The Arrowverse is full of very popular canon ships, but there are still some that the fans prefer more than them.
- Oliver/Felicity started out as this trope, becoming so popular with fans compared to Oliver's canonical romance with Laurel that the show made it canon in season 3. However, their promotion to Official Couple caused them to suffer from Shipping Bed Death to some, which led to it falling out of favor with several fans who came to want Oliver to be with Sara or Laurel instead.
- Tommy/Laurel are a very well regarded romance in the Arrow community with many fans regarding them as having far more convincing chemistry and moments together then any of her scenes with Oliver throughout season 1. It's pretty noteworthy that the two still have a very strong fan following to this day despite the fact that Tommy's been dead since the end of season 1. That being said, it can be argued that the fan following for Oliver/Laurel has grown enough to at least match it, especially after Laurel was no longer Oliver's main love interest. The series finale reveals in the new timeline where Tommy survived, he and Laurel were married until her death
- Surprisingly, despite everything that happened between them in season six (or in some ways because of it), Dinah/Earth-2 Laurel is incredibly popular, especially in comparison to any other ship involving the two (including Dinah's canon one with Vigilante). Them going from enemies to genuinely really close friends helps. The fact that the canceled spin-off, Green Arrow and the Canaries, was very heavily pushing them as main characters also helps. Even Dinah's actress Julianna Harkavy seems to ship them together.
- The most popular non-canon pairing in the fandom is Barry Allen/Leonard Snart, aka ColdFlash, thanks to Captain Cold being quite the Lovable Rogue. The Official Couple, Barry Allen/Iris West (WestAllen), though remains the most popular once Snart moved shows.
- Barry Allen/Caitlin Snow (SnowBarry) was this during Season One. While still a popular ship, the introduction of Caitlin's fiancee/husband Ronnie Raymond caused it to die down significantly. It did, however, have a brief re-surge in popularity over the course of Season Three, when Caitlin briefly succumbed to her Superpowered Evil Side Killer Frost, and joined up with Savitar, an evil time remnant of Barry's future self..
- After Ronnie's death, Cisco Ramon/Caitlin Snow became one, as many believed Caitlin had more chemistry with her best friend than she did with her later love interests. The same reasoning went for Cisco.
- In season one, Kara was shipped with Cat Grant much more often than with her canon love interest, James Olsen.
- Due to Cat's departure at the beginning of season two, Kara is now most frequently shipped with Lena Luthor even after the show tried giving Kara male love interests like Mon-El and William and the actors made fun of the idea that Supercorp could ever become canon in an interview (which fans did not take well to). On Archive of Our Own, the Kara/Lena paring not only has the most fanfiction of any Arrowverse ship, but also any DC or even femslash ship in general.
- In season three, Alex/Maggie remains an extremely popular ship even after they break up; Alex doesn't get another love interest in the season, but there's a small Alex/Sam fandom.
- Mick Rory/Amaya Jiwe had some brief Ship Tease, but for whatever reason Amaya was paired with Nate Heywood instead. Many still prefer the former pairing.
- Wally West/Nate Haywood has a very vocal fandom and a large bulk of the fans who called for Wally to move to the Legends were Wally/Nate shippers, especially as many believe it would be a good way to allow Keiynan Lonsdale to play a bisexual character after coming out in 2017.
- Zari Tomaz/Amaya Jiwe became popular with Zari's intro and their shared connection. Some shippers transfered over to Charlie/Zari after Amaya left and Charlie started to look like Amaya. Supposedly, a kiss was filmed between the latter two, but it was never released.
- Most fans don't ship Kate with her ex Sophie. Instead, most of the show's fanfiction pair her with Kara Danvers/Supergirl. This is due to the large amount of Les Yay they shared in Elseworlds (2018), including Kara using her x-ray vision to see Kate's tattoos. This only increased after Crisis on Infinite Earths (2019), which saw them spend most of their screentime together and bonding. Now that they are on the same Earth many fanfic writers have jumped on board shipping them.
