Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has been beaten in under an hour

Zelda Tears of the Kingdom
(Image credit: Nintendo)

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has finally been beaten in under an hour.

We now have a brand new world champion in the Tears of the Kingdom speedrunning scene. The new speedrun comes from Zdi, and they've somehow managed to complete the new Zelda game in a mind-bending 59 minutes and 22 seconds, nearly a full three minutes faster than the previous world record holder.

The run in full, just above, begins with the player using a trick that involves sheathing and unsheathing their weapon to rapidly move across the ground. The Ascend, Fuse, Ultrahand, and Rewind abilities are all collected in a stunning 33 minutes, meaning the runner is done with the Great Sky Island starting area in 37 minutes and four seconds.

We won't say anything else, just in case you're yet to finish the story of Tears of the Kingdom, but suffice it to say it's a truly staggering run. In the comments over on the speedrun subreddit, some players doubt if this sub one-hour speedrun is ever going to beat, or if it even can be beaten at this point.

Breath of the Wild launched over six years ago, and it felt like we were constantly finding new discoveries in the original game practically until the day Tears of the Kingdom launched earlier this month. Here's hoping the latest Zelda game has a similarly huge range of secrets and tricks still waiting for players to uncover.

Keep an eye on speedun.com to see if anyone can manage to beat Zdi's record-breaking Tears of the Kingdom speedrun.

Check out our guide on how to use the wings in Zelda Tears of the Kingdom if you want to pick up your pace around Hyrule.

Hirun Cryer

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.