Sven/Counters

Bad against...

 * makes it hard for Sven to fight Clockwerk in his . Using Blademail while inside Power Cogs will force Sven to either take massive damage from reflection, which bypasses Black King Bar, or waste time destroying the cogs.
 * greatly limits Sven's positioning, even with in teamfight.


 * Against her, Sven is barely able to hit Enchantress without using his.
 * deals lots of damage to Sven if she is left aside.


 * disables Sven for a very long duration while having a low cooldown. This can be countered by buying a, but it will cost him an item slot. So in late game, Sven has to rely on his teammates or is forced to buy a.


 * Sven can hardly hit Phantom Assassin against her, and will need to rush a earlier than usual to deal damage to her.


 * can temporarily interrupt Sven's initiation. Even if Sven has, can save an ally in a pinch.
 * pierces Spell Immunity, significantly slows Sven down. The upgraded version has 3 charges which is more than enough to kite Sven, also disables Great Cleave.


 * With all his skills, Slark is extremely hard to catch with your disables.
 * Slark can drain your stats with and knock you out in a prolonged fight.


 * With, Sniper is extremely hard to initiate on for a melee hero as Sven.
 * and kites you hard.


 * Early to mid game, causes Sven's attack to miss,  and  causes a lot of damage on Sven without even getting close to him.
 * Late game, Tinker is available to permanently hex Sven using, and kite Sven by refreshing . still works if Sven didn't build a.


 * Since most of your damage comes from physical attack, allows Troll Warlord to fight you early game.
 * With and all his attack speed increase skills, Troll Warlord can almost permanently bash you even you have.


 * Venomancer forces Sven to choose between using his, or getting constantly slowed by his poison.
 * Venomancer can be especially hard to deal with in lane, as his damage over time will keep Sven from farming effectively.


 * could save the ally being initiated on.
 * can be devastating to Sven's team, as his massive damage can take out a teammate before there is much time to react.

Others

 * In general, any hero that can stun, root or slow will give Sven a hard time.
 * 's AoE blind, and 's miss can keep Sven from landing hits.

Items

 * kites Sven hard, also saves ally from Storm Hammer.
 * disjoints Storm Hammer in quick hands.
 * allows the owner immune to physical attack. As a strength hero Sven seldom builds.
 * makes Sven temporarily useless.
 * makes it very hard for Sven to catch up to his targets.
 * reflects Sven's massage damage.

Good against...

 * Anti-Mage is fairly fragile, and cannot stand against Sven in a prolonged fight. gives you protection against, Great Cleave will also destroy the illusions from.


 * Great Cleave clears Spiderlings quickly in lane.


 * Great Cleave makes short work of Chaos Knight's s.


 * Great Cleave clears Chen's Creeps fast in mid to late game.


 * cannot purge God's Strength, and can only disable Great Cleave with . Sven is still a hard target to fight against even after being Doomed, as long as he activated God's Strength beforehand.


 * Great Cleave will devastate Meepo's clones. Against a closely packed group, Sven does not even need to target the clone with the lowest health.


 * Great Cleave cuts through Phantom Lancer's illusions in no time.


 * With God's Strength, Warlock's Golem goes down in a matter of seconds. The two weaker golems granted by will fare worse due to Great Cleave hitting both.

Works well with...

 * Crystal Maiden's and numerous slows make it easy for Sven to catch up to enemies.


 * A well positioned could result in a team wipe for Sven with his Storm Hammer and God's Strength.


 * A and Storm Hammer combo can stun the whole enemy team with good cooperation.


 * and sets Sven up for easy ganks anywhere on the map. This is effective against single targets because Sven can burst them down without being disabled by the enemy's teammates.


 * and gives Sven plenty of time to beat down the enemy.


 * gives Sven additional cleave and damage.
 * A well positioned could result in a team wipe for Sven with his Storm Hammer and God's Strength.


 * and debuffs most of disarms, making Sven unstoppable and leaving you free to attack.


 * and gives Sven plenty of time to beat down the enemy.


 * gives Sven incredible attack speed, allowing him to quickly demolish the enemy.

Others

 * Sven's kit is quite versatile and generally speaking there are very few heroes that Sven doesn't make a good ally with.
 * In general, any hero with lengthy stuns or roots will synergize well with Sven.
 * Because of Warcry, Sven makes a particularly powerful ally in teams with heroes with little armor, especially if they have otherwise large sums of HP, as his whole team can become extremely resilient to physical damage, which is a very powerful advantage of late game scenarios. Example of heroes with little armor but with other forms to survive fights include, , (Note: Though the hero starts out with strong armor, this will be quickly outweighed by his abysmal agility growth) and.
 * With enough mana regeneration, it's possible for Sven to be run as a roamer and help land kills with Storm Hammer. Though this limits Sven's early farm significantly, it is possible to catch up in farm and transition into full core with neutral creep stacks and Great Cleave. Consider this strategy if your team has an overabundance of cores, as most heroes are incapable of catching up in farm as easily as Sven can, so denying your other cores of farm could be significantly more detrimental to your team than denying Sven's farm.

List of heroes that counter Sven, and list of heroes that work well with Sven.