Laziest Characters In Harry Potter

Highlights

  • Ron Weasley grew up lazy but stepped up when it mattered, and played a major role in defeating the Dark Lord.
  • Gilderoy Lockhart was a fraud who stole credit for others’ accomplishments and chose easy options over facing danger.
  • Crabbe & Goyle were Slytherin lackeys with no ambition.


Just like the real world, the wizarding world of Harry Potter is populated by a wide variety of characters, including those with no drive or desire to do anything or even just a particular fondness for lazing about. Lazy characters in the series can be found on both sides of good and evil and this trait does not inherently make them bad, although it can lead to other bad habits.

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Even the main hero, such as Harry, could be known to be lazy at times, especially when it came to doing homework. The laziest Harry Potter characters, however, were much worse.


1 Ron Weasley

Ron Never Wanted To Do His School Work & Expected Hermione To Do It For Him

Rupert Grint Ron Weasley Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

  • Featured in all eight Harry Potter movies.

While Harry and Ron could both be lazy at times, especially when it came to school work, the fact that Ron had grown up being mollycoddled by his mother meant that he had more lazy tendencies and sometimes simply expected things to be done for him.

Ron was also fairly lazy at points while hunting Horcruxes and often expected Hermione to do all the cooking and other tasks. However, all this being said, whenever things got serious and real work needed doing, Ron would always step up and there’s no doubt he played a major role in bringing down the Dark Lord.

2 Gilderoy Lockhart

Plagiarized Other People’s Deeds

Gilderoy Lockhart in the Duelling Club

  • Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Despite his immaculate sense of style and ever-present smile, Gilderoy Lockhart could actually be considered lazy due to the way in which he made a name for himself. As it transpired, Lockhart never did any of the heroic acts described in his books. Instead, he simply extracted the memories from other witches and wizards, stealing their valor.

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When Harry and Ron come to Lockhart in a moment of need with the life of a young girl on the line, Lockhart chooses the easy option and is even willing to destroy their minds with the Memory Charm Obliviate rather than face the kind of danger he was all too fond of writing about.

3 Crabbe & Goyle

They Didn’t Do Anything During The Entire Series

Crabbe and Goyle in Harry Potter

  • Most of the Harry Potter films

One of the traits often associated with Slytherin House is ambition, but two members of this House during the ’90s showed no sign of it. Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle were lackeys of school bully Draco Malfoy, and throughout the series, they did naught but crack their knuckles and stand there looking menacing.

From the books it is known that the pair of them did terribly in their exams, which was attributed to a general lack of magical prowess and intelligence, but also to their laziness.

4 Peter Pettigrew

He Was Even Lazy As A Rat!

hp-peter-pettigrew-wand

  • Prisoner of Azkaban, Goblet of Fire, Order of the Phoenix, Half-Blood Prince, Deathly Hallows

Peter Pettigrew was always happy to ride on the coattails of his superiors and got by in life by doing the bare minimum for whoever could offer him safety at any given time. Even his greatest magical accomplishment, managing to become an animagus, was mostly thanks to the hard work and skill of his friends at the time, James and Sirius.

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Pettigrew’s laziness can be best summed up by his time as the Weasley’s pet rat, Scabbers. Wormtail grew far too comfortable during his time as a pet and, apparently, all he did was eat and sleep. While Peter did eventually return to his master, Lord Voldemort, this was only after being exposed. If Sirius hadn’t escaped from Azkaban, Pettigrew might have lived out the rest of his days lazily as a rat.

5 Dudley Dursley

Complained About The Distance Between The TV And The Kitchen

Dudley Dursley

  • Philosopher’s Stone, Chamber of Secrets, Prisoner of Azkaban, Order of the Phoenix, Deathly Hallows Part 1

While Dudley Dursley is one of the Harry Potter characters who changes the most throughout the series, and in his case thankfully for the better, he started as a spoiled, gluttonous, and lazy bully. Throughout the books and films, Dudley never shows an ounce of energy other than to beat up those weaker and smaller than himself.

Believing himself to be better than everyone else as a result of his parents’ incessant fawning, Dudley appears to have had very little drive to do anything and expected others to do everything for him. His laziest moment from the books, which also ties into his obesity in the third book, was when he complained about the kitchen being too far away from the TV and convinced his parents to get a new one in the kitchen.

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