Utility junglers are great for making sure your team gets ahead.
A good utility champion will have a modest combination of CC, shielding, and empowering effects for allies. Some picks will only possess one of these traits but they will prioritize it by maxing it out first.
Since the jungle is the role that has the most interaction with everyone on the map, junglers are often regarded as the “second supports”.
So by having the ability to provide value for your entire team and allow them to become carries, playing utility champions in the jungle always feels extremely rewarding.
I have made a list of the 7 best utility junglers in LoL, which should make it easy for you to pick out the right champ for your needs.
1. Nunu
Nunu is the king of utility junglers and one of my personal favorites. He is fun to play, and most importantly he can easily carry games. He provides insane value for his team since he can gank as soon as the game starts.
The early game with Nunu is relatively straightforward, and it should be very easy to get leads with him once you get some experience. The only thing you need to be doing is permanently scouting the map.
Once you are done with your first camp, you can look for ganking opportunities. And if you have watched the lanes while clearing your camp, you will have a good idea of where you can actually gank.
To make your scouting efficient, you need to know what to look for. These are signs of vulnerability such as the enemy being too pushed in, low HP, or low mana. You should also consider your own laners too.
Having laners with CC is often helpful for a jungler, but if you are playing Nunu, it is not a huge necessity. Nunu has great utility in form of CC, and passive that enhances his and the auto-attacks of his allies. This means that Nunu will synergize a lot with burst allies.
Another notable thing that sets Nunu apart from other junglers in LoL is his ability to take objectives quickly. I do not know a single utility jungler that can clear dragons and heralds faster than Nunu.
Read Also: Top 10 Most Fun Junglers
2. Ivern
Ivern is one of the most unique lol champions, and certainly the most unique utility jungler. And the thing that makes him stand out the most is his passive, Friend of the Forest. This passive has lore implications as well as game implications.
Since Ivern is almost a tree himself, he knows how it is to be a part of the jungle. So instead of killing monsters, he sets them free. He also gets to share the red and blue buffs with his allies. It’s a great reward for his efforts.
Not only does Ivern do a great job of supporting jungle life, but he is also a good support for allies. The amount of utility this jungler has is equal to or even higher than that of the average support champion.
His Q will root enemy champions and mark them, giving your teammates the ability to get closer to them with a single click. His W spawns a brush in every place you desire, and it can be great for setting up teamfights. A
Ivern’s E is a potent shield that also bursts and deals AoE damages around his target. And with his R he summons Daisy, a powerful pet that sticks to enemies and can knock them up with auto-attacks.
If all this was not enough, Ivern can and is actually encouraged to build support items that other utility junglers can only wish for. These are Moonstone for more healing, Shurelya’s for extra movement speed, and Chemtech Purifier for healing reduction.
All these items have great utility, and all of them will enhance ally stats. You also have the freedom to build any item an enchanter support would.
3. Sejuani
Unlike Ivern that goes around buffing everyone, Sejuani focuses more on completely disabling enemies. She’s a great utility jungler, full of mobility and CC. She has enough damage to battle carries and her CC is so strong that it almost leaves enemies with an AFK warning.
Sejuani’s first spell is a charge that knocks back minions and enemies. I like to use it for gap-closing when I’m ganking, but I also find it handy for passing through different obstacles and walls.
Casting her second spell gives you the opportunity to hit enemies twice with her weapon, which will slow your targets and stack your third ability if it is active. The third ability is a stun, but it requires you to stack it 5 times.
Finally, the most important ability of Sejuani is her R. It makes her throw her True Ice bola and it can stun and slow enemies. The opponents that are directly hit get stunned and the ones around will all get slowed.
Her R has great utility for ganks and team fights. This means you should be ganking all the time when it is up, and you will want to have it ready for team fights.
Overall, Sejuani’s abilities make her an amazing jungler overall. She has enormous ganking potential, high damage, fast clear, good sustain, and a bunch of CC. This makes her one of the most useful picks to help your team get ahead.
4. Vi
As you can notice, most high-utility junglers in LoL are AP, and I am not quite sure why. Luckily Riot has blessed us with a great AD jungle pick that makes up for the lack of other AD utility junglers.
Vi’s main strengths lie in her mobility, CC, and armor-shredding potential. Her Q is a spell that charges and makes her deliver a punch in a direction you choose. It is great for traveling around the map and going through terrains due to its low cooldown.
When it comes to CC, we are mainly talking about her ulti, although her Q has a short airborne effect too. Vi’s R is a spell that makes her charge at an enemy while being unstoppable. This makes it easy for you to execute ganks, and focus down enemy carries.
Another thing that makes Vi a good utility jungler is her W. It is a spell that procs after you hit an enemy 3 times consecutively. And when it does, it deals damage equal to a percentage of the target’s HP and shreds their armor.
This is really cool as it leaves the target more vulnerable to your entire team.
Read Also: 7 Best Junglers Against Tanks
5. Morgana
Morgana is an old utility jungler, which everyone seems to have forgotten about. She had a brief spike of popularity when she was buffed for the role specifically, but after getting nerfed a couple of times, she dipped never to be seen again.
I would argue that Morgana jungle is still a viable pick and that it can be great in many situations. I believe many people who stopped playing her never even understood how to play her properly, to begin with.
I am pretty sure you are familiar with Morgana’s kit. Her Q stun is infamously long, her W is a small pit that burns the enemies, and her E is a shield that blocks magic damage and spell effects.
Finally, her R is a close-range ability, which can chain and stun the whole enemy team simultaneously.
Essentially she has 3 utility spells and to succeed at playing Morgana, you will have to master using these three spells. You can work on landing more Qs and using E and R more efficiently in fights.
And if you manage to get good at Morgana, there’s really no stopping you.
Read Also: 5 Best Utility Top Laners in League of Legends
6. Amumu
Amumu is a utility jungler that does not provide any stats from his team. What he does provide though is an endless amount of stuns.
Amumu is a simple champion, and you don’t need to play him a lot in order to figure him out. This is simply due to his spells being very straightforward. He is even simpler than Morgana, with the only mechanical requirement being landing his Q well.
As Amumu, you’ll mostly want to focus on ganking. And you can start looking for cheeky ganks as soon as you level up your Q.
Amumu’s Bandage Toss can be leveled up early if you are sure about a gank. But generally, you will want to level it on level 3 because if you do it sooner, that will make it hard for you to clear the jungle camps. Bandage Toss costs mana and doesn’t deal too much damage to monsters. Not to mention that it only affects one target.
When it comes to his R usage, it is not much different from that of Sejuani and Morgana. Amumu’s R creates a huge circle which impairs all the enemies around him. To make the most out of it, you should use it in the middle of the teamfight, on as many enemies as possible.
In summary, Amumu is definitely one of the best utility junglers in LoL. The amounts of CC and tankiness he offers are hard to match. He is also really easy to play, which makes him a good beginner jungler.
Read Also: 7 Ultra Aggressive Junglers
Conclusion
Utility junglers are great for helping your teammates all around and allowing them to carry the game. But picking the best utility jungler will depend on your needs.
If you are someone who enjoys being a tank and dishing out tons of CC you can go for champions like Sejuani and Amumu. If you like having the most impact early on you can go for something like Nunu. And if you are looking for an off-meta pick, there is Morgana.
There are also options for a totally unique playstyle, such as Ivern. However, if you want an AD utility jungler, you can go for Vi.
Read Also: 5 Best Utility ADCs in League of Legends
