I'm curious, what is the most played class in D&D? Reply with your class.

Over the last 40 years, every major, scaled Poll has always revealed the same answer: Human Fighter.

back before Wizards bought DDB, people were certain that it couldn't be the case, and so the company that created DDB released the stats of the characters that had been created using it.

Human Fighter was far and away the winner.

I recall a Dragon magazine poll on it in in the early 1980s -- you had to call a phone number to vote. The result was Human Fighter. Next closest was Wizard -- at half the popularity of the Fighter.

Ok. Thank you for answering

I probably will never play a human fighter just because I love casters, and have a thing where I can't play humans well, idk why, but they are probablt the best and definitely the most popular class/race combo

I have only ever played caster classes. My two characters are a druid and warlock. I've always been a fan of buffing my party and punishing my foes with magical powers.

I play bard, barbarian/druid multiclass, druid/ranger multiclass, bard/warlock, sorcerer, and a warlock

This link is one of the most recent looks at the most popular race/classes on DnDBeyond - https://dice-scroller.com/en/most-popular-dnd-classes-and-races/

I wouldn't take the data from the article too seriously, as it just pulls raw data, but it is good food for thought. For sure human fighters are appealing to players, but whose to say how many of these are a few level dips? Or created by players using the free DndBeyond account without full access to many of the other classes and races?

Personally, I struggle with naming a favorite class. I've played them all at one point or another except for bard. The class I have played the longest in 5e would be an artificer. I wouldn't say artificer is my favorite, though. That really has more to do about the character and the campaign. 

Quote from Slaine000 >>

This link is one of the most recent looks at the most popular race/classes on DnDBeyond - https://dice-scroller.com/en/most-popular-dnd-classes-and-races/

I wouldn't take the data from the article too seriously, as it just pulls raw data, but it is good food for thought. For sure human fighters are appealing to players, but whose to say how many of these are a few level dips? Or created by players using the free DndBeyond account without full access to many of the other classes and races?

Or people who are just experimenting with creating characters that they don't play?

I've never seen a single Human Fighter PC at any table I've ever played at. 

The stats do make sense from a min-max perspective, every powergaming character is going to be Variant Human for the free feat and take 2 levels in Fighter for Action Surge.  But how many people actually PLAY those characters vs how many people just theorycraft them for fun?

I would say Fighter, Wizard, Cleric, and Rogue are the most popular. 

Quote from DrJawaPhD >>

I've never seen a single Human Fighter PC at any table I've ever played at. 

The stats do make sense from a min-max perspective, every powergaming character is going to be Variant Human for the free feat and take 2 levels in Fighter for Action Surge.  But how many people actually PLAY those characters vs how many people just theorycraft them for fun?

 Most people aren't doing it for optimization.

Human fighter is popular because it's the simplest. It's going to be a very popular choice for people just making their first character. If somebody doesn't know what species to play, they play a human, because they think they can wrap their brain around what being a human is. Similarly, they play a fighter, because it's mechanically the simplest.

Quote from DrJawaPhD >>

I've never seen a single Human Fighter PC at any table I've ever played at. 

The stats do make sense from a min-max perspective, every powergaming character is going to be Variant Human for the free feat and take 2 levels in Fighter for Action Surge.  But how many people actually PLAY those characters vs how many people just theorycraft them for fun?

 I've only ever encountered human fighters when I played in Adventurer's League. Usually it was min-maxing. Plenty of guys rolling up with Polearm Master and Great Weapon Master.

Quote from DrJawaPhD >>

I've never seen a single Human Fighter PC at any table I've ever played at. 

The stats do make sense from a min-max perspective, every powergaming character is going to be Variant Human for the free feat and take 2 levels in Fighter for Action Surge.  But how many people actually PLAY those characters vs how many people just theorycraft them for fun?

 
The very first character I ever built way back in 2e was a human fighter.

Personally I've never played a Human Fighter, in over 40 years. But they have been in the party on occasion. Currently we have one (Eldritch Knight/Bladesinger combo)

That's another good point: the fighter is a good class for a one or two level dip for virtually every other class.

Quote from IamSposta >>

 
The very first character I ever built way back in 2e was a human fighter.

 There may have been a human fighter in my first D&D game. (I say "may" because it was Basic D&D, so arguably the character's species was Fighter.)

My first character was a half elf ranger. And died.

Horribly.

And I almost never saw human fighters in my group games, but I did frequently see them in the open games I ran (where anyone could join and I wasn't able to say no). The reason I know the stats is that it has always stood out to me as a shock, lol.

When that phone poll was done, I recall being shocked to my core.

And yet, every single poll or study I have seen since then continued that same trend.

I somewhat agree. V.human is a very powerful race

Of course Fighter is number one. Fighter is the only class where you never have to put a single point into your main ability and you will still function properly. And they get the most Ability Score Improvements to boot! 

Attunement slot 1: Strength enhancing item (Gauntlets of Ogre Power then eventually Belts of Giant Strength) for 19+ Strength.

Attunement slot 2: Amulet of Health for 19 Constitution. 

Then get a magic weapon and armor and you're set. 

Half of the games I've played in have had a fighter. And the majority of the fighters were the Variant Human. The Variant Human gives you the free feat. The only reason not to use that race is if you can use Tasha's Custom Lineage where you get the free feat plus darkvision. And you can put both points to a stat! So if you're doing Point Buy or Standard Array you get to start with an 18 in the stat of your choice if you want to. Of course that's why so many DMs don't allow it. 

If it's Point Buy, Standard Array or you rolled badly for stats the Fighter is the go-to class. With the ability to grab nothing but feats you can build them however you want. Give them Inspiring Leader and Healer. You can get that Polearm Master and Sentinel for crowd control. Shield Master for an evasion equivalent if you have fireball happy companions. And Great Weapon Master is excellent for damage output. 

And if you want to you can even be a better archer than a Ranger. Sure you'll have to use some ASIs for dexterity but you can easily get Sharpshooter. And if you don't want to use the Arcane Archer subclass you can pick up Crossbow Expert, use a hand crossbow and get that extra attack per round to go on top of having the most attacks per round of any class. 

I'll never understand why people are surprised that Fighter is the number one class. 

Quote from AEDorsay >>

My first character was a half elf ranger. And died.

Horribly.

And I almost never saw human fighters in my group games, but I did frequently see them in the open games I ran (where anyone could join and I wasn't able to say no). The reason I know the stats is that it has always stood out to me as a shock, lol.

When that phone poll was done, I recall being shocked to my core.

And yet, every single poll or study I have seen since then continued that same trend.

 
The first character I actually played was a Half-Elf Ranger too!! I built the human fighter first, but played him second.