Dash

Mario dashing in Melee

Cloud dashing in Smash 4

A dash is a form of ground movement faster than walking. The dash is a character's top sustainable speed barring the use of advanced techniques. It is performed by tapping sideways on the control stick. The player's character enters their initial dash animation, in which they change directions with very little lag, and then proceeds to their running animation. In Super Smash Bros. Brawl, a character attempting to dash can trip instead. In Super Smash Bros. 4 and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, dashing off a platform will cause the character to perform a short flipping animation, and landing on another platform while continuing to hold the control stick in that direction will allow them to continue dashing. While dashing, characters can also perform their dash attack, shield, or jump. The Bunny Hood and Super Mushroom items increases a character's running speed. in Ultimate, the "Impact Run" Spirit ability allows the fighter to deal damage while running.

Initial dash

The initial dash is the first part of a character's dash, during which a character gains a quick burst of speed before transitioning into their run. During a character's initial dash, they accelerate significantly more quickly than they do while in their run animation, and this applies to the dash turnaround animation as well, allowing a fighter to turn around relatively quickly. In addition, during an initial dash, certain options that are normally available to the player cannot be performed, such as shielding, and in Ultimate, canceling into a tilt. Initial dashes have their own speed limits independent from a character's regular running speed, and these speeds are rarely the same as a character's running speed.

The concept of the initial dash is vital to many forms of ground movement, especially in Super Smash Bros. Melee, such as dash-dancing, fox-trotting, and pivoting. However, from Brawl onwards, the window for turning around during an initial dash does not last for the entire dash, instead only lasting for the first 6 frames, making dash-dancing much harder, and fox-trotting is also not entirely dependent on the length of the initial dash. An example of this is Sheik and Roy in Smash 4, who have nearly identical fox-trots despite Roy's initial dash being over twice as long as Sheik's (17 frames to her 8 frames). In Ultimate, a pivot dash can be performed at the end of a character's initial dash, similarly to dash dancing, but with much more restrictive timing, and with the additional 2 frames of startup that pivot dashes have in Ultimate.

Other terminology

The turn-around animation plays when the character attempts to change directions after their initial dash. Unlike in an initial dash, attempting to turn around during a run can take as long as 51 frames (Marth in Melee), and before Smash 4, it can only be canceled with a jump (and therefore up smash and up special) or reversed side special. However, from Brawl onwards, canceling the jump with an up smash or up special also reverses its direction, and in Smash 4, the turn-around animation can be canceled with a reversed forward tilt or forward smash. In Ultimate it can be canceled with all ground moves, doing which will make characters keep some momentum from the animation. Coupled with the universal speed buffs, this allows characters like Chrom and Sheik with high ground speed but laggy dash attacks to use running forward tilt as an approach option. Any shield input is also ignored during this animation, and due to the way the Ultimate input system works, pressing the grab button will produce a 1 frame attack input, allowing for uncharged smash attacks.

A stutter step is the term for when a character begins to dash but stops almost immediately, often used for positioning and mind games. Along with merely stopping, characters can also dash cancel via a variety of other methods.

The skidding animation plays when the character stops running after their initial dash and attempts to stop their momentum. The length of this animation varies between characters, but it can also vary depending on the speed the character is running at relative to their maximum running speed. Shorter skidding animations are preferred, particularly in Smash games where dash canceling is impossible. For example, in Smash 4, Bowser, Charizard, Ganondorf, and Lucario have extremely short skidding animations even after stopping at maximum speed, which effectively allows them to do any attack out of their runs with little lag in between, or even seamlessly begin another dash in the opposite direction. This animation can only be canceled with a jump, or with an item pick up if one is nearby. Its first few frames can also be canceled into any special move.

In Super Smash Bros. Melee

Initial dash

Because the initial dash animation translates into the running animation much later than in Brawl, it is a vital tool for movement in general and dash-dancing in particular. During the initial dash, the following actions can be used:

• Altering the speed of the dash with the control stick, most notably backward to Moonwalk.
• Turning around by mashing the control stick in the opposite direction. Turning around takes one frame during which the character is standing and can do all ground attacks except neutral special. If the control stick stays in a neutral position after this pivot frame, the character will keep standing.
• Pressing A or C-Stick forward/backward during the first 3 frames to do a small step forward smash. This is only possible after dashing forward, not backward.
• Pressing A after the first 3 frames to do a dash attack.
• Pressing L or R to shield. During the first two frames of a forward dash, L/R always triggers a roll. On frame 3, they trigger the shield, but with 1 frame delay.
• Pressing L+A, R+A or Z to do a dash grab.
• Jumping and jump canceling.
• Using forward special.
• Pressing forward again to enter run break animation. From here the player can crouch immediately and do any move. This can be used for a quick dash into down tilt, or a non-jump-canceled down special.

Run

During the run—the later part of the dash—different options are available:

• Pressing down to crouch. (Spending 1 frame in the RunBrake animation is necessary before the crouch can start.)
• Turning around by mashing or pushing the control stick in the opposite direction. Turning around takes very long, up to 51 frames (Marth). During the turnaround animation, only a jump can interrupt it.
• Pressing A to do a dash attack.
• Pressing L or R to shield.
• Pressing L+A, R+A, or Z to do a dash grab.
• Jumping and jump canceling.
• Using special moves.

Running speed

Running speed is the rate at which a character can run. Running speed is measured in units per frame.

Super Smash Bros. rankings

Super Smash Bros. uses a different scale for mobility specs compared to later games. The scale approximately converts to (a / 30) (so for example, Captain Falcon's NTSC run speed of 75 is about equivalent to a run speed of 2.5 in future games).

JPN

Rank	Character	Initial Dash	Run speed
1	Captain Falcon	80	70
2	Fox	61	60
3	Pikachu	60	55
4	Samus	56	54
5	Yoshi	40	50
6	Kirby	61	48
7	Donkey Kong	60	48
8	Mario	54	44
9	Link	68	42
10	Jigglypuff	50	42
11	Ness	68	40
12	Luigi	50	40

NA, EU, AUS

Rank	Character	Initial Dash	Run speed
1	Captain Falcon	80	75
2	Fox	81	60
3	Pikachu	60	55
4	Samus	56	54
5	Yoshi	40	50
6	Kirby	61	48
7	Donkey Kong	60	48
8	Mario	54	44
9	Link	68	42
10	Jigglypuff	50	42
11	Ness	68	40
12	Luigi	50	40

The data shown here was taken from Antdgar's Frame Data and Madao's Character Data posts. Captain Falcon is the only character whose speed changes according to the version of the game.

Super Smash Bros. Melee rankings

Starting in Melee, much like with air acceleration, there exist two acceleration values for each character's initial dash speed until it reaches their run speed: a base value that determines the minimum acceleration, and an additional value that is scaled based on how much the control stick is tilted. A character's maximum potential acceleration is the sum of these two values. For example, Captain Falcon has a base value of 0.01 and an additional value of 0.15, so its dash acceleration can vary from 0.01 at minimum input to 0.16 at maximum input. If the character's initial dash speed is equal to their run speed, the acceleration values are not used, while if it is higher, the character's traction value is used to decrease it down to their run speed.

Rank	Character	Initial Dash	Run Speed	Dash Frames	Base Acceleration	Additional Acceleration	Max Acceleration
1	Captain Falcon	2	2.3	15	0.01	0.15	0.16
2	Fox	1.9	2.2	11	0.02	0.10	0.12
3	Pikachu	1.8	1.8	13	0.02	0.08	0.1
4	Sheik	1.7	1.8	7	0.02	0.10	0.12
5	Marth	1.5	1.8	15	0	0.06	0.06
6	Pichu	1.8	1.72	13	0.02	0.08	0.1
7	Roy	1.4	1.61	15	0	0.07	0.07
8	Young Link	1.8	1.6	13	0.02	0.10	0.12
9	Donkey Kong	1.6	1.6	15	0.02	0.05	0.07
10	Yoshi	1.33	1.6	13	0.02	0.08	0.1
11	Falco	1.9	1.5	11	0.02	0.10	0.12
12-14	Mario	1.5	1.5	10	0.02	0.06	0.08
	Dr. Mario
	Mr. Game & Watch			8
15	Bowser	1	1.5	13	0.02	0.04	0.06
16	Samus	1.86	1.4	8	0.02	0.10	0.12
17-19	Mewtwo	1.4	1.4	18	0.10	0	0.1
	Kirby			12	0.02	0.08	0.1
	Ice Climbers			13		0.05	0.07
20	Ness	1.3	1.4	13	0.02	0.04	0.06
21	Ganondorf	1.3	1.35	15	0.01	0.08	0.09
22	Luigi	1.34	1.34	10	0.02	0.06	0.08
23-24	Link	1.3	1.3	12	0.02	0.10	0.12
	Peach	1.2		15
25	Jigglypuff	1.4	1.1	13	0.02	0.065	0.085
26	Zelda	1.1	1.1	15	0.02	0.10	0.12

Dash frame source

Super Smash Bros. Brawl rankings

Rank	Character	Initial Dash	Run Speed	Dash Frames	Base Acceleration	Additional Acceleration	Max Acceleration
1	Sonic	1.5	3.5	11	0.04	0.15	0.19
N/A	Wario-Man	1.3	3.5	13	0.04	0.0954	0.1354
2	Captain Falcon	2.05	2.18	16	0.02	0.1618	0.1818
3	Fox	2.1	2.08	11	0.04	0.1111	0.1511
4	Zero Suit Samus	1.7	1.93	13	0.04	0.0942	0.1342
5	Sheik	1.7	1.92	8	0.04	0.1143	0.1543
6	Meta Knight	1.75	1.847	13	0.04	0.0948	0.1348
7	Charizard	1.3	1.8	11	0.02	0.0963	0.1163
8	Pikachu	1.8	1.765	14	0.04	0.0912	0.1312
9	Diddy Kong	1.7	1.721	11	0.04	0.15	0.19
10	Marth	1.5	1.7	17	0.01	0.082	0.092
N/A	Giga Bowser	1.9	1.7	15	0.05	0.12	0.17
11	Yoshi	1.33	1.68	15	0.04	0.096	0.136
12	Toon Link	1.5	1.65	13	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
13	Donkey Kong	1.6	1.622	16	0.04	0.0667	0.1067
14	Pit	1.5	1.583	13	0.04	0.1134	0.1534
15	Mr. Game & Watch	1.5	1.553	9	0.04	0.0823	0.1223
16	Bowser	1	1.527	14	0.04	0.0648	0.1048
17	Mario	1.5	1.5	11	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
18	Ivysaur	1.4	1.5	11	0.04	0.08	0.12
19-20	R.O.B.	1.3	1.5	11	0.04	0.1128	0.1528
	Lucas				0.02	0.0756	0.0956
21	Samus	1.86	1.445	9	0.04	0.12	0.16
22	Falco	1.9	1.432	12	0.04	0.112	0.156
23	Lucario	1.8	1.414	11	0.04	0.15	0.19
24	Wolf	1.7	1.4	11	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
25	Olimar	1.4	1.4	11	0.04	0.0872	0.1272
26	Ness	1.3	1.393	14	0.04	0.0651	0.1051
27	Ice Climbers	1.4	1.388	14	0.04	0.0736	0.1136
28	Ike	1.5	1.371	11	0.01	0.0724	0.0824
29	Kirby	1.4	1.371	13	0.04	0.0954	0.1354
30	Squirtle	1.6	1.37	11	0.1	0.2	0.3
31	Peach	1.5	1.35	16	0.04	0.1181	0.1581
32	Wario	1.3	1.35	13	0.04	0.0954	0.1354
33	Snake	1.1	1.35	13	0.04	0.1154	0.1554
34	Luigi	1.28	1.34	11	0.04	0.0786	0.1186
35	Link	1.3	1.328	13	0.04	0.1197	0.1597
36	Zelda	1.25	1.224	16	0.04	0.1175	0.1575
37	King Dedede	1.4	1.22	11	0.01	0.0858	0.0958
38	Ganondorf	1.3	1.16	16	0.02	0.0963	0.1163
39	Jigglypuff	1.4	1.1	14	0.04	0.0829	0.1229

Note that several slow runners can use their dash attack to travel a far distance quicker, and some characters have a DACUS to increase mobility. The most notable case of this is Snake, whose DACUS gives him much more stage control and ability to evade opponents.

Super Smash Bros. 4 rankings

Rank	Character	Initial Dash	Run Speed	Dash Frames	Base Acceleration	Additional Acceleration	Max Acceleration
1	Sonic	1.5	3.5	11	0.04	0.15	0.19
N/A	Wario-Man	1.3	3.5	13	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
N/A	Giga Mac	2.05	2.8	16	0.06	0.1618	0.2218
2	Captain Falcon	1.7	2.32	16	0.1	0.06	0.16
3	Little Mac	2.05	2.24	16	0.02	0.1618	0.1818
4	Fox	2.4	2.184	11	0.04	0.1111	0.1511
5	Zero Suit Samus	1.7	2.1	13	0.04	0.0942	0.1342
N/A	Mii Brawler (lightest)	1.95328	2.099776	11	0.048832	0.0998	0.148632
6	Greninja	1.6	2.08	11	0.05	0.12	0.17
7	Mewtwo	1.4	2.05	11	0.1	0	0.1
8	Sheik	1.7	2.016	8	0.04	0.1143	0.1543
9	Charizard	1	2	11	0.015	0.0963	0.1113
N/A	Giga Bowser	1.9	2	14	0.05	0.12	0.17
10	Cloud	1.8	1.97	11	0.01	0.09	0.1
11	Roy	1.4	1.95	17	0	0.07	0.07
12	Meta Knight	1.75	1.9	13	0.04	0.0948	0.1348
13	Palutena	1.5	1.888	14	0.04	0.1181	0.1581
14	Yoshi	1.33	1.86	15	0.04	0.096	0.136
15	Pikachu	1.8	1.85325	14	0.04	0.0912	0.1312
N/A	Mii Swordfighter (lightest)	1.58704	1.8312	13	0.048832	0.1197	0.168532
16	Diddy Kong	1.7	1.824	11	0.04	0.15	0.19
17	Bowser	1	1.792	14	0.04	0.0648	0.1048
18-19	Marth	1.5	1.785	17	0.01	0.082	0.092
	Lucina
20	Toon Link	1.5	1.7325	13	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
21	Mii Brawler (default)	1.6	1.72	11	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
22	Donkey Kong	1.6	1.7031	16	0.04	0.0667	0.1067
23	Wii Fit Trainer	1.5	1.696	16	0.04	0.0998	0.1398
24-25	Pit	1.5	1.66215	13	0.04	0.1134	0.1534
	Dark Pit
26	Rosalina & Luma