Battle of Leuthen
The leftmost column of cavalry remained behind to convince the Austrians that it was still approaching directly at the latter end of the Austrian line, near Frobelwitz. The visible distraction screened Frederick's intent of executing an oblique maneuver like the one that he had used successfully only weeks earlier at the Battle of Rossbach. Prince Charles, watching from his vantage point, moved his entire reserve to his right flank. That not only weakened the left flank but also stretched his front from Leuthen past Frobelwitz and on to Nypern and extended it well beyond its original 4 km (2 mi).
While a single column of cavalry mesmerised Charles at his rightmost flank, the rest of the Prussians continued undetected, behind those hills across the Austrian front and overreached the Austrian left wing.

Oblique maneuver: The Prussian infantry marched southward and remained behind a line of low hills, out of the Austrians' sight. When the heads of both superbly-drilled Prussian columns, the distances between the marching platoons remaining exactly the width of each platoon's front, had passed the Austrian left flank, the columns veered left toward the enemy and continued their march until they had passed beyond the left Austrian flank. On command, the platoons of the columns then faced left at Lobetinz, and the whole Prussian army stood in line of battle, two to three men deep, at a nearly-right angle to the weakest point of the Austrian left. Similarly, Hans Joachim von Zieten's cavalry had traversed the entire Austrian front and positioned itself at a 45-degree angle to the Austrian flank.
The Prussian artillery perched on the reverse slopes of the Butterberg and was hidden from the Austrians' view while it prepared to move to the crest to time their bombardment with the infantry's attack. The bulk of the repositioned Prussian army now faced the smallest component of the Austrian line. The only column of Prussian cavalry and the small reserve of infantry remaining at the Austrian far right continued to demonstrate in front of the Austrians and even moved further north, as if an attack would occur there.

Attack: The Austrians were astonished at the Prussian appearance on their left flank, but the objective was soon clear. The Prussian infantry, now arrayed in the conventional two lines of battle, advanced on the weakest part of the Austrian line with the intention of rolling up the flank. The Austrian colonels on the scene did their best by turning their own lines 90 degrees and trying to take advantage of a shallow ditch, which faced the Prussian line. Franz Leopold von Nádasdy, who commanded the flank, asked Charles for support, a request that was ignored. Even in the late morning, with most of the Prussian army on his left flank, he still believed that any attack would come at the northern flank. Most of the men in the first Austrian line were Württembergers, Protestant troops whose willingness to fight the Lutheran Prussians had been called into question by the Austrian command. The Württembergers held out and maintained steady musket fire until the mass of Prussians emerged through the haze of gunpowder. They then ran for their lives, sweeping the Bavarians deployed by Nádasdy to support his flank with them.
The first wave of Prussian infantry, supported by Frederick's artillery, which now pounded away from the crest of one of the hillocks, pushed steadily toward Leuthen. Commanded by Moritz of Anhalt-Dessau, the seasoned infantry and grenadiers went into battle with 60 rounds per man, according to Prussian regulation. When they overwhelmed the first Austrian line, they had already run out of ammunition. Nádasdy sent his own small cavalry against the Prussian grenadier column and its infantry support but to no avail. Nádasdy withdrew his men in chaos with his troops disarrayed. Prince Charles and Daun finally realised they had been tricked and rushed troops from the right to the left, but they had extended the front, which was originally about 4 km (2 mi) long, to almost 10 km (6 mi), when they had repositioned forces earlier that day to meet Frederick's diversion. As the Austrians withdrew, the Prussian artillery raked them with enfilade fire.
The Prussian infantry and grenadiers reached Leuthen in 40 minutes and pushed the Austrian troops into the village. Prussian grenadiers breached the wall first and stormed the church, where many of the defenders were killed. Hand-to-hand fighting raged throughout the village. Charles-Joseph Lamoral, eventually Prince de Ligne, was then a captain in an Austrian regiment of foot:

Our Lieutenant-Colonel fell[,] killed almost at the first; beyond this we lost our Major, and indeed all the Officers but three.... We had crossed two successive ditches, which lay in an orchard to the left of the first houses in Leuthen; and were beginning to form in front of the village. But there was no standing of it. Besides a general cannonade such as can hardly be imagined, there was a rain of case-shot upon this Battalion, of which I, as there was no Colonel left, had to take command.
Leuthen was not a big village, troops were so closely packed they stood 30 to 100 ranks deep and the killing was terrible. Lamoral commented later that his battalion, usually some 1,000 strong, as well as some Hungarians and some grenadiers who had been separated from their own companies, gave him fewer than 200 men. He drew them back to the height at the edge of the village, where there was a windmill around which they could take shelter. Eventually, the Prussian Life Guards, commanded by Captain Wichard Joachim Heinrich von Möllendorf broke through the village cemetery and forced them to abandon their post.
The Austrians briefly took the advantage when they moved a battery from the ridge north of the village to cover their infantry, and the fire from the battery allowed the infantry to deploy at right angles to their original front. Frederick responded by ordering the last of his reserved left wing to advance, but the Austrian battery drove it back. Finally, Frederick's heavy cannons on the Butterberg, a small knoll to the west of town, laid down a barrage. Some participants said that barrage, more than the Prussian infantry, won the battle.
The assault on the wall briefly exposed General Wolf Frederick von Retzow's infantry line. More than two hours had elapsed since the Prince had ordered his cavalry back to Leuthen, but it arrived opportunely. Commanded by Joseph Count Lucchesi d’ Averna the cavalry hurried to take them in the flank; a successful cavalry charge at that critical moment could have turned the tide of battle. Unfortunately for the Austrians, 40 squadrons of Zieten's cavalry awaited them at Radaxdorf and charged their flank, and another 30 squadrons commanded by Georg Wilhelm von Driesen charged their front. The Bayreuth Dragoons hit the other flank; and the Puttkamer Hussars charged the rear. Lucchessi was killed by being decapitated by a cannonball, and his troopers were scattered. The cavalry mêlée soon swirled into the Austrian infantry line behind Leuthen, which caused more confusion. Overrun by the Prussian horse, the Austrian infantry broke. The infantry and then the cavalry retreated toward Breslau, where they crossed the Schweidnitzer Weistritz river, then called the "Black Water".

Maps: Solid red lines indicate Habsburg positions. Solid blue lines indicate Prussian positions. Dotted lines show movement. Rectangles with a diagonal line indicate cavalry.

	The Battle in Four Maps

Aftermath: As the smoke cleared, the Prussian infantry reformed its lines and prepared to pursue the fleeing Austrians. Snow began to fall, and Frederick halted the pursuit. A few soldiers, perhaps only one of them, started to sing the well-known chorale Nun danket alle Gott (Now Thank We All Our God). Eventually the entire army may have joined in the song, but that story is likely apocryphal.
Frederick pushed toward Lissa. Refugees from the battle had filled the town, and he found the courtyard of the local castle crowded with startled Austrian officers. Reportedly, after the King dismounted, he addressed them politely, "Good evening, Gentlemen, I dare say you did not expect me here. Can one get a night's lodging along with you?"
After a day of rest, on 7 December, Frederick sent half his cavalry with Zieten, chasing Charles's retreating army, now heading toward Königgrätz by Schweidnitz and captured another 2,000 men and their baggage. With the rest of his army, Frederick marched on Breslau. By chasing Charles's army into Bohemia, the Prussians guaranteed the isolation of the Allied garrison holding Breslau. The Austrian general left in command of the city, Lieutenant Field Marshal Salman Sprecher von Bernegg, had a combined force of French and Austrian of 17,000 men. Breslau was a well-fortified city of walls and moats.