Terminator Models: Every Machine Across the Six Films

The theatrical Terminator films feature four named models, the T-800, the T-1000, the T-X and the Rev-9, plus two human machine hybrids, Marcus Wright and the machine John Connor of Terminator Genisys. They arrive in release order, starting with the cyborg assassin of The Terminator (1984), directed by James Cameron, and ending with the Rev-9 of Terminator: Dark Fate (2019), directed by Tim Miller.

How many are there? Six types in total across the six films, four models and two hybrids. Lists titled "all 15 Terminator models" or "all 25 Terminator models" include machines from outside the six films, so their totals depend on where each list draws the line.

Is it T-800 or T-101? The model is the T-800; T-101 is not a credited name in any of the six films. The T-800 appears across the saga, and the credited names for Schwarzenegger are Terminator, The Terminator, Guardian / The Terminator and T-800 / Carl.

Each machine first appears at a different point in the story. The T-800 comes first in 1984, and the T-1000, T-X and Rev-9 follow in release order. For the films in sequence, see terminator movies in order, and for where each machine sits in the story, see the terminator timeline.

The T-800 is the Terminator model played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, and it appears in five of the six films, from The Terminator (1984) to Terminator: Dark Fate (2019). In the first film it is a cyborg assassin that arrives naked in Los Angeles from 2029, with orders to kill a waitress named Sarah Connor. Its method is blunt: it works through the women named Sarah Connor in the phone book while Kyle Reese, played by Michael Biehn, tries to reach the real Sarah first. Franco Columbu is also credited in that film as a Future Terminator.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), directed by James Cameron, turns the same face into a protector. The resistance sends back a reprogrammed T-800 to guard the young John Connor, and it rescues him from the T-1000 in a shopping mall. John orders it not to kill people, which changes how the machine behaves for the rest of the film.

In Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003), directed by Jonathan Mostow, an older Terminator credited as The Terminator is again sent to protect John and Kate Brewster. Terminator Genisys (2015), directed by Alan Taylor, credits Schwarzenegger as Guardian / The Terminator, and the story calls this T-800 Pops, a reprogrammed machine who has raised Sarah Connor since childhood. Terminator: Dark Fate credits him as T-800 / Carl, the machine that killed John in 1998 and now lives as a man with a conscience.

Terminator Salvation (2009), directed by McG, also features a T-800 that stabs John through the chest, but Schwarzenegger is not among that film's leading cast.

How does it end up? The 1984 machine is stripped to a metal frame and destroyed at a factory, where Reese dies helping Sarah. The T2 protector insists it must be destroyed too, and Sarah lowers it into molten steel as it gives John a thumbs up. The Terminator of T3 sacrifices itself with its last fuel cell. Pops is rebuilt from liquid metal debris, and Carl is destroyed alongside the Rev-9.

The T-1000 is a shape shifting liquid metal Terminator, played by Robert Patrick in Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), directed by James Cameron. Skynet sends it back to kill John Connor, played by Edward Furlong, while he is still a boy, and it tracks him to a shopping mall, where the T-800 arrives just in time to help him escape.

The model returns in a smaller role in Terminator Genisys (2015), where Lee Byung-hun is credited as Cop / T-1000. In that film a liquid metal T-1000 is sent to stop Sarah Connor, Kyle Reese and Pops, and the group destroys it together with the assassin Skynet sent to kill Sarah.

What makes the T-1000 stand out among the Terminator models is the way it fights through imitation. In the steel mill finale it disables the T-800 and imitates Sarah to lure John out, which turns a chase into a trick. Sarah and the reactivated T-800 finally push it into molten steel, where it is destroyed, and John throws the T-800's arm and chip into the steel after it.

The T-X is the Terminator model of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003), played by Kristanna Loken, a shape shifting machine built to hunt both humans and other machines. Skynet sends it back to 2003 to murder the future leaders of the human resistance, starting with Kate Brewster, a veterinarian played by Claire Danes. The resistance sends an older Terminator back to protect John Connor, played by Nick Stahl, and Kate, and the T-X is shown to be more advanced than that protector.

Its most dangerous trick is control of other machines. The T-X wounds General Robert Brewster, takes over the company's machines, and then takes over the protecting Terminator and orders it to kill John. The Terminator forces its own shutdown to resist, and the T-X recovers and keeps hunting them.

The T-X is destroyed at Crystal Peak, where the Terminator crashes a helicopter into it and then uses its last fuel cell to destroy itself and the T-X. That holds the bunker door open long enough for John and Kate to get inside. The ending is unusual for the saga, because the machine loses its fight but Judgment Day goes ahead anyway.

Marcus Wright is the saga's human machine hybrid, a man who does not know what he has become, played by Sam Worthington in Terminator Salvation (2009). His story starts with a signature in 2003, when a condemned prisoner hands his body over to Dr. Serena Kogan, a Cyberdyne researcher played by Helena Bonham Carter. He wakes in 2018 in a ruined world, with no memory of the years between.

Unlike the T-800 or the T-1000, Marcus is not sent to kill anyone. After he proves to be a cyborg, the soldiers around John Connor, played by Christian Bale, turn on him. Marcus bargains with John: he will help free the captured prisoners if his own life is spared. Only later does he learn that Skynet rebuilt him to draw John into a trap. He breaks free of Skynet's control and sides with the Resistance, and in the base fight he tears the head off the T-800 that has stabbed John through the chest.

The cost comes afterward. John's heart cannot survive the wound, so Marcus gives his own for the transplant and dies. John then radios the Resistance that this battle is won but the war against the machines goes on.

The machine John Connor is a human machine hybrid played by Jason Clarke in Terminator Genisys (2015), a captured John turned into a new nanotech machine that serves Skynet. The team fights him inside the Cyberdyne building, and Pops traps him in the field of the time machine's reactor. Both are torn apart in the blast, which destroys the Genisys core.

Skynet is the network behind every model, and this film gives it a face. Matt Smith is credited as Alex / Skynet, and the story presents Genisys as an app set to launch worldwide and link every device, which turns out to be Skynet itself. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines takes a different view, with Skynet as software spread across networked systems rather than a single core.

A short scene after the credits shows the core system surviving in a protected underground chamber.

The Rev-9 is the newest Terminator model in the films, played by Gabriel Luna and credited as Gabriel / REV-9 in Terminator: Dark Fate (2019). It can split into a liquid metal body and a hard endoskeleton, so two machines can hunt at once. It is sent after Dani Ramos, a factory worker in 2020 Mexico City, because Dani is destined to lead the human resistance against a defense AI called Legion.

Grace, an augmented human soldier from 2042 played by Mackenzie Davis, protects Dani, and the Rev-9 kills Dani's brother Diego, played by Diego Boneta. Sarah Connor, played by Linda Hamilton, arrives to rescue the survivors. The Rev-9 later captures Carl, the T-800, on a cargo plane, and the group parachutes out near a hydroelectric dam where the final fight takes place.

The Rev-9 is destroyed when Dani uses Grace's power core as a weapon while Carl holds it in place near a turbine. Grace dies from her injuries and Carl is destroyed along with the machine, which leaves Dani and Sarah to prepare for the war.

My ranking of the Terminator models, from best to worst, is the T-1000, the T-800, Marcus Wright, the Rev-9 and the T-X. This is opinion, and I have weighed each model by what it does on screen, not by how often it appears. The machine John Connor of Terminator Genisys is left unranked because he appears too briefly.

1. T-1000. In my opinion, it is the best villain in the saga. The mall chase, the imitation of Sarah at the steel mill and the molten steel finale of Terminator 2: Judgment Day give it more memorable set pieces than any other model.

1. T-800. The T-800 ranks second because one machine works as assassin in 1984, protector in 1991 and Carl in 2019. No other model is asked to change this much and stay believable.

1. Marcus Wright. He is the most interesting design, because he does not know he is a machine. His heart transplant ending in Terminator Salvation gives the hybrid concept a real payoff.

1. Rev-9. Its ability to split into a liquid metal body and an endoskeleton is a clever update, and the dam fight is a strong closing set piece. It ranks fourth because it follows the T-1000's template closely.

1. T-X. On paper it is the most advanced machine, since it takes over the protecting Terminator and the company's machines. In practice, in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, I find it the least distinct of the models, and its defeat at Crystal Peak is overshadowed by the Terminator's sacrifice.

For how the films themselves compare, see terminator movies ranked, and for the people these machines hunt, see terminator characters.