With a little over a month left to go of 2023, we're still seeing plenty of brilliant albums pop up on the calendar, even as the threat of end of year lists looms. In a year that began with Ville Valo making his comeback with Neon Noir and has since seen everyone from Metallica to Babymetal, Avenged Sevenfold to Within Temptation offer massive new records, it can be hard to keep up.
That in mind, you can consider this a handy guide - and End Of Year primer - for some of the biggest and best records we've seen in 2023, covering genre giants, ascendant newcomers and veterans who continue to raise the bar for everything from death metal and doom to metalcore and symphonic metal. Without further ado, these are the best metal albums of 2023 so far...
