Falling speed

Falling speed refers to the rate in which a character can move downward in mid-air. Falling speed can greatly impact a character's fighting style - for instance Jigglypuff, a floaty character uses its low falling speed in order to hit opponents multiple times in mid-air while faster characters like Captain Falcon use their quick falling speed to perform quick and powerful aerial attacks.

Additionally, falling speed directly affects the vertical component of attacks' knockback in combination with weight. Attacks of upward trajectory knock back slow-falling, floaty characters more than they knock back fast-fallers. However, a floaty heavyweight will be harder to KO vertically than a floaty lightweight. Though both falling speed and weight affect knockback, they are independent of each other. A fast-falling character is not heavy and in vice versa. Examples would be Fox who is a fast-faller, but is very light while Samus is a heavy weight and a floaty character.

Fast-faller
Fast-faller is a name that refers to characters with relatively fast falling speed. and are prominent examples.

Fast-fallers enjoy increased speed in the air and faster short hop approaches, but their recoveries suffer as a result. They are susceptible to different combos then floaty characters. Generally, fast-fallers are more vulnerable to chain grabs and combos.

Floaty
Floaty is a name that describes characters with slow falling speed. and are prominent examples of characters with slow falling speed. is also a floaty character which is unusual for a heavyweight.

Floaty characters have great benefits in terms of performing aerial attacks in quick succession. Jigglypuff would be an example of this with the wall of pain. Floaty characters have an easier time recovering due to slow falling speeds, but are easy to KO vertically. However, they're less vulnerable to combos and chain grabs.

Characters falling speeds
The following results are estimates and were tested in Target Smash!!. The results are from the fastest to the slowest fallers.