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Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield and Tom Holland all played incredible live-action Spider-Men, but which one packs more firepower than the other? Which Spider-Man is the strongest? Each section will break down each Spider-Man’s feats based on raw strength, intelligence and fighting ability. By the end, you’ll know who the best Spider-Man is.
Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man — Raimi Trilogy
Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man is often considered the strongest live-action version, but not necessarily in the video games or comics. He has many impressive achievements.
Raw Strength
Capable of lifting 20 tons without webs, Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man is crazy strong. In Spider-Man 3, he caught a concrete slab Sandman threw into the air, and concrete can weigh several tons. He’s also caught several cars and falling structures.
But his most impressive display of strength was in Spider-Man 2, when he stopped a runaway subway train traveling at 80 MPH. It’s likely that the train, which had 6 cars and hundreds of passengers, weighed around 300,000 pounds. A University of Leicester study determined he exerted 300,000 newtons of force, about 67,500 pounds across 12 webs for 46 seconds. Each arm carried 12 tons of load while his body absorbed the deceleration stress.
In No Way Home, Maguire was able to stop Tom Holland’s downward thrust when attempting to use the Green Goblin’s glider to kill him, showing Maguire has the strength to stop Holland.
Web Shooter
Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man is the only live-action version to date to have organic webs. He can shoot webs from his wrist without a device, giving him an advantage since he doesn’t need to restock the shooter. The webs match the toughness of actual spider webs, with a strength of 3.12 gigapascals and toughness of 500 megajoules per cubic meter.
That said, his web stops working when he’s under stress. In Spider-Man 2, his webs failed several times during his identity crisis, causing him to fall from several hundred feet into the air and onto piping. Despite this, he was barely hurt, which is good news for his durability.
Spidey Sense
His spidey sense is the least impressive out of the three, though still impressive. He has this power right away, and it allows him to dodge projectiles in close quarters. His spidey sense does fail when he’s emotionally compromised, which doesn’t happen with the others.
Fighting Abilities
The most interesting thing about each Spider-Man is that they fight in different ways. Since Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man is a brute, he relies on his strength and endurance. He was able to overpower the Green Goblin just with punches. When fighting Dr. Octopus, he stopped the fusion reactor from exploding by tearing through metal supports with his bare hands. His fighting style was about absorbing damage and overpowering opponents.
You could say he was the most experienced and dedicated fighter, as he sacrificed nearly everything to take up the mantle. But you could also argue that Holland sacrificed more. He defeated Green Goblin, Dr. Octopus, Sandman, Venom and New Green Goblin.
Even with his strength, Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man is also intelligent, as he used Venom’s power against him to defeat him.
Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man — Amazing Series
Andrew Garfield is the least fleshed out of the Spider-Men, but he’s also the least impressive. Garfield wasn’t even in the running when it came to the most powerful Spider-Man.
Raw Strength
Andrew Garfield is the weakest Spider-Man, as he can only lift about 10 tons without webs. Still, he possesses strength that any human would kill for. In the Amazing Spider-Man, for example, he held a burning car over the Williamsburg Bridge with one arm while rescuing a child trapped inside. The car likely weighed around 3,000 pounds, as that’s an average car’s weight.
In The Amazing Spider-Man 2, he caught an NYPD Crown Victoria patrol car that was flying through the air. These patrol cars weigh about 4,000 pounds, though this varies by model. He caught it with both hands and set it down gently.
Web Shooter
While Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man does design and build his own web shooter, the director downplayed Spider-Man’s intelligence in the Amazing series, as he doesn’t make his own web formula. The web formula came from his father’s research at OSCORP. The shooters attach to his wrists under his suit and fire pressurized web fluid via nozzle controls.
It’s unclear how strong the webs are, but they can hold at least 4,000 pounds. This seems to be in line with other media, like Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Marvel’s Spider-Man.
Garfield’s web shooters may have the smallest capacity when compared to Holland’s and may also be the least durable. In The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Electro zapped and fried one of his web shooters, causing it to malfunction. This forced him to rely on one web shooter.
If his web shooter breaks or the web shooter fluid runs out, he has to make new batches, and that makes him vulnerable. He seems to run out of fluid a lot in the series, and maybe this is to build tension, but the point stands. The mechanical design does mean he can modify his shooters for different web types. These include ones that create wide nets or electricity.
Spidey Sense
Andrew Garfield’s spidey sense, at least as it’s depicted in the movies, makes the world around him slow down. He can dodge lightning strikes from Electro at close range, which is incredibly impressive because a return lightning strike flies at 200 million MPH. He has demonstrated reflexes well beyond those of the other Spider-Men. It also guided him through a hail of bullets and had him do flips and jumps to disorientate opponents.
Fighting Abilities
He is the fastest and most agile Spider-Man, but not particularly strong. He was outmatched in strength by all of his opponents, especially Rhino. In terms of raw strength, he had no chance against Rhino. Even so, Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man defeated Lizard, Electro, Green Goblin and the Rhino. If he had more movies, maybe we would have seen cooler fights.
Based on his previous matchups, this Spider-Man relied more on his intelligence and agility in fights. For example, when fighting the Lizard, Garfield exploited his weakness to cold temperatures. He also overloaded Electro’s body with too much electricity.
Tom Holland’s Spider-Man — Marvel Cinematic Universe
Tom Holland’s Spider-Man has the luxury of having multiple movies, so we have a better idea of what he’s capable of. But how does he match up against Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man?
Raw Strength
In terms of raw power, Tom Holland is the second strongest, able to lift around 12.5 tons without webs. Despite him not being as strong as Tobey Maguire, he managed a feat that tops him. In Spider-Man: Homecoming, he held the Staten Island Ferry together after Vulture cut it in half. The ferry included passengers, cargo and cars. It’s unclear how much the ferry weighed in the movie, but estimates based on the real thing put it at 4,570 tons, able to hold 4,500 passengers.
With the ferry cut in half and Holland needing to hold it with his webs, he exerted approximately 1,100 tons of force. While his webs strained and many snapped, he slowed the separation before Iron Man arrived. The stress left him extremely tired.
In Avengers: Infinity War, he caught Cull Obsidian’s warhammers mid-swing with both hands and stopped the weapon completely. He stopped it without visible strain, which is impressive because Iron Man was laid flat on his back from the swing’s impact. In Avengers: Endgame, he did this again while Cull Obsidian was attacking Tony Stark. This could show that over the course of several movies, his endurance increased, leaving him less tired.
In Spider-Man: Far From Home, Holland held structural debris from a collapsing bell tower with his webs. The concrete and stone were likely several tons, maybe 1,700 tons, but this is based on the size of the clock tower and the approximate weight of concrete. Based on physics, the force needed to stop the collapse would be about 10,000 tons.
Web Shooters
Like Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man, Tom Holland’s Spider-Man uses web shooters. However, Holland designed his in high school. He also uses his own web fluid formula, making him the most intelligent Spider-Man. The shooters are small devices worn on his wrist that fire web fluid from pressure-sensitive triggers in his palms.
When Tony Stark recruited him to the Avengers, he also upgraded his suit with enhanced web shooter controls that were linked to AI assistants. With the Iron Spider suit, he had mechanical spider legs that emerged from the sides, but no change to the web shooter. In No Way Home, Holland ran out of his web fluid, so he relied on hand-to-hand combat. The capacity for his webs seems larger than Garfield’s, as Holland doesn’t run out of webs as often.
Spidey Sense
Spidey sense seems to be present from Tom Holland Spider-Man’s first appearance in Civil War, as he was able to catch Captain America’s shield. Unlike the other live-action Spider-Men, though, his spidey sense develops over time. We first see a visual representation of it in Avengers: Infinity War, when his arm hair stands up. This alerted him to the attack that would follow.
In the final battle of Avengers: Endgame, his spidey sense was fully awakened. In No Way Home, his senses reached full strength. He was able to fight three enemies at once while he was blinded by darkness. He now seems to trust his sense completely.
Fighting Abilities
Tom Holland’s Spider-Man’s fighting style combines acrobatics and technology. He uses his web combinations to trick and immobilize opponents. He takes a tactical but improvisational approach to most fights, relying on his intelligence rather than his experience. But by Spider-Man: Brand New Day, he’s a seasoned veteran in combat.
Holland defeated Vulture and Mysterio, along with many, many other villains, making him the most prolific Spider-Man. In No Way Home, Holland was actually able to beat up the Green Goblin faster and with more force than Maguire did in his movie.
One thing to note is that he caught Bucky’s vibranium arm mid-punch in Civil War with one hand. That arm is strong enough to damage Iron Man’s armor. So, even in his first appearance, he was confident enough in his powers to tango with the greats.
The Verdict — Who Is the Strongest Spider-Man?
Andrew Garfield isn’t in the running, let’s make that clear. It’s between Tobey Maguire and Tom Holland. While conventional wisdom would say Tobey Maguire is the strongest in raw power, based on all the evidence, Tom Holland is the strongest overall Spider-Man.
While he can’t lift as much as Maguire, his ingenuity, intelligence and experience make Holland the strongest overall. And with more movies coming out, he may lift more than Maguire.
