How to win lane as Nasus against Illaoi · 48.51% win rate over 604 Emerald+ games · Updated 2026-07-27
| Stage | Favoured | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Level 1 | Illaoi | You have no Wither and no stacks while she drops a tentacle and smashes you with passive hits — pure concede, last-hit at max range. |
| Level 2 | Illaoi | Her E (Test of Spirit) threat plus a tentacle owns level 2; one pull near her field chunks you and you cannot answer yet. |
| Level 3 | Illaoi | Wither comes online but extended trades on her tentacles still beat you and her sustain out-refills your chip damage. |
| Levels 4-5 | Illaoi | She shoves and pokes with tentacle smashes while you hoard stacks; any all-in on her field loses to her AoE and healing. |
| Level 6 | Illaoi | Fury of the Sands lets you SURVIVE one committed dive, but her R plus full field still out-damages your lifesteal — Wither and disengage, do not duel. |
| First item | Illaoi | Her tentacle-field all-in still beats your first-item spike unless you Wither her and fight off the field — she edges the straight trade. |
| Two+ items | Nasus | Your infinite Q stacking, Wither slow and Soul Eater lifesteal flip it — drag her off the tentacles and out-grind her with no percent-HP to punish your HP bar. |
Illaoi owns these levels and you cannot contest it — you have no Wither until 3 and zero stacks, so just soak Q farm at the very tip and refuse to walk into E (Test of Spirit) range. If she rips your spirit you have to run from your own tentacles, eating free damage, so respect the cast and keep tentacles on your flank, never between you and the wave. Your Soul Eater lifesteal sustains the passive poke, but do not trade — there is no trade you win here, only chip you survive.
The full Nasus vs Illaoi report continues with the mid-game plan, the late-game and teamfight plan, every power spike to play around, and the win conditions for both sides — plus cooldown tracking and the live enemy-jungle tracker inside the app.
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Playing the other side? Illaoi vs Nasus guide →
All Nasus top lane matchups →