Looking for the best MTG planeswalker cards? Since 2007 when they were first introduced, Wizards of the Coast has created a fair few planeswalkers, but only a small portion of them are worth slotting into your decks.
Whether you’re looking for an all-star multiverse explorer to strengthen your deck, or just a history lesson on the best Planeswalker cards Wizards has ever put to print, we’ll help you out.
This list show you the best of the bunch, but if you’re interested in specific categories, we also have guides to the best white planeswalker cards, the best red planeswalkers, the best green planeswalkers, and the best planeswalker commanders.
What is an MTG Planeswalker card?
Planeswalkers are mighty, magical beings capable of dimension-hopping. They walk between the planes, exploring the multiverse, dealing with world-ending threats, getting into unlikely scrapes, and generally making a humongous mess wherever they roam.
In game terms, planeswalkers are a unique type of card, with their own health (or loyalty) pools which they can spend (or increase) once per turn to activate numerous loyalty abilities, and which can be depleted by spells or attacking creatures. Many are just a minor nuisance, while others are supremely powerful, representing some of the top cards you can play in Magic: the Gathering.
Planeswalkers are value engines – providing powerful effects for free once you’ve played them. You plonk them down, and your opponent has to immediately make a choice: either divert resources to taking your ‘walker out, or try and finish you off ASAP, before they run away with the game.
Here, in very rough ascending order of excellence, are the absolute best planeswalkers: the ones you want on your side of the board, and the ones that will elicit a groan whenever your opponent puts them into play.
10. Narset, Parter of Veils
Narset is a deceptively mean planeswalker, who fetches you cards and stops your opponents drawing any. While it’s true she has no way to restore loyalty, that’s not really important, as for three mana you’ll be perfectly happy getting one or two uses out of her, then having her sit on the battlefield causing problems.
What makes Narset so horrendous to deal with is that your opponent has very little recourse if they’re not already set up to deal with her. If they don’t have a substantial board presence when you cast her, or cards in their hand that can take her out, they’re stuffed: they can’t go digging for answers.
9. Nissa, Who Shakes the World
Another WAR planeswalker who was amazing in Standard, Nissa, Who Shakes the World provides great value for a five mana Planeswalker. First off, she immediately doubles your mana, ensuring you have all the resources you need to cast something mammoth.
Even if you weren’t immediately boosted in this way, Nissa would still be pretty tricky to deal with, as she turns your lands into vigilant creatures that can attack and then block, right away.
Thanks to the mini Mirari’s Wake effect and the endless stream of creatures, it isn’t rare for Nissa to reach her -8 ultimate ability, which can fetch every land out of your deck, and make all your animated lands indestructible.
8. Karn, the Great Creator
The Batman of planeswalker cards, Karn has an unlimited utility belt filled with everything you could possibly need, as long as it’s an artifact. Able to grab the best card for any situation from your sideboard, if you have a Karn on the field, you’re prepared for anything.
That’s not to mention his other abilities, the most important of which is a static that shuts down opposing artifacts. There are lots of punishing combos with this ability, including some that lock out all your enemy’s lands. Karn received a ban in Pioneer pretty recently, and in protest he turned into a tree.
7. Chandra, Torch of Defiance
None of Chandra’s abilities are outrageously powerful on their own. Instead, her strength lies in how many niches she fills. For a character whose solution to most problems is setting things on fire, she’s got a surprisingly varied resume.
Chandra, Torch of Defiance has four different loyalty abilities, one more than most planeswalkers manage to bring to the table – better still, each one is very useful. You can generate card advantage or create extra mana with her +1 abilities.
You’ll always want to be doing one of these: use the second ability to play all the cards in your hand, and the first as soon as you start to run out. If you get into trouble, you can use her -3 ability to remove threatening creatures, and finally, her ultimate ends the game in short order.
That’s a lot of utility, all wrapped up in one super-economical 4-mana package.
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6. Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
A planeswalker from a time when control was king, Teferi, Hero of Dominaria has a bunch of really useful abilities. He can draw you cards as he ticks up, and untap lands to let you play a counterspell or piece of removal. That’s important, as most really good planeswalkers are a bit cheaper than Teferi, but he essentially refunds you two mana.
If your opponent has something really dangerous, Teferi’s -3 ability can take care of it, removing it from the battlefield for several turns. Finally, you can never ignore this planeswalker, as the emblem he creates with his ultimate will spell your inevitable doom.
5. The Wandering Emperor
The Wandering Emperor is a brutal, and fairly unconventional planeswalker, able to come down on either player’s turn and exile a creature straight away. Even if there’s nothing tapped for her to kill, her abilities make combat a nightmare, as she can create a blocker or grant first strike to an existing creature.
From there, The Wandering Emperor takes over the game with ease, growing creatures, popping out 2/2s, and then removing anything you try to attack with.
4. Teferi, Time Raveler
In MTG’s story, Teferi is a pacifist, a good dad, generally a nice bloke. But ask anyone who played Standard when Teferi, Time Raveler (T3feri to his friends) was king and they’ll tell you: he’s a villain through and through.
Prevalent in Standard until it finally ate a belated ban, this three mana planeswalker was an oppressive control card that was incredibly annoying to come up against, due to the number of strategies he shuts down.
Thanks to his static ability, you can’t play counterspells; in fact, instants in general are out. On top of that, your opponent can play sorceries on your turn, which just feels unfair. That -3 ability is super-handy too, removing a threat and providing card advantage.
Paired with his buddy Narset, Parter of Veils, Teferi terrorised the Standard format for the duration of his time there. Beyond Standard, the card saw plenty of play in non-rotating formats like Modern as well, and with good reason.
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3. Ugin, The Spirit Dragon
The most costly planeswalker on this list, Ugin, The Spirit Dragon comes with plenty of loyalty and some extremely powerful effects that make them well worth the cost.
The most important of these is their -X ability. It’s a game-ender, typically sweeping away your opponent’s entire board, while preserving any colorless permanents you’ve chosen to play, and, more often than not, also leaving Ugin alive to keep pecking away with their +2 damage-dealing power. Do dragons peck? Never mind, it’s not important.
Ugin’s ultimate ability is the cherry on top – it’s perfectly reachable, requiring only two turns before you can activate it. If you can pull it off, you’re almost guaranteed the match, but you barely ever need it.
The card got a reprint in Core Set 2021, giving this already popular planeswalker a brand new lease on life.
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2. Oko, Thief of Crowns
In late 2019, the only creature type in Magic: the Gathering was the elk. That’s all thanks to this devilishly good-looking Oko fella. Clearly billed as a troublesome prankster, Oko, Thief of Crowns, in fact, proved far more apocalyptic than that.
Oko’s power mainly comes from his low casting cost and the fact that most of his abilities increase loyalty instead of reducing it. Oko comes down on turn 3 (often sooner, since green is the color of mana ramp) and if you don’t have some way to dish out 6 damage right away, there’s not much you can do to catch up. That’s quite a tall order, so early in the game.
Oko has great versatility for a planeswalker with three abilities – he produces 3/3 elks to block your smaller creatures, and your bigger creatures? They’re elks now. Oh god, everything is elks now!
Fortunately, “Broko” Oko took a banhammer right to the kisser, and was kicked out of five different formats in total. You can still play him in Commander, though, if you want all the other players to suffer flashbacks and then turn on you in fury.
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1. Jace, The Mind Sculptor
Oko is far too banned to clinch the top spot, so the prize instead goes to the ever-popular Jace, The Mind Sculptor, arguably the best planeswalker ever printed.
Why is Jace so good? Well, for starters, he’s cheap and comes with four abilities, both hallmarks of a strong planeswalker. But then, if you look more closely at the first and third of those abilities, you’ll see that they can be used in entirely different ways, depending on whether you target your opponent’s side of the board or your own. Jace must have been doing his daily stretches, because boy, is he flexible.
Jace is a fantastic tool if you want to play a controlling game of Magic, as he gives you multiple methods to find the cards you need and deal with your opponent’s threats. He’ll keep that up all game, while you get on with playing your win conditions and your opponent tears their hair out. The card wins games, simple as that.
Jace broke Standard wide open in 2010, and has been pulling his weight handily across all other formats ever since. He’s yet to be unseated as top dog, and any new planeswalker that did so would probably be courting a mass-ban like the one Oko received.
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Source: Wargamer
