Canton, Ohio's The Behest of Serpents deal in melodic death metal with a coiling, venom-laced attack that suits their name — sharp melodic leads threaded through a backbone of heavy, purposeful riffing. Formed in 2021, they're part of a new wave of Midwestern acts proving that the region's industrial heritage continues to produce some of the country's most serious death metal.

Cincinnati's The Vile Doctrine blend deathcore's breakdown-heavy architecture with the putrid mid-tempo grind of old-school death metal, crafting a sound that sits at the uglier, more aggressive end of the Ohio underground since their 2020 formation.

Cincinnati's Thorns of the Carrion have been building their atmospheric gothic doom/death sound since 2000, blending the mournful grandeur of gothic metal with death metal weight and doom's measured pace. The long-running Ohio act occupies a space where beauty and decay intertwine across decades of output.

Twinsburg, Ohio's Thou Shalt Not have been a steadfast presence in the Ohio death metal scene since forming in 2000, building a catalog rooted in mid-period American death metal with a commitment to the genre's founding principles. Longevity in a regional underground is its own testament to the band's dedication.

Columbus, Ohio's Throne of Decay blend melodic death metal's sweeping, mournful leads with black metal's freezing atmosphere and abrasive intensity, carving a niche in the Midwest's growing extreme metal underground since their formation in 2022.

Toledo, Ohio death metal act Thy Demise have been delivering straightforward, no-compromise brutality since 2015, operating in a rust belt city with a surprisingly durable extreme music underground. Their approach strips away the subgenre's more technical or melodic tendencies in favor of direct, relentless aggression.

Ironton, Ohio's Titanosauria are a 2025 slam and brutal death metal project with prehistoric appetites — dense, low-tuned, and devoted to the maximally heavy end of the spectrum where breakdowns hit like extinction-level events.

Based in Coldwater, Ohio, Toluca Lake push melodic death metal into stranger territory, weaving experimental textures into their song structures to produce something more unsettling than the genre's traditional melodic fare.

Greenville, Ohio's Tomb Perfume arrived in 2024 with a death-grind approach that prizes speed and grime equally, suggesting a band more interested in maximum ugliness than technical precision.