Elemental Reactions are one fo the core components of combat in Genshin Impact, but using them can be complicated, even tricky. At the highest level, you’ll be optimizing what reaction you want for a certain rotation, the timing you need, and a thousand other little details. In this guide, we’ll go over every Elemental Reaction and secondary reaction so you have a firm baseline to build from.
How Elemental Reactions Work in Genshin Impact
Every Elemental Skill and Burst your characters can use, and most enemy types in the game, have a particular elemental affinity. When either you or they are hit by a particular elemental attack, you’re liable to apply that element to them, allowing either of you to apply a second element, causing a reaction. There are seven elements in Genshin Impact:
- Anemo — Wind.
- Cryo — Frost.
- Dendro — Nature.
- Electro — Lightning.
- Geo — Earth.
- Hydro — Water.
- Pyro — Fire.
Let’s say you’re fighting a random goblin-like Hilichurl, and you hit them with a Pyro element attack. You apply Pyro to them, which you’ll see as the Pyro sigil above their head. Let’s say you then hit that Pyro-afflicted enemy with Hydro. The instant you do so, you’ll trigger the Vaporize reaction, clearing both the Pyro and Hydro afflictions and dealing extra damage from the reaction.
That same process can occur when any of two of the seven elements react together, but there’s also a separate set of reactions that only occur once you’ve activated one of the base versions. The easiest to understand is Melt. If you apply both Hydro and then Cryo to an enemy, they’ll be Frozen. Then, if you hit them with Pyro, the Frozen condition will clear when Melt activates, dealing heavy damage.
A couple of other wrinkles: some elements don’t react, allowing you to use attacks of the unreacting attack without clearing the element. Additionally, Anemo doesn’t apply an elemental effect to enemies. It instead specializes in enhancing currently applied elements with its Swirl reaction, which makes characters like Kazuha so strong.
In short:
- Most elemental attacks and elemental enemies apply their keyed element as an affliction when they hit a target.
- Combining two elements usually causes a reaction that creates a specific effect (i.e. Vaporize between Hydro and Pyro).
- Some reactions can activate secondary reactions that require a third elemental input (i.e. Melt following the interaction of Hydro and Cryo). These additional reactions can be more powerful than standard ones.
List of Elemental Reactions in Genshin Impact
The list of Elemental Reactions in Genshin Impact is fairly expansive, so for the sake of brevity and completeness, I’ll list each of them in their own section with a brief description of their effect.
Pyro Elemental Reactions
- Pyro + Cryo: Melt — Additional damage.
- Pyro + Electro: Overloaded — Additional damage plus an AoE.
- Pyro + Hydro: Vaporize — Additional damage.
- Pyro + Geo: Crystalize — Grants an elemental shield.
- Pyro + Anemo: Swirl — Collects Pyro damage and spreads it to all affected by Swirl.
- Pyro + Dendro: Burning — Pyro damage over time.
Cryo Elemental Reactions
- Cryo + Pryo: Melt — Additional damage.
- Cryo + Electro: Super-conduct — Cryo AoE damage and lowers enemy resistances by 50%.
- Cryo + Hydro: Freeze — Freezes enemies in place.
- Cry + Geo: Crystalize — Grants an elemental shield.
- Cryo + Anemo: Swirl — Collects Pyro damage and spreads it to all affected by Swirl.
- Cryo + Dendro: No reaction.
Here are the additional Cryo reactions:
- Frozen + Geo or a Blunt damage attack: Shatter — Increases subsequent attack critical rate.
- Frozen + Pyro: Melt — Additional damage.
- Frozen + Electro: Superconduct.
- Frozen + Anemo: Swirl.
Electro Reactions
- Electro + Cryo: Super-Conduct.
- Electro + Pyro: Overloaded.
- Electro + Hydro: Electro-Charged — Electro damage over time after initial burst.
- Electro + Geo: Crystalize.
- Electro + Anemo: Swirl.
- Electro + Dendro: Quicken — Applies a Quicken aura but deals no damage. Aura degrades over time.
Here are the additional Electro reactions:
- Quicken + Dendro: Spread — Applies a flat damage bonus to the attack.
- Quicken + Electro: Aggravate — Applies a flat damage bonus to the attack.
- Quicken + Pyro: Burning.
- Quicken + Hydro: Bloom — Creates a Dendro Core that explodes after a duration.
Hydro Reactions
- Hydro + Cryo: Freeze.
- Hydro + Pyro: Vaporize.
- Hydro + Electro: Electro-Charged.
- Hydro + Geo: Crystalize.
- Hydro + Anemo: Swirl.
- Hydro + Dendro: Bloom.
Here are the additional Hydro reactions:
- Frozen + Pyro: Melt.
- Frozen + Electro: Super-Conduct.
- Frozen + Geo or a Blunt damage attack: Shatter.
- Frozen + Anemo: Swirl.
- Bloom + Electro: Hyperbloom — Detonates the Dendro Core and sends the energy as a beam to damage the enemy.
- Bloom + Pyro: Burgeon — Causes the Dendro Cores to explode in a large radius, damaging you and your enemies.
Anemo Reactions
- Anemo + Cryo: Swirl.
- Anemo + Pyro: Swirl.
- Anemo + Hydro: Swirl.
- Anemo + Electro: Swirl.
- Anemo + Geo: No reaction.
- Anemo + Dendro: No reaction.
Here are the additional Anemo reaction effects:
- Pyro, Cryo, and Electro all Swirl to create a damaging AoE of their Swirled element.
- Hydro Swirl does no damage but spreads the Wet (Hydro-afflicted) condition.
Geo Reactions
- Geo + Cryo: Crystalize.
- Geo + Pyro: Crystalize.
- Geo + Hydro: Crystalize.
- Geo + Electro: Crystalize.
- Geo + Anemo: No Reaction.
- Geo + Dendro: No Reaction.
One additional Geo reaction:
- Frozen + Geo or a Blunt damage attack: Shatter.
Dendro Reactions
- Dendro + Cryo: No reaction.
- Dendro + Pyro: Burning.
- Dendro + Hydro: Bloom.
- Dendro + Electro: Quicken.
- Dendro + Anemo: No Reaction.
Here are the additional Dendro reactions:
- Quicken + Dendro: Spread.
- Quicken + Electro: Aggravate.
- Quicken + Pyro: Burning.
- Quicken + Hydro: Bloom.
- Bloom + Electro: Hyperbloom.
- Bloom + Pyro: Burgeon.
How Elemental Resonance Works in Genshin Impact
On top of Elemental Reaction, there are also Elemental Resonances, which activate when two or more members of your party are of the same element, like Electro, for instance. Sadly, having more than two characters of the same element doesn’t apply a Super Resonance or anything like that, but you can have two Resonances active with two sets of characters of the same element.
You can check a character’s element easiest in the party select screen, as they’ll have the symbol above their heads there. Character designs tend to feature their element as well, so red-clothed characters are Pyro, purple and pink are Electro, and so on.
Once you have enough characters, you’ll need to know that the resonances are:
- Geo + Geo: Enduring Rock — Improves your party’s resistance to interruption and increases your attack damage by 15% when protected by a shield.
- Pyro + Pyro: Fervent Flames — Decreases the impact Cryo has on your party by 40% and increases attack by 25%.
- Hydro + Hydro: Soothing Water — Decreases the impact Pyro has on your party by 40% and increases healing by 30%
- Anemo + Anemo: Impetuous Winds — Lowers your party’s stamina consumption by 15%, increases movement speed by 10%, and shortens Skill CD by 5%.
- Electro + Electro: High Voltage — Decreases the impact Hydro has on your party by 40% and Superconduct, Overloaded, and Electro-Charged have a 100% chance to generate an Electro Elemental Particle.
- Cryo + Cryo: Shattering Ice — Decreases the impact Electro has on your party by 40% and increases critical rate by 15% towards enemies impacted by Cryo.
- Any Four Unique Elements: Protective Canopy — Increases all Elemental resistance by 15%.
And that wraps up everything you need to know about elemental combos in Genshin Impact. Be sure to keep checking back in for more tips, and if this guide helped you out, don’t forget to visit the Genshin Impact guides hub for more.
