that because having your Q up at all times makes you extremely mobile and
flexible as to what you can do in team fights because a majority of team fighting in the mid game
is picking the right targets at the right time.

2b. The Build in Mid Game

Typically the items you want to aim for after trinity are going to be Titanic Hydra and Guardian
Angel and either mercs or tabi depending on whether or not you rushed tabi in lane (generally
its best to never rush mercs unless vs a champion like Kennen which will be discussed in the
matchup section)

Titanic Hydra

The reason why you want to build this item after trinity is because it offers something Irelia
lacks: ​waveclear. I believe that it is the best second item since it is both a defensive and an
offensive item at the same time. The hp that it offers can make quite a bit of a difference while
providing you with an auto attack reset or potentially activating it when you are about to Q
someone as it will apply on your Q. It also gives a bit of AD and a passive that scales off of your
HP so it is overall a perfect item for Irelia.
Guardian Angel

I think this item is great on any champion that has to dive in. It makes you a much less favorable
target to focus because you have GA and it gives you a bit of ad and armor that will increase
your survivability and burst potential in team fights. It is also quite cheap and can be quite game
changing as the passive lasts for 4 seconds so it requires the enemy team to be completely
focused on finishing you off if you happen to die when diving in. Hence why it is such a good
item to build if you are a dive champion like Irelia.

Mercurial Threads vs Ninja Tabi

A lot of the time ninja tabi are going to be superior to mercs in almost every way. The only time
mercs are going to be better than ninja tabi are vs heavy cc teams and teams with mostly
magical damage (eg. if they have a malphite top, kassadin mid, ivern jungle, ezreal adc and lulu
support), then in that case there is no reason to get tabi over mercs. However, just 1-2 AD
champs will make tabi much better. They offer 30 armor and 10% auto reduction which is
absolutely insane. It will keep you alive a lot longer than the tenacity and 20 MR that Mercs give
you.

So in the mid game your build should look something like this:

Ninja Tabi (or mercs), Trinity Force, Titanic Hydra and Guardian Angel

3. Late Game (Levels 15-18) [30+ Minutes]

3a. Team Fighting in the Late Game

Late game team fighting will be somewhat different from fighting in the mid game. Irelia loses
her one shot potential at this time and she will shift from an assassination role to more of that of
a bruiser-disruptor role. You will have started putting points in your E at this time and it will mean
that your stun will last considerably more. Focusing on getting off stuns on the right people
should be your concern now and not as much on which target you can one shot because it will
be much harder to do. Irelia is now a lot more reliant on her team because she will not be able
to have the same impact that she had before in the mid game. There may be opportunities to kill
the ADC or their mid laner alone but it will depend on the champions and whether or not they
will have back up. Supports will now have anti diver items that will help them peel you right off
and end up killing you with their team if you dive in. So it is best to focus on being able to stun
the right people when you notice good opportunities. Furthermore, if your guardian angel is up,
do not be afraid to go in as you would normally in the mid game. This is because even if you do
not kill anyone, by having the attention of 2-3 people at once will enable the rest of your team to
do some work on the enemy team. The less focus there is on your adc or mid laner the more
damage output your team will be capable of.

3b. The Build in the Late Game

At this point, you should still have 2 empty slots left. The items you generally want to aim for
should be ones that increase your survivability. This will depend on your preference (it is also
possible to build more damage if you prefer it) on what they should be. Use your judgment and
think about the enemy team. If they are full AD you probably want to build items like randuins,
thornmail, or deadman’s plate. If they are mostly magical damage you may want to opt out for
items like spirit visage, maw, or adaptive helm. There are many possibilities and you would aim
to mix both magic resist and armor if the enemy team has good balance between the two. So
your final build should look something like this:

Tabi (or mercs), Trinity Force, Titanic Hydra, Guardian Angel, Situational Tank Item (or a
damage item like duskblade), Situational Tank Item)

Duskblade

This item is great on Irelia because it adds to her burst and has an insane slow if you get the
proc. The Lethality and CDR comes in quite handy and even if you build this item along with
another offensive item like a maw of malmortious you will still be somewhat tanky and deal
LOADS of damage.

4. Matchup Section:

User Discretion:

Remember that this is going to be a general outline of how you should play these lanes. The
things I am about to show you will not guarantee you a win in the laning phase. Every game is
going to be different. There are always going to be different outcomes from game to game.
Every time you play against the same champion it will always be different because you will be
playing against a different player who will likely play the game differently from the person before.
Even if you play against the same player, they will likely play somewhat different to the point
where it will feel like you are playing against a completely different person. So, remember to
keep an open mind when playing against other champions and not to head into the lane
expecting everything to go the way that it is written here. I am only human after all even if I may
be challenger and have 7000 Irelia games, I still get surprised in lane. Anyway let us begin in
alphabetical order. I will also include a difficulty rating that I believe will fit each matchup’s
difficulty which again may not be accurate since it is from my own judgment. I will assign a
number between 0-10 instead of 0-5 in order to capture the difficulty of each matchup a bit more
accurately.
Akali: Difficulty Rating: 3/10

I feel as though this lane is not difficult because it is quite easy to keep auto attacking her even
when she is in her shroud because she has to reveal herself in order to use abilities or to proc
her Q on you. Level 1 you should be focused on E>autoing her because she has no way of
proccing her q apart from walking up to you to auto attack which should be easy to avoid with a
stun. I would avoid fighting her at lvl 2-3 as her level 2-3 is quite strong versus melees as she
has an easy time proccing her Q with her shroud while having the safety of her shroud to
disengage. Overall, I’d just let her push me in pre level 4. Once you are level 4, as long as you
are paying close attention you should be able to auto her everytime she tries to do anything
while in her shroud. Irelia’s W post level 4 will rip right through Akali as long as she does not get
poked too much before. You will start losing fights with her if she gets to get a double Q proc on
you so I recommend engaging on her before she can time her Q. What I mean by this is, most
Akali players (ones that tend to main her) will try to throw a Q on you, wait until their Q is up
again and proc that Q, throw another Q and proc that one and disengage with shroud. So what
you want to do is get on her before she can do this, because if she gets to do this she may
chunk up to 60% of your hp before you can react and by that time you have already lost the
potential all-in or trade. It is highly recommended that if you do have a Q mark on top of you,
that you keep your distance and wait it out before trying to fight her. An item that is quite good
against her if you are struggling is hexdrinker. If you are not comfortable in this matchup I
recommend rushing this item as it will keep you quite safe against her all in while giving you a
pretty good all in yourself. A sweeper after level 9 will also help track her while she is in her
shroud

Aatrox: Difficulty Rating: 4/10

Aatrox can bully you quite a bit early on so you should be careful. Avoid fighting him at all costs
until level 4+. This is because he can easily outsustain your damage and out-damage you if he
gets on you especially if his bloodwell is stacked up. Once he stacks up his bloodwell his W can
hurt a lot and the increased attack speed will guarantee him winning trades at these levels. I
recommend waiting until level 4+ and even then you should wait until his bloodwell is no longer
stacked. Without bloodwell stacks he is pretty much a sitting duck. Irelia is good against him
because she tends to heavily outdamage him when his bloodwell is empty and how squishy he
is versus her W. The more points you have in your W the easier this matchup tends to get. I also
like to set up a low hp minion beside him so that I can juke out his Q. You should always try to
have minions set up to avoid it as it is easy to avoid and will negate a lot of his damage and
allow you to Q back into him and continue the trade. This matchup is quite snowbally so try to
not make much mistakes because if aatrox gets ahead of you, farming will become very difficult.
Irelia should win this lane unless she gets cheesed at lvl 1-3. Your level 4 is just much stronger
and assuming you play things out right you should be fine. Tabi reduce a lot of his damage so I
recommend rushing those if he has an ad jungler as well.

Camille: Difficulty Rating 5/10

Irelia should do well in this lane but given her recent buffs she is a bit harder to deal with. Her
AD shield that she gets means that you cannot fight with her until you have more points in your
W. So I would recommend fighting her after level 7+. Fighting her before level 7 will be risky as
her AD shield will negate a lot of damage. If you do fight her before level 7, try to fight her after
she goes on you rather than before. Camille is extremely reliant on her CD’s so when her
abilities are on cooldown it is a perfect time to go for a heavy trade with her as her shield
passive will likely be gone after she bursted you and it would mean that she used her escape
(E) to damage you. Do not be afraid of her burst because after she does it she does not have
much consistent damage until much later. If she uses her Q to farm, it is another good
opportunity to fight her. Post level 7 it is quite simple to beat her in an all in. Walk up to her stun
her, turn your W on and start auto attacking DO NOT LET her burst scare you, she does not
have much after its done so as long as you have an extended trade with her or an all in, you
should be able to come out on top.

Cho’gath: Difficulty Rating: 5/10

Cho’gath will beat and outsustain you early levels so it is best to let him shove the lane early.
You will have to play from the backpedal for a little bit until you are level 4+. Once you are level
4 and healthy enough you can walk up or q a minion right beside him and stun him. Turn your W
on before his silence and start auto attacking. His circle is easy to avoid so try to avoid it when
he pops it. Your damage should be much higher during this time so assuming that you stayed
healthy enough during the earlier levels, you should be fine. It does get tricky at level 6 because
his ultimate is a true damage nuke that can hurt so you should try to soften him up first before
all-inning. The same applies for levels 6-11. After a certain point he will get too tanky to reliably
kill so I’d avoid fighting him once he has a major armor item completed because by the time you
can kill him he will have backup from his team, not to mention that he sets up ganks quite easily
for his team mates.

Darius: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

Darius is quite a tricky matchup because he tends to thrive in the same way that you do,
however, there are ways around him in order to beat him. Level 1-3 it is pointless to fight him as
he will outdamage you early on if he gets 5 stacks. The trick is to be healthy enough post level 4
and when engaging to save your Q for his Q. When he charges up his Q, you want to Q him
right away so that you are right on top of him. What this will do is negate a lot of his damage and
deny him his heal. If you manage to do this you should win the trade with him. You want to be
careful with overcommitting because once your W is down and he has 5 stacks he will likely
obliterate you. Even when you avoid the outer-clip of his Q you should still be careful when
fighting him as the Q cooldown is not long at all so if you chunk him heavily and he is running
away, you should let him run until your cooldowns are gone so that when u fight him again you
can easily finish him off instead of giving him a chance of ramping up his passive. This matchup
revolves around cooldowns and controlling your greed. As long as you can manage both, you
should win.

Mundo: Difficulty Rating: 2/10

This matchup is quite easy in my opinion. The only way you can screw this one up is if you
overcommit with your W down. You can E auto him lvl 1 and as long as you don’t get hit by his q
you can trade with him just fine level 2-3. Level 4 is even better however he will eventually
outscale you if you do not get ahead of him early on so make sure that you are paying attention
to his items. This is because if you are even with him at later levels and he has items that
directly counter you like bramble vest and armor+hp it will become increasingly difficult to kill
him and at that point. He can face tank your damage and start fighting you back, so I’d
recommend not trying to all in him if you haven’t started winning lane before he gets those
items. If you start winning early against Mundo which is fairly easy to do you should be able to
keep your lead for the rest of the laning phase.

Fiora: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

This one can go either way but Fiora outscales Irelia super hard in a 1v1 so it will progressively
get harder even if you get ahead of her. There will be apoint where her kit will just naturally
outperform Irelia’s. I recommend being passive lvls 1-4 because Fiora tends to beat Irelia during
those levels, everytime she jumps on you at lvl 1 however, try to stun her because she will draw
minion aggro and you will be able to get another auto attack in between before she can react to
you. If you do this enough you may be able to chunk her enough at lvl 1 so that you can keep up
with her levels 2-3 if you choose to fight her. The sweet spot like with other matchups tends to
be level 4. At level 4 if you are healthy enough and you wish to fight her, I recommend opening
up with your stun. By going on her with your e right away it will make it extremely difficult for her
to predict it, I do recommend avoiding making a pattern of this though. So after you do this once
I recommend not trying to stun her the same way again. If she hits her W on your E or even
your Q, you will 100% lose the trade/all in against her. So be extremely careful about her W, she
does not even need to parry any ability, if she simply hits it on you, you will lose a good portion
of your damage as it reduces attack speed by 50%. Try to have a minion set up so that its low
enough for your Q so that when she charges her W, you have a second or so to avoid it and Q
back into her. If she does not hit her W on you, you should be able to crush her post level 4.
Also post level 6 try to make it harder for herto proc vitals by hugging walls to make the vital
facing the wall harder to proc. If you are struggling in this lane I recommend getting a bramble,
however, I do not think you will need it. Tabi also reduces a good portion of her damage if y
would like to build defensive against her.

Gangplank: Difficulty Rating: 2/10

This lane is quite easy as well for Irelia. I recommend starting Q at level 1 even though he is a
melee champion. This is because he has weak base stats and if you get in his face with Q you
will be able to bully him right from the get go. By starting Q at level 1 and jumping on him you
also prevent him from getting free harass on you early on. The only way he can win this lane is
by beating you early and by being able to get in his face you will prevent this. His level 2-3 tend
to be a little better but if you were able to bully him out at level 1 it won’t matter. This lane will
get progressively easier but I still recommend getting tabi against him to reduce a good portion
of his damage because he scales super well with items and you don’t want to lose lane just
because you got hit by a few q’s and a barrel or two. Just make sure you jump on him before he
can poke you to the point where you can no longer fight him. Once he gets to 3 items I
recommend to avoid trying to 1v1 him as he will naturally outscale you after a certain point.

Garen: Difficulty Rating: 5/10

This lane tends to be quite rough early on since he has a lot of natural regen due to his passive
(allowing him to heal up quickly after a bad trade early on). So I’d recommend avoiding any
trades with him early as they are going to be a waste of mana. Irelia starts beating him after she
gets tabi and lvl 7+. This is because tabi cuts down a lot of his base damage and the true
damage you get at level 7 will shred through his W’s resistances and allow you to start bullying
him back in lane. I recommend turning on your W before his silence so that you can start auto
attacking him while he spins on you and Q’ing him when he starts running away to put more
damage on him. Overall it should not be a hard lane as long as you play before level 7 carefully.
Furthermore, you should be wary of the villain marking on you because his ult will do much
more damage if you are marked as the villain, so after you kill him be careful if you have the
villain mark on you. Try to soften him up before all inning him.

Gnar: Difficulty Rating: 4/10

This is going to be similar to the gangplank lane. You can jump on gnar at level 1 because he
has low base stats which should allow you to beat him early on, his Q is also easy to avoid once
you get right on top of him because a lot of them will use it to push the wave so once he uses it
to push the wave or fails to hit you when trying to harass, punish him by Q’ing right on top of him
and getting a few autos off. If you chunk him hard enough you should be able to start pushing
the lane without worrying about his harass early on and hit level 2 first. If you hit level 2 first try
to jump on him right away, since you have good kill potential on him if you have chunked him
earlier in the lane. In the very least you should be able to burn his flash. By the time you push
him in you should be level 3, at this point since you pushed the wave into the turret it will start
pushing back to you which means that you will be at a minion disadvantage if you try to fight
him. This is where I let him push me in until it resets by going into my tower. If I have burned his
flash from earlier it will mean that he will be easy to gank since the lane will start pushing so if
my jungler decides to gank it will mean an easy kill. I think that rushing tabi+phage vs gnar is the
right way to go because the movement speed will help you get more autos off on him and
prevent him from kiting you, while reducing a lot of his damage. Try to q a minion right beside
him, E him and turn W on and start autoing, save your Q for his jump and Q right on him as
soon as he jumps away. If you can do this you should be able to win this lane. Just be careful at
level 9 because at this point his boomerang will be maxed out giving him maximum kite
potential. I’d avoid fighting him post level 9 unless you got ahead of him from before or he is still
somewhat squishy.

Gragas: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

The reason why I placed this matchup high on the difficulty is because he is quite an early game
bully vs a melee champ like Irelia. He can also stop you from auto attacking quite easily and
keep poking you with barrels so he can be a pain in the ass. Also most of the people that will be
playing Gragas tend to main him so that will also make things a bit more difficult. The way I tend
to beat Gragas is to play passive and farm but once I get to level 7 I start beating him because it
is easy to get Q resets with W turned on to stick to him and out trade him with the 60 true
damage per auto. You can also juke out his Q and E easily while trading with him. It is quite
easy to outplay him but you have to be careful with how easy it is for him to disengage from you
after chunking you heavily. So, I’d recommend only fighting him if you have minions set up to
juke him out so you don’t have to worry about him bursting you and disengaging. It can be quite
annoying but not impossible.

Heimerdinger: Difficulty Rating: 7/10

This lane is a bit harder than the previous ones because he can bully you quite a bit early on
and keep you constantly shoved with a few turrets up making it super difficult to fight him, even
with your jungler. So, I recommend being completely passive until the first back. The best first
item you can build is mercurial threads which will reduce the stun duration and a bit of his
damage allowing you to get a few more autos in. A lot of them will use their stun to try and hit
you to poke you down. It is easy to avoid and as soon as he does this it should be a good
opportunity to go for an all in with him. Even if you quickly kill him, be ready to flash away right
after because his big turret is gonna melt your HP away even after he dies. If he is holding on to
his stun, wait until there is a few minions that are low enough so you can juke out the stun and
jump right back into him. All-inning him with minions set up is necessary because you need to
avoid the stun order to beat him unless you are ahead of him. If you manage to kill him once it
should be a breeze because all-inning him at that point won’t require you to time it because your
mercs should reduce the stun duration enough to the point where it won’t matter and if you are
ahead of him in levels it should be quite easy to 100-0 him given how squishy he is.
Illaoi: Difficulty Rating: 9/10

Remember when I said that Irelia doesn’t have hard counters? Well, I lied a little when I said
that. Illaoi is probably the biggest pain in the ass if you are a melee champ. She isn’t impossible
to beat but she may as well be. Your level 1-3 are going to be slightly weaker but if you can
avoid her Q and E you should be able to beat her at those levels. It gets a lot easier at level 4-5
because you can straight up out damage her during this time. It is highly recommended that you
try to dodge her E before all-inning her though. If she manages to hit her E on you, it is quite
difficult to outtrade her because if her tentacles are set-up she will heal a lot and do a ton of
damage back to you. Post level 6 it is even more important to do this because if she hits her E
on you when you are trying to all in her, it will pretty much be a guarantee death unless you
flash. Her damage is absolutely insane during this time. Even if you are ahead of her, always be
careful with her E because she can easily outduel you if her tentacles are set up right and she
hits her E on you. Furthermore, try to kill her tentacles, don’t let her stack them up for free. Just
be careful when hitting them, don’t remain stationary because that will make it easy for her to hit
her E on you. Once she gets a little tanky, I avoid trying to fight her because after a certain point
she will have enough CDR to the point where missing her E won’t really matter because she will
have her next one up very soon and easily beat you in an all in.

Jarvan: Difficulty Rating: 3/10

I feel like this lane is pretty easy unless he beats you early on. The only way you can lose this
lane is if he cheeses you at level 2. Just be passive early on and let him push. You will start
smashing him as soon as you hit level 4. Once you are level 4, all you have to do is get right on
him by walking up or Q’ing a low hp minion right beside him and pressing E and turning on your
W to open up the trade. You can juke out his EQ by having a low hp minion set up before you
actually fight him. Even if you do get hit by it, I think you should still win the all in because as
long as you can auto attack jarvan you should beat him. This is because he is more of a burst
champion and not as much of a sustained damage champion like Irelia. Although his burst will
be scary, all you have to do is keep going and you will eventually out damage him. Ninja Tabi
are also great against Jarvan.

Jax: Difficulty Rating: 7.5/10

The reason why I put a weird score on this one is because I feel like the Jax player will also
need to understand what Irelia’s win conditions are in this lane. A lot of them do not so I didn’t
want to put it at 8/10. He does well against Irelia because his E means that you cannot damage
him apart from your E/R for 3 seconds. This is because it lasts for 2 seconds and it stuns for a
second right after. You can bully him at level 1 because your E has a longer range than his auto
and by stunning him you can get another auto attack before backing away. When you are
healthier than he is, you won’t be able to avoid his E when you walk up to E and auto him again
but that is okay because his E cd early on is almost double the cd of your E. So trading with him
at level 1 is actually pretty good for Irelia because you can bully him out. He will beat you very
hard if he gets a good counter strike off and also make sure to not auto attack him during it
because the more he gets autoed during his E, the more damage it will do at the end of the
duration. You want to run as soon as he activates it because if he chooses to auto while counter
striking, he won’t be able to get the stun off. At levels 2-3 you want to keep your distance
because it is quite easy for him to outtrade you during these levels.

Try to save your E incase he decides to jump right on top of you because you can stun him in
your creep wave and make him take a lot of minion damage. Post level 4 there is a lot of ways
you can beat him, but the most consistent is to try to bait out his counterstrike by stunning him
and auto attacking without using anything. If the Jax doesn’t know what he is doing he will pop it
and after it ends you can turn your W on and re-engage on him with your Q. If he is good then it
is fine to stun and turn your W on and getting an auto attack and Q right before the stun ends
and backing away. This will chunk him very hard early on and it will make it quite easy to all in
him even when his E is up when your cooldowns are gone. If you are healthier by 25%, you will
beat him even when he presses E when you press W.

Post 6, I prefer to freeze the lane a little in front of my turret so that I can back away to the
safety of my tower if need be. It also makes it harder for him to keep his passive stacked and to
bully me with his 3rd proc on his ultimate. If he gets too optimistic you can stun him under your
tower and likely kill him. I would recommend rushing tabi if his jungler is also ad, if not then rush
a phage because it will allow you to take up more of his damage and punish him with your base
damage since Irelia does do more before they both get items.

Overall post level 11 if you have not gotten ahead of him, do not try to 1v1 him anymore. After
level 11 his ultimate damage is just way too high for you to handle if you are even and so try to
look for opportunities to 1v2 him or roam since Irelia is going to be a better roamer than Jax.

Jayce: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

This matchup is considered a traditional counter towards Jayce, however, that is not really the
case anymore. He can bully you quite heavily from levels 1-4. A lot of them will duck in and out
of the brush closest to your tower. This will allow him to drop minion aggro every time he autos
you while zoning you from the minion wave. What you want to do in this case is just to simply
ward that bush, so that every time he autos you, your minions will follow him in there. Play
passive and get whatever minion you can but avoid ones that will result in a lot of harass. Once
you hit level 4, I still recommend avoiding any fights with him unless he jumps on you in your
minion wave. Sometimes they tend to REALLY try to harass you and if they ignore creeps a little
too much, you can punish them heavily. This matchup tends to get easier post level 6 because
he does not get a real ultimate at level 6 since he starts with the ability to swap forms
essentially. After 6, you want to try and save your Q for his E. You will still need to rush tabi in
order to be faster than him and negate a lot of his damage. This will also allow you to bounce
right back to him after he knocks you away. Otherwise, if you have the same movement speed
as he does, you will not be able to Q him right after he E’s. If you cannot catch up to him with
your Q after he E’s you away, make sure you have a minion set up so that you can catch up to
him by Q’ing that minion after he knocks you away and then Q’ing right into him. Try to fight him
before he pokes you down because if he gets you under 60% hp before you start fighting him,
you will lose. It is also extremely hard to stay in lane vs Jayce if you fall behind so I recommend
rushing tabi just to be safe in case that happens.

Ornn: Difficulty Rating: 8/10

He is quite annoying early on as he has high base stats and it is impossible to trade with him
until level 4. I recommend letting him push you in early on and just focus on farming. Once you
are level 4 you can start trying to fight him with as long as you can dodge his W. You can dodge
his W by walking parallel to him when is casting it or having a minion setup so that you can
bladesurge that minion and then back to Ornn. As long as you avoid his W you should be able
to outtrade him and possibly even kill him. The same applies post level 6 and until he gets a lot
of cooldown reduction. After he gets a bunch of cooldown reduction, if you haven’t gotten ahead
of him already, you shouldn’t fight him anymore. This is because even if you do avoid his W, it
will be up shortly and he will end up smashing your face in if you haven’t gotten ahead of him.

Olaf: Difficulty Rating: 7/10

This is a pretty rough matchup since you only have a few windows of time to actually beat him.
He completely smashes you level 1-3, so you have to play super passive and get whatever
minions you can. If he can chain his axes on you, he might even burn your flash early on so be
extremely careful and try to avoid them. You should hold on to your stun until he starts running
up to you in your minion wave. At level 4-5+ you have a good opportunity to all in him. If you
manage to kill him during this time you will be able to keep your lead over him throughout the
entire laning phase. However if you do not, once he gets to level 6 and acquires some CDR it is
next to impossible to outduel him as Irelia if he chains his axes. Obviously if the Olaf is bad it will
be quite easy to beat him but it will be fairly difficult to kill him after the first back if he is any
good.

Kayle: Difficulty Rating: 2/10

I think this is an easy matchup but it can get out of hand if you aren’t careful. You can start Q at
level 1 and start jumping on her right away. Walk in the bush to drop minion aggro after you can
no longer auto attack her and keep your distance till your Q is back up. You can do this and hit
level 2 first and try to jump on her. If you do not hit level 2 first, let her push as her level 2-3 are
generally going to be stronger than yours. Levels 4-5 are a good time to all in her as long as you
prevent her from kiting you by q’ing a low hp minion right next to her stunning her and auto
attacking until you can no longer stick on her. When she makes some distance use your 2nd Q
on her and you should be able to kill her or at least win the trade super hard. Post level 6, you
should save your ult for her ult. As long as you did what you did at level 4-5 while saving your ult
fr hers, t should be fairly easy to kill her. I recommend avoiding fighting her once she gets 3+
items though as Kayle tends to scale extremely hard.

Kennen: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

Irelia is one of the better melees against Kennen, however, he can still be a tricky and very
annoying matchup. You can do the same thing that you do vs other ranged matchups that I
mentioned earlier, it will be riskier however so I do not recommend it unless you are extremely
comfortable with Irelia. The safest way to beat Kennen is to give up minions that you would take
a lot of harass for durings level 1-3. Once you are level 4 you can start fighting him but I would
recommend only doing so if there is a low hp minion right beside him. This is because he can
instantly stun you as soon as you get in melee range of him so it would be wise to have your Q
up so that you can get in his face right after the stun. If you are under 50% HP post level 6 I
recommend not sticking around as it is going to be very easy for him to finish you off with his ult
and stun combo before you can react. Rushing mercurial threads is a must in this lane because
his stun lasts a little too long and stops you from sticking to him. The MR will also help a lot
against his damage and items like phage are great because of the movement speed passive
and the health that it provides against his burst. Overall it should be an easier lane with time as
long as you did not get bullied too hard early on.
Kled: Difficulty Rating: 7/10

This matchup can be quite difficult if you do not have a lot of experience against Kled. I promise
that it will get easier the more you play against him. His remount mechanic forces you to play
very carefully with your abilities and although it is quite simple to deal with him, it is hard to
consistently time everything right. A lot of the time I play very passive until level 4. This s where
the tricky part comes. To beat him you need to dismount him and BACK AWAY. You should
focus on doing a full ability cycle to dismount him and wait for cooldowns before all inning him.
When he is dismounted he can be impossible to finish off if your W and Q are down sobe very
careful with how much you commit against Kled. Keep your distance, be patient and wait for
your cooldowns and all in him while he is dismounted. You should be able to finish him off
before he remounts, when he is dismounted he is quite slow and vulnerable to all ins assuming
your abilities are up. It is highly recommended that you rush tabi against Kled because he has
quite high base damage and the movement speed will help you dodge his Q. After that rush a
phage to help you take more of a beating and stick to him furthermore. Overall you shouldn’t
have a hard time as long as you respect his remounting and play around your cooldowns.

Malphite: Difficulty Rating: 7/10

.This matchup is quite boring and can be really annoying because his damage scales off of
armor. The only times you can realistically kill him is before he gets HP items because his attack
speed slow makes it really hard to get autos in. It is not hard to avoid however and you do have
a good chance of beating him and out trading him if he misses it. It is simple to avoid because if
there is a low hp minion nearby you can q to it right before he e’s and q back into him after he
e’s. I would only recommend fighting him until he gets a bramble or other armor and hp items
because if you do not get ahead of him at this point you will start doing peanut damage to him.
Quite often this simply becomes a farm lane and not a whole lot happens. He becomes quite the
lane bully if he gets ahead of you so I recommend playing extremely carefully and only fighting
him during your strong points (lvl 4/5/7) before he gets tanky and when you outplay his E. Also
be careful when fighting him as he does setup ganks quite easily post 6. This means that every
time you fight him when you do not know where the enemy jungler is, you could be killed easily
as his cc is almost guaranteed and with a high damage jungler it can mean certain death. I
would recommend rushing a phage into stinger against him as the HP from phage will help you
fight him over time and stinger will add to your true damage allowing you to get more autos in to
shred through his resistances.
Maokai Difficulty Rating: 6/10

This matchup is similar to the Malphite one. He can be pretty rough lvls 1-3 though because his
Q has high base damage early on and Irelia’s levels 1-3 are one of the weakest against melees.
It is best to just let him shove you in early on and wait until later levels (post level 4). The
difference from the malphite matchup is that he has no way of slowing your attack speed or
getting damage from building armor. This means that he will not hurt as much in later levels
especially once you get magic resist later on. You should be able to whittle him down with your
true damage over time and potentially kill him. This does not mean that he cannot kill you either.
He still has insane sustain and can effectively bully you if he keeps landing Q’s on you so it is
best to stay in his face post level 4 and not give him a chance to boss you around in lane. You
definitely want to rush phage in this matchup as it will help counter his base damage and allow
you to stick to him and get more auto attacks in when he is running away from you. It is also
recommended that you are careful when fighting him when you do not know where his jungler
is. He sets up ganks really well with his W (root) and can mean certain death is his jungler is a
high damage jungler. Whenever you fight him be careful for this, because junglers love to camp
Irelia.

Mordekaiser Difficulty Rating: 7/10

Although he is not played much, he can be a rough lane early on. He can bully you quite hard
so it is best to just let him push. The best time to fight him is when you do not have any minions
around you because that gives him a lot of trading power (increasing his shield) and thus
negating a good portion of your damage. I also recommend not fighting him until level 7. They
tend to build squishy so the more points that you have in your W the better. It is best to fight him
before he builds up his shield and before he pokes you down because he is quite the lane bully
if you let him. Hexdrinker may help a lot if you struggle in this lane, however, if you play it out
right, you should be able to beat him without it.

Nasus: Difficulty Rating: 5/10

Nasus can be quite annoying but I do not think he is a hard matchup. He will definitely outscale
you and make your life miserable with wither but he has exploitable weaknesses during the
laning phase. If you get even slightly ahead of him it can make his life miserable in lane as he
does not really have any cc to stop you from damaging him apart from wither. I like to let him
push levels 1-3 because he has to due to his Q stacking. Once it resets under my tower, it will
start pushing back to him and I use this opportunity given the minion advantage on my side, to
start going for heavy trades with him. Level 4 is preferred when you are going to be doing this
and it should be fairly easy to out trade him until level 6. Post level 6 you have to soften him up
before all inning. This is because his ult gives him a lot of HP and will make it hard to all in him
straight up. Chunk him down without using your ult with a EWQ rotation and then all in him with
your ultimate. I would not recommend fighting him post level 11 and after he gets 300+ stacks
on his q. Tabi are great for reducing his damage as well.
Pantheon: Difficulty Rating: 8/10

This guy is a pain in the ass. He will likely try to spam Q’s on you early on and make your life
miserable. I just give up a lot of cs and let him push the lane and farm safely under tower. Even
under tower he will still poke you down, so try to only go for the melees that are directly under
your tower. You should be focused on getting to level 6 safely because his ultimate does
nothing for him in an all in. After level 6 you can start beating him if you are over 90% hp and
before he pokes you down. Try to fight him before he does otherwise if you get poked down it
will be impossible to all in him. The later this lane goes, the easier it gets for you but he is still
going to be annoying due to his passive overall. Also be careful when using your Q because his
passive can block it and it will be wasted. I heavily recommend rushing tabi against him as his
base damage with penetration is too high otherwise.

Poppy: Difficulty Rating: 7/10

I find this matchup pretty annoying as it is really hard to deal with her until later levels. I
recommend avoiding fighting her until level 7-9+ because she gets a lot of free resistances and
has high base damage. Post level 7 you should have enough points in your W to cut right
through her, even if she builds tank items. I recommend saving your Q until she casts her W
(the shield around her) because it will stop your Q from going off. I highly recommend avoiding
walls and try to step on her shield (the one on the floor). You can deny her the shield by doing
this and avoid getting cc’ed yourself. It is a little hard to all in her because she can ult you away
so I recommend chunking her down a bunch before straight up all inning her. You can also flash
the ult if you feel like it will secure you the kill on her. This is a very fragile lane so if you fall
behind I recommend not trying to fight her at all as she will be too hard to kill and will pound you
with her base damage.

Renekton: Difficulty Rating: 8/10

This is one of the lanes in which you have to be very patient early on. I would recommend letting
him Q you once or twice at level 1 so that it gets the lane to push. Once the lane is pushing
keep your distance as he will likely hit level 2. Let him push you into the tower and farm
whatever you can. You should let him do this until the first back. The item you need before you
start fighting him is ninja tabi. I recommend rushing them and then assuming you did not fall
behind early on and kept up within 10 cs of his cs, you can start fighting him. The recommended
level for this is 7+ this is because with your ninja tabi his burst combo wont hurt that much. After
he does his combo you have to make sure that you can sit right on top of him and get your
sustained damage off. He might hurt in the start of the fight but if you keep going, you should
out damage him. Make sure to not overcommit with your W down as it will give him time for his
cooldowns to pass which will allow him to kill you. I recommend not fighting him if he gets ahead
of you unless you are getting ganks.
Riven: Difficulty Rating: 1-9/10

The difficulty of this lane depends on how good the Riven player is. If it is not a challenger riven
main, it is likely going to be a very easy lane. Play passive and E her if she jumps on you in your
creep wave and back away before she can get more of her combo on you. Farm under tower
and focus on making it to level 4-5 as healthy as you can. At these levels you have kill potential
over her. However, you have to time your abilities right for hers. A lot of them will typically try to
poke you by going in with Q, stunning you with W and then disengaging with the rest of her Q’s.
Since Riven’s abilities are quite long during this time, as soon as she goes for the poke combo,
stun her and start auto attacking her with your W. When she e’s away DO NOT Q her because
you will just waste your damage on her shield. What you want to do is wait it out (it only lasts
1.5s) and then Q her right after, denying her that extra bit of tankiness. The first item MUST be
tabi otherwise she can pretty much one shot you post level 6. It also negates a lot of damage
from her passive and just makes her life miserable until she gets a lot of penetration items. I do
not recommend trying to all in her once she has a lot of CDR as it will be really hard to get autos
in and she will be extremely tanky with her spammable shield. However, if you build an
advantage during levels 4-5 or after you get tabi, the lane will be a breeze as long as you do not
Q on her shield.

Rumble: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

This matchup tends to be rough until level 7 because Rumble can easily kite you and out trade
you early levels if he is in the yellow zone. He is quite weak if he is not in the yellow zone
though, so keep your mind open to the possibility of fighting him pre level 7 if he isn’t managing
his heat carefully. If he is managing it carefully, you have to be patient because a lot of the time
they will use their abilities on you when you jump on them and then overheat to get the bonus
damage on their autos, which will hurt a ton. I recommend rushing phage because movement
speed is really important in this lane and the extra hp will help you survive his damage. Post
level 7, just walk up to him or q a minion right beside him that is low enough, stun him and start
beating him with your W and hold on to your ult. Be careful when committing though and watch
your Hp before you Q at the end of your W. If he is under 30% HP and you are over 50%, it is
okay to Q him even if it does not finish him off. If you are about the same HP I recommend
backing away without Q’ing him. This is because if you get right on top of him and then start
backing away due to cooldowns, he can turn on you and start smashing you with his
flamespitter while being outside of your auto attack range. So after getting him under 50% HP,
wait for your cooldowns on QWE, and then all in him with your ultimate. Your damage comes
out a lot faster than his damage so you should win. You naturally beat him in a 1v1 unless he
gets ahead of you pre level 7. If you fall behind and you are struggling a hexdrinker will keep
you safe.
Shen: Difficulty Rating: 8/10

This is a hard one early on because he has extremely high base damage and he has the barrier
(W) that blocks auto attacks AND your Q. So he somewhat counters Irelia pretty hard early on.
Post level 6, you tend to have an advantage because his ultimate does nothing for him in an all
in with you. I recommend trying to bait out his W just by simply auto attacking him as a lot of
them will try to get an ability cycle on you as soon as they get an opportunity to. He will hurt
REALLY hard but once his W passes, you can turn on him and probably out damage him quite
hard. As long as you survive until level 6 without falling behind, you should be able to win this
lane. However, even then it will be extremely hard and a pain in the ass to have to rely on him to
mess up in order to do anything to him. Overall the more you play this lane the easier it will get
to manage, so don’t get discouraged if he beats you the first few times you lane against him.

Singed: Difficulty Rating: 4/10

I think that this matchup is fairly straightforward and easy but it can be annoying if he proxies
because Irelia has no wave clear and can’t really stop him from doing it. His level 1 is weaker
than yours because you can stun and auto him before he can react. He has to get his poison
trail on you which is why his level 2 is super strong. When he hits level 2, you have to be a lot
more careful when fighting him. His levels 2-3 are going to be stronger than yours so it’s usually
best to keep your distance. Once you hit level 4 you start beating him up until he gets a rlyais.
The only thing to keep in mind is that post level 6 you need to soften him up first before all
inning. If he pops his ult when you go to trade with him without using your ultimate, just wait it
out before all inning him. His ultimate makes him extremely tanky so if you can wait it out before
all inning him, you will be golden. Phage will help you a lot in this lane as movement speed is
extremely beneficial in this lane. Being able to auto him is necessary and for him, it is necessary
to be faster than you. So try to play around your minions with your Q resets in order to get more
auto attacks in. Do not try to kill him once he gets rlyais as his kite potential will be insane with it.

Sion: Difficulty Rating: 5/10

This lane tends to be pretty annoying but is, overall, an easy lane. He will bully you around early
but once you get to level 4 it shouldn’t be too hard to outplay him and kill him. When he charges
up his Q. Q him right away and move behind him. It should only take a step because whenever
you Q someone, it puts you right on top of them. If he misses his Q he will lose a lot of his
damage and you do not need to worry about his shield because it is easy to pop early on. He
will be really hard to kill once he gets items so when he completes his first major armor item, I
recommend not fighting him because by the time you chunk him 50%, his team will likely be
able to help him and you will be stuck in a rough situation since he sets up ganks extremely
well. I recommend rushing a phage and then building stinger to get more W empowered autos
off in order to cut through his tank items.
Swain: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

This matchup tends to get harder over time as he becomes extremely difficult to kill while doing
a lot of damage. Early on, you can try to cheese him with Q start and being in his face all the
time. This will allow you to hit level 2 and burn his flash. Overall you should have lane control
until level 6. It is also easy to dodge his W simply by having a minion ready in case he uses it.
Post level 6 all you need to do is fight him without your minions. If you have a big wave around
you, it will allow him to heal for a lot more, so it is recommended that you fight him when you do
not have any minions around. You should be able to kill him until he gets a lot of HP and zhonya
as long as you do not give him the opportunity to heal off of minions. Phage is a great first item
against him as the movement speed passive will help you stick to him and avoid his root (W).

Tahm Kench: Difficulty Rating: 10/10

He is impossible to kill as Irelia so there is not much to say other than to try and farm what you
can. You actually outscale him pretty hard in team fights so it isn’t too bad and your roaming
potential is much better than his. He is just way too tanky to be reliably killed as Irelia and his
base damage will tear you apart. Fortunately he can’t really stop you from farming and his
tongue isn’t too difficult to dodge. So if I were you, I wouldn’t be trying to kill him just passively
farming unless you get a gank or he is being dumb and fights you in your minions and misses
every ability during early levels.

Teemo: Difficulty Rating: 7/10

This is a pretty annoying lane but there are ways around him in order to do well against him.
Teemo is actually pretty vulnerable at level 1 if you can get in his face. If you let Teemo boss
you around in lane, he certainly will. So the key here is to boss him around first. If you get the
lane to push you should be able to get level 2 vs teemo. If not at least you will be able to shove
out the lane and take minimal harass because if you let him push you in early on he will get a lot
of harass on you as you farm under tower. I would avoid any all ins with him at lvl 2-3 unless
you have chunked him down considerably from before. Levels 4-5 are going to be in your favor,
just try to have more minions than him before you all in him. Since a lot of them take ignite, be
prepared to go for a heavy trade without all inning him and then tping back to lane in order to
shove him out or kill him. The simple counter to ignite is the fact that you get a lot more sustain
from being able to go back after a heavy trade and tp back to lane. Post level 6 I recommend
being a bit more careful when you all in him. Your level 6 will be stronger as long as he does not
get a good shroom set up against you. If you are really struggling, a hex drinker helps a lot
when trying to all in him.
Trundle: Difficulty Rating: 8/10

This tends to be a hard lane but you have a lot of opportunities to start beating him before level
6 and keeping that lead against him. He tends to have a strong level 1-3 vs most melees so this
is a time where you want to remain passive unless he tries to auto-Q you in your minion wave.
In this case then you may want to stun and auto him and back away. Once you safely make it to
level 4-5, you can start fighting him. It is best to soften him up first before you all in, as trundle
does sap your AD and will outtrade you as soon as your W goes on cooldown. Post level 6, the
same applies even more but it can be quite difficult to whittle him down because he can pillar
you in and kill you straight up. Always have minions ready to bladesurge to incase things go bad
if you try fighting him post level 6. He is also easy to gank so don’t be too afraid to wait for some
ganks post level 6. You also tend to have a much better roaming potential and ability to make
teleport plays so if you don’t kill him and it turns into a farm lane, it isn’t too bad. A bramble may
be very beneficial against him to counter his healing when he ults.

Tryndamere: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

This matchup tends to be difficult if he gets a good cheese off on you at levels 1-2. He hurts
quite a bit if he gets a few lucky crits once he has some rage so be prepared to E him as soon
as he jumps on you and back away. I tend to play this lane passive until the first back because
ninja tabi reduce a great deal of his damage as he is all auto-attack based. By the time you
complete ninja tabi you both should be post level 6. This means that you have to be very careful
when all inning him. I tend to soften him up first without using my ult as he cannot beat you in an
extended auto attack trade early on until he gets some items. Once I have him under 30% HP, I
all in him with my ult but I also have minions prepped in order to kite out his ult. The reason why
you want to kite it out is because he gets the most damage at this time and it lasts for 5
seconds. Letting him auto during this time even if you are much healthier will be quite bad as he
will likely kill you. So as soon as you get him to pop his ult start backing away, don’t just sit there
and let him auto, force him to chase you and in that case you can turn on him with your Q (you
should be saving it for this situation) and possibly kite him around with your minions. Overall it
will remain an easy lane as long as he didn’t build too much of an advantage early on and until
he gets 2-3 items. After he gets 2-3 items it becomes very difficult to 1v1 him unless you are
extremely ahead of him so at that point I would recommend not fighting him.

Urgot: Difficulty Rating: 4/10

I find this lane pretty easy but it will be rough until level 4-5. You should just be passively
farming early on and avoiding his poke as best as you can. Once you get to level 4-5 it is pretty
simple to all in him. Walk up to him or Q a minion right beside him and start trading with him. As
long as you sit in his face with W up, you should come out ahead. He will start winning the trade
initially but as long as you keep going, you should be able to crush him. Post level 6 the lane
gets even easier as your ultimate is way better than his in an all in. His ultimate is a low hp
execute so it almost does nothing for him in a straight up all in. I also recommend rushing tabi
against him as it will reduce a lot of his damage and allow you to stick to him due to the
movement speed. He does scale super hard so it may be quite difficult to 1v1 him after he gets
2 items (usually cleaver and frozen mallet) if you did not get ahead of him in lane.

Vayne: Difficulty Rating: 3/10

She can be rough early levels (lvl 1-3), so I recommend just being passive and getting whatever
minions you can. It does progressively get easier over time but if you wish to fight her before the
first back levels 4-5 are great assuming you remained healthy enough from before. Just Q a
minion right beside her and stun her and start autoing with your W on. She will likely condemn
you right after the stun wears off so try to not be near any walls and try to walk behind her so
that when she condemns you its towards her side of the map (denying her a way out). Then Q
her as soon as you are in range after her condemn and you should be able to come out on top.
Level 6+ is a little tricky due to her invisibility but as long as you jump on her and have your Q
up for her condemn it shouldn’t really be a problem. She will have a hard time dueling you until
2-3+ items. I would recommend rushing ninja tabi against her and having an upgraded sweeper
at level 9.

Vladimir: Difficulty Rating: 2/10

Vlad doesn’t really get played top lane much anymore because he is a weak top lane champion.
He will be able to bully you levels 1-3 but once you get to level 4 safely, it is all over for him. All
you have to do is be able to stick to him and get a lot of autos off. If you can do this there is no
way he can outtrade you. Vladimir is a poke/sustain type of champion until he can safely all in
you. As long as you do not let him do this, you will be good to go. He does naturally outscale
you after a certain point, so once he gets to 1-2 items, I would not recommend fighting him
unless you are extremely ahead of him. Post level 6 be careful when you are under 40% hp as it
is very easy for him to finish you off with his QER combo and then being able to safely get away
with his pool before you can react. The only way you can lose this lane is if he gets a lot of poke
on you early and starts zoning you. So it is okay to give up some minions early on, especially
when he can cast his empowered Q. Once you get to level 4+ it is fairly simple to beat him as
long as you can stay right on top of him which should be fairly easy to do if you use your Q
properly. If you struggle in this lane, hexdrinker is a perfect counter to his ultimate.

Wukong: Difficulty Rating: 4/10

He tends to be annoying early on as he has a lot of damage at lvl 1-2. If he gets right on top of
you at lvl 1, you can simply e and auto him and outtrade him with your minions. However, his
levels 2-3 are quite strong so it is recommended that you keep your distance until you get to
level 4. Once you get to level 4, try to go on him first by walking up and stunning him. Turn your
W on and start auto attacking him. A lot of them will use their Q and E on you and then Clone
away. It is simple to counter this by having your Q up and Q’ing him as soon as he is out of
stealth. He will chunk about ~40% of your hp with his Q and E (plus electrocute) but if you can
get on him right after he does this, you should win with your sustained damage. The same
applies post level 6 however make sure to not Q him while he is ulting because the knock up will
cancel your Q gapcloser. Ninja tabi are great against him and I highly recommend rushing them
against Wukong.

Yasuo: Difficulty Rating: 2/10

This lane is quite easy as long as you don’t get cheesed from level 1-3. He tends to outtrade
you pretty hard during this time because he is a crit champion. I recommend letting him push
and being focused on safely farming. Once you get to level 4+ it is simple to outtrade him as
long as he doesnt get to kite you around. Try to not overcommit with your W down because he
will certainly outtrade you in an auto attack battle. Save your Q as long as possible (just make
sure to use it before your W ends as it will do more damage with W up) so that you can prevent
him from kiting you around with minions. Post level 6 the same applies and you should be able
to crush him as long as you are able to stay on top of him until he gets 2+ items. Once he gets
2+ items, if you aren’t extremely ahead of him it is quite difficult to 1v1 him. Ninja tabi are great
in lane vs him as they will cut a lot of his damage away. Overall a very easy lane unless you get
cheesed early on.

Yorick: Difficulty Rating: 6/10

He is fairly hard to deal with once he gets some items because a lot of them will AFK push and
ignore you while they melt your towers away. However you can still beat him in lane. Levels 1-4
are going to be rough if you try to fight him, luckily he has to hit his wall on you to stop you from
running away from him which you can easily Q out of. After level 4 you can sit right in his face
and likely beat him until level 6. After level 6 I recommend softening him up if you can because
his ultimate will heal him for a lot and will likely allow him to beat you in the all in. As long as you
don’t try to all in him straight up, you should be fine in this lane. Ninja tabi will help a lot as he
hurts quite a bit with his Q so I recommend rushing these. It is going to be difficult at any stage
of the game to 1v1 him when his ult is up because he can lock you in and destroy you with his
ghouls.

5. Conclusion:

Thank you for reading my guide! I really appreciate all the support you guys have given me and
I hope you like this small form of gratitude for your support. I can’t wait to make another for the
new Irelia once she is out and I hope this guide will help you kick some ass as Irelia until then. It
was a pleasure to put out all my accumulated knowledge regarding Irelia into this guide and I
hope that I can do the same for the new Irelia once she is out!

Best Regards,
Irelia Carries U