The Triforce (Japanese: トライフォース, Hepburn: Toraifōsu) is a fictional artifact and icon of Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda video game franchise.

The three pieces of the Triforce are often in the possession of the three main characters of the series, Ganon, Zelda and Link, who each embody one of its virtues: power, wisdom and courage.

Obtaining the Triforce is a frequent objective in the series, requiring the player to search for its shards and protect it from Ganon, who seeks its power for evil purposes.

Due to its prominence and significance within the mythology of the Zelda series, the Triforce has become a widely recognizable symbol in gaming.

[1] Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of The Legend of Zelda series, explained his vision for the first game in an interview with Gamekult.

He said that the Triforce fragments were originally supposed to be electronic chips, as the game was intended to be set in both the past and the future.

[6] The trinity within the Triforce creates a moral balance, with evil seeking power, and wisdom and courage being the opposing forces for good.

[7] A recurring theme of the series is Ganon's plan to steal the Triforce from the Sacred Realm in order to use its power to conquer Hyrule, which is ultimately thwarted by Link and Zelda.

[11] In 1986, the original The Legend of Zelda video game introduced the Triforce, which consisted of two pieces, as a central plot device.

It involves the hero, Link, embarking on a quest to save Hyrule from the evil Ganon, who has stolen the Triforce of Power.

[13] The game's instruction manual tells the backstory of Princess Zelda being placed in a magical sleep by a wizard and sets Link's fate as the hero who will wake her by marking the back of his hand with the Triforce.

After a seven-year sleep, Link awakens as an adult and sets off to protect the Triforce from Ganondorf by travelling back and forth in time.

[15] In The Wind Waker (2002), Link must collect eight pieces of the Triforce of Courage, which are scattered across the islands on the map, before he is ready to confront Ganondorf.

[4] Nintendo published Tri Force Heroes (2015) for the 3DS, a cooperative multiplayer game involving three Links dressed in red, blue and green.

[29] The Triforce continued to be absent from the series as a plot device with the release of Tears of the Kingdom (2023), although it appears on in-game architecture and as a tattoo on the arm of the character Sonia.

For this reason, they set the story in an undefined time period to give the impression that the inhabitants had forgotten the Triforce and had only a vague idea of its existence.

[39] Two manga adaptations of A Link to the Past were also published by Ataru Cagiva in 1995 and Akira Himekawa in 2005 with the Japanese title Triforce of the Gods.

[40][41] Akira Himekawa also produced a manga book published by Viz Media, which is based on Ocarina of Time and follows the game's plot involving Link's quest to protect the Triforce from Ganondorf.

In the series spin-off hack and slash video game Hyrule Warriors (2014), the Triforce is the objective for one of the main antagonists, Cia.

[47][48] In the same game, Zelda uses the Triforce of Wisdom as her Final Smash, which produces a glowing triangle that sucks in opponents and deals damage.

[57] Professional wrestler Cody Rhodes, a longtime Legend of Zelda fan, formerly had the Triforce on his wrestling boots in his early career with the WWE.

[59] In 2023, the British metal band DragonForce released a single titled "Power of the Triforce", which is a tribute to The Legend of Zelda series.

Florent Gorges, author of The History of Nintendo, opined that the symbol is so ubiquitous in Japan that Yokoi's protégé, Shigeru Miyamoto, could not have ignored it and had reused the design for the Zelda series.

Ashcraft also remarked that the Triforce had such an impact on the younger Japanese generation, that the crest is now widely recognised, not as the mitsuuroko symbol, but as the icon of The Legend of Zelda series.

[67] In 2016, Kate Gray of TechRadar noted that players persisted in their search for the Triforce in Ocarina of Time, using various methods of play in the hope of recovering it.

Aonuma stated that the concept of creating a female version of Link, "would mess with the balance of the Triforce" and had been rejected by Nintendo for that reason.

[72] Edge staff commented that the Triforce is the deus ex machina of The Legend of Zelda series, stating that, of all the world-saving devices in gaming, it is "the most visually iconic and symbolically potent one" and noted its Christian similarities: "salvation through a trinity that is also one".

[7] Luke Plunkett of Kotaku opined that the Triforce is "one of the most iconic designs in the history of video games" and "the object that lies at the heart of The Legend of Zelda".

She highlighted that it creates a sense of community for many isolated gamers and also provides personal significance to those who find comfort and meaning in its symbolism.