The 10 Best X-Men Costumes Of All Time (#1 Will Never Be Beaten)

The X-Men have grown a lot over the years. When they started, they were the premiere Marvel teen team but they didn’t really catch on, especially after Stan Lee and Jack Kirby left. Down the road, Marvel would try to revitalize them, and they did that by changing their costumes. The first X-Men costume change was a major success, and over the years, the House of Ideas has used this idea over and over again. The X-Men’s growing popularity meant that the publisher put their best artists on the books, and those creators gave the men and women of X some of the best costumes ever.

The X-Men have some iconic costumes, supplied by some of the greatest artists to ever pick up a pencil. However, even among those amazing costumes, there are some that rise to the top. These are the ten best X-Men costumes of all time and number one is a classic that can’t be beat.

10) Wolverine’s Modern Yellow and Blue

Wolverine is the best there is at what he does and what he does is wear excellent costumes. He’s had some amazing ones over the years, with many fans loving his classic yellow and blue costume. However, the second yellow and blue costume, first appearing in Astonishing X-Men (Vol. 3) #1, is the easily the best of his yellow and blue threads. It did away with the trunks and gave the ensemble a more modern, uniform look. It felt more heroic in a lot of ways than his earlier, more famous yellow and blue fighting togs, and is an iconic look for the character.

9) Gambit’s First Costume

Gambit quickly became a superstar, and a big reason for that was his first costume. The trench coat and head sock are classic ’90s, and the black pants and purple top are awesome. His costumes was both flashy and demure at the same time. It was what someone who wanted you to know that they were more than meets the eye would wear, working equally well for sneaking as it did showing he was no one to mess with. Some heroes get lucky and have a great costume right from the beginning, and Gambit was one of those heroes who lucked out. He’s worn other costumes, but all of them owe their existence to this classic number.

8) Colossus’s Original Costume

Colossus was the X-Men’s resident bruiser, but he was also one of the team’s most sensitive souls. On the battlefield, he’s all about the fight, keeping his friends safe and breaking his foes, so he needs an intimidating look. His original costume did a fantastic job of establishing who he was. The one piece red and yellow number was eye-catching and showed off the physical power of the hero. Instead of pants, his thigh-high boots covered up his beefy legs, all while showing a little bit of “skin”. It’s the perfect costume for a beefcake like him, showing how tough he is while also showing off his looks.

7) Nightcrawler’s Original Costume

Nightcrawler is one of the X-Men’s greats, and he’s mostly looked the part (there was a more pirate-inspired costume in the mid to late ’90s that wasn’t great). Much like Colossus and Storm, Kurt Wagner was designed by Dave Cockrum, one of the most unsung costume designers in comics. He gave Kurt the perfect costume, a black, red, and white number that had some nice contrasts while showing how inhuman he looked. It fit him as a character like a glove, a costume that told you everything you needed to know about him just by looking.

6) Jim Lee’s Rogue Costume

Rogue had the most unique powers on the team for long time. Her ability to absorb the powers of others made her clutch in combat, but the drawbacks – she absorbed the lifeforce of those she touched and could do a lot of damage accidentally – made it so she mostly kept covered up. She’s had some cool full body costumes over the years, but the best one came from the 1991 X-Men reboot, when artist Jim Lee gave her a new costume. The yellow and green body suit with the leather jacket became her most iconic look, and is a favorite of nearly every fan of the character.

5) Magneto’s Red and Purple Costume

Magneto was once the X-Men’s greatest foe, but that has changed in recent years. He’s been a member of the team for years now, and has changed his costume several times. However, the best one is still the classic purple and red costume that he was introduced in. The iconic helmet and flowing cape are the centerpieces, giving the hyperbolic man the perfect look. It was spruced up over the years, with the helmet getting perfected and a lot of the details getting changed to and fro, but it has basically been the same until about 2012. It’s the costume that everyone recognizes him and it helped make him an icon over the years.

4) Jean Grey’s Original Phoenix Costume

Jean Grey is the patron saint of the X-Men, the team’s first woman and one of its most powerful members. She left the team for a time after Krakoa captured the originals, but was sucked back into the group during a mission to space, saving them when their ship was crashing to the Earth. They thought she died, but she rose from the waves in his amazing costume. It took the colors of her Marvel Girl miniskirt and mask and went wild, creating a regal look that fit her new standing in the Marvel Universe perfectly. She looked like a queen, and it remains one of her best looks.

3) Storm’s Original Costume

Storm is the goddess of the X-Men, and has worn many of the greatest costumes in the team’s history. Many people would pick the silver ’90s costume that she wore in X-Men: The Animated Series as the most iconic, but her best costume, and the one that stands the furthest out in the team’s history, is her original costume. It’s basically a bathing suit with one of the best capes in comics and a perfect head piece, with awesome thigh high boots. The costume managed to be both regal and sexy at the same time, and inspired aspects of every costume that came after it.

2) Cyclops’s Second Costume

Cyclops has had fantastic costumes over the years, but there is definitely one that rises above the rest. It’s not the ’90s-erriffic blue and yellow number with the pouches and the bandoliers, but his second costume, the one he designed as a teen. This navy blue and yellow number followed the design conventions of its time, with trunks and pirate boots, but there’s something about the brilliant simplicity of it that makes it such a perfect look. It’s an understated masterpiece, a costume that will always be in style.

1) Wolverine’s Brown and Orange

As mentioned above, there are lots of people who prefer Wolverine’s blue and yellow costume, but it was eclipsed quicker than most realize. Artist John Byrne didn’t like the garish colors and wanted to make the hero look more like his namesake, so he gave him the amazing brown and orange costume. This feels more like a costume that Logan would wear than his original. It’s savage and animalistic, yet it has just the right look to show that you could trust him. It’s an undisputed classic, a costume that will never be topped.

What’s your favorite X-Men costume? Leave a comment in the comment section below and join the conversation on the ComicBook Forums!

10 Best X-Men Comics Of All Time (#1 Will Never Be Matched)