Most Pokémon players prefer to use fast Pokémon, but there are a lot of ways to move quickly than using partners with a high Speed stat. One of the best ways to move fast is through moves with Speed Priority, which ignore a Pokémon’s stats so that it can attack at the start of a turn.

These moves are incredibly complex, but there’s a lot of variety in the kinds of effects you can have, and they can help turn slower Pokémon into unexpectedly speedy attackers. There are tons of these moves in Pokémon Sword & Shield, and they’re learnable by several types of Pokémon through leveling up, items, and breeding.

13 Quick Attack & Extreme Speed

One of the oldest and most well-known Speed Priority moves is Quick Attack, a Normal-type move that nearly all young Pokémon learn. It’s incredibly basic and deals a small 40 damage, but is a great option for anyone who needs a quick final hit to finish off weak opponents.

What’s less common is Extreme Speed, an evolution of this move that first came in Pokémon Gold & Silver. Very few Pokémon in Galar that can learn it, but it’s usually a superior choice as it deals twice as much damage as Quick Attack.

12 Water Shuriken

Water Shuriken is one of the newest moves with Speed Priority, originally being the signature move of Greninja in Pokémon X & Y. The only other Pokémon that can currently learn this move in Galar is Accelgor, who can use it to strike first and hit an opponent anywhere between two and five times.

Due to its variance, however, this move is hardly useful compared to other priority moves. Accelgor also happens to be one of the fastest Pokémon in all of Galar, meaning an exceptionally fast move is fairly useless anyway.

11 Bide

Bide is perhaps one of the most useless moves in the series, halting the user from attacking for two turns before dealing twice the damage received over that time. Many people know it as Brock’s pointless TM in Pokémon Red & Blue, but this weak attack is oddly a priority move.

This means you can start storing damage immediately, preventing your opponent from planning around it on the first turn it’s used. Taking two turns off of damage is quite risky, but its ability to start immediately makes it slightly more usable.

10 Elemental Quick Attacks

There are a lot of very similar priority moves, most of which debuted in Pokémon Diamond & Pearl to add variety in each Pokémon’s move pool. One large category of these new moves includes a series of Quick Attack clones with the same power, accuracy, and effect, but with different elemental types.

This includes moves like Ice Shard for Ice-types, Shadow Sneak for Ghost-types, Aqua Jet for Water-types, and several more. Fighting-type Pokémon learn the widest varieties of these attacks, receiving multiple Fighting-type options like Vacuum Wave and Mach Punch alongside Steel-type alternatives like Bullet Punch.

9 Accelerock

The rarest of Pokémon Sword & Shield’s clones of Quick Attack is Accelerock, a move that was unavailable until the Isle of Armor DLC was released. This move is yet another Quick Attack clone, but it’s unique by being exclusive to the dusk and midday forms of Lycanroc.

This is quite a shame given how Lycanroc is already one of the fastest Rock-type Pokémon in the game, but is still a fine utility in certain circumstances. It also has the traditional standard accuracy rating of Quick Attack, making it slightly more reliable than moves like Rock Slide and Stone Edge.

8 Sucker Punch

Unlike the other Speed Priority moves mentioned earlier, Sucker Punch stands out in terms of complexity. It might seem powerful thanks to its high base power of 70, but it will always fail if the opponent isn’t using a damaging move that turn.

Predicting whether Sucker Punch will work can be a complex task against the in-game trainers, but it’s even more challenging in competitive and online battles. It takes practice to use effectively and is potentially quite powerful, but failing to attack when your foe uses an item or status move can often lead to a loss.

7 Fake Out & First Impression

Another pair of conditional Speed Priority moves come in the form of Fake Out and First Impression. Both of these are quick different, each being common with Normal and Bug-types respectively, but will only hit if it’s the first move used by a Pokémon upon being sent out. Otherwise, they will fail to hit the opponent.

Fake Out deals as much damage as Quick Attack, but will cause the target to flinch on impact, eliminating their turn. First Impression, meanwhile, has an impressive 90 base damage, making it the strongest priority move in the game.

6 Grassy Glide

There’s one other exceptionally powerful damage move with Speed Priority in Pokémon Sword & Shield, and that is the new Grassy Glide attack. This Grass-type move is just as powerful as Sucker Punch, but will only hit with Speed Priority if the user’s standing on Grassy Terrain.

The key difference to Sucker Punch is that this move won’t just fail if the condition isn’t meant, as Grassy Glide will hit with normal speed in any other terrain. It isn’t too hard to meet the condition thanks to Dynamax, as most Grass-type moves will turn into Max Overgrow and provide the terrain upon dealing damage.

5 Protection Moves

Besides Quick Attack, the most frequently-used move with Speed Priority is likely Protect, which shields a Pokémon from damage for the turn. This effect would be mostly useless on Pokémon that move slowly, so to ensure its effectiveness, it will take place right at the start of the turn it’s used.

However, Protect is not the only move with this caveat, as there are several protection moves with variant effects that all have the same degree of Speed Priority. This includes Wide Guard, Spiky Shield, Max Guard, Magic Coat, King’s Shield, and many more. Simply put, if it says it’ll protect a Pokémon for one turn, it will usually be a priority move.

4 Feint

Feint is a much stranger Speed Priority move, essentially acting as an anti-priority move. This attack is designed to always hit foes that defend themselves with the previously-mentioned protection moves and eliminates their shield for the rest of the turn.

To do this, Feint has to be faster than attacks like Quick Attack, but must be slower than moves like Protect to ensure the shield is broken. For most trainers, though, it’s simply an upgraded version of Quick Attack.

3 Follow Me & Rage Powder

Much like protection moves, many unusual battle effects need to happen at the start of the turn to be useful. One of these is Follow Me, a move that causes all attacks to be redirected to the user for the turn, and is commonly learned by defensive Normal and Fairy-types.

Rage Powder is an identical move, except more common among Grass-types like Tangrowth and Amoonguss. If you’re in a Double Battle and don’t want your fragile Pokémon getting knocked out easily, these moves are a great way to make sure they get a turn.

2 Baby-Doll Eyes

Baby-Doll Eyes does quite a similar job to Protect by lowering an opponent’s attack by one stage. While it isn’t as strong as negating it, its Speed Priority gives it an edge over similar stat-decreasing moves like Growl.

Despite being a Fairy-type move, this attack is primarily learned by Normal-types, particularly the Eevee family which has many members who learn it through leveling up. The Eeveelutions are also some of the best users of this move, as many are defensive tanks that don’t have much speed.

1 Ally Switch

The last priority move in the game is a greatly underrated one, the unusual defensive move Ally Switch. This move originally just swapped the places of the user and its partner in a Double Battle.

In later games, however, it was given Speed Priority, meaning the other trainer’s attacks will hit always hit the opposite targets. As a result, this move can make some teams unstoppable by making unpredictable scenarios for opponents.

NEXT: Pokémon: The 10 Best Egg Moves