5 Topwater Lures That Will Catch You More Fish

The best topwater lures vary depending on conditions, bodies of water, and of course, between anglers. Knowing this, we created a list of five of the best topwater lures, according to our team. Take a peek and hopefully it helps you spend a little less time in your tackle box and more time ripping lips.

1) Topwater Walking Bait

Explore The Googan Squad Hound

A classic walk-the-dog style topwater like Heddon Spook or the Googan Squad Hound are important tools on the belt for any topwater angler. The ability to cover water while creating a loud and enticing action across the surface helps trigger insane blow-ups from both brown and green bass. Throw topwater walking baits near points, docks, creek-mouths, or around schooling baitfish and you'll get lit up.

2) Topwater Plopping Bait

Explore The River2Sea Whopper Plopper

Inspired by a musky lure design, the Whopper Plopper from River2Sea took the bass industry by storm a few years back. Unlike any top-water bait we've seen before, this bad-boy creates a plopping noise upon retrieval that just screams big fish. Coming in a variety of sizes the Whopper Plopper is a remarkably effective and fun bait to fish with. The calming plopping noise can set anglers into a trance, usually interrupted by a surprising surface explosion.


In addition to the traditional plopping style bait, the Googan Squad Revolver features a plopping propeller more centrally located and closer to the bait's hooks. This adaptation increases hook-up percentages and, in return, has turned the Googan Squad Revolver into one of the hottest topwater plopping baits on the market today.

3) Hollow Body Plastic Frog

Explore The Googan Squad Filthy Frog

You can throw frogs around pads, grass, mats or even skip it under docks. The subtle commotion you get from slowly twitching, popping, or walking a frog can result in the most insane topwater strikes of your life. When a fish hits a frog, your instincts will want you to immediately rip the rod high in the air with a hard and fast hookset. This is not what you should do. Instead, it is essential to be patient and give a brief pause before reeling down and setting the hook. It's much easier said than done, but reacting calmly and waiting for a second will help increase your hook-up ratio.

4) Topwater Popper

Explore Topwater Poppers

Topwater poppers are easy to fish, highly effective, and known for singing some of the sweetest songs a fishing lure can produce. Poppers get their name from the ''popping'' motion anglers use to work this bait effectively. Once your rod is pointed towards the water, gently twitch your rod tip to get the bait moving. The sudden commotion fills the popper's distinguishable cupped mouth while emitting a subtle blooping noise. This should be continually be repeated throughout each cast to help draw strikes from nearby fish, who might think your popper is a distressed baitfish or frog skimming across the surface.

5) Buzzbaits

Explore Buzzbaits

Buzzbaits will sink, so you'll need to start retrieving your bait as soon as it hits the water. With the rod tip pointed up, quickly wind your bait so the buzzing blade is plopping and flopping across the surface. The loud buzzing and clicking action create a disturbance atop the water to trigger strikes from curious fish close enough to hone in on the abnormal noise. The hook/skirt combo design also helps avoid snagging when you fish the buzzbait around laydowns or timber. The baitfish profile is enhanced by the "clicking" sound you receive from the blade.