Best Planeswalkers in Magic: The Gathering (2026) — A Cross-Format Tier List
Planeswalkers promised to be the most powerful card type ever printed. Most of them flopped. The handful that didn't bend entire formats around themselves. Here's the tier list.
Planeswalkers were sold as the most powerful card type ever printed — permanents that generate value every single turn and can win the game outright with an ultimate. Most of them flopped. For every Oko there are ten walkers that cost five mana, do nothing the turn they land, and die to a single attacker before they ever pay you back.
The handful that work, though, bent entire formats around themselves. Oko, Thief of Crowns got banned in nearly everything. Wrenn and Six dominated Legacy. Teferi, Hero of Dominaria defined Standard and Modern control for years. The gap between a great planeswalker and a bad one is enormous, and the difference is almost never the ultimate — it's whether the card does something useful the turn it enters and whether it can defend itself.
This is a cross-format tier list. A planeswalker that's an S-tier bomb in 1v1 Modern can be a B-tier liability in four-player Commander, where three opponents can gang up on it. We'll flag where each walker shines. No "every planeswalker ranked" filler — just the ones worth building around.
What makes a planeswalker good
Three things separate the staples from the chaff.
- Immediate impact. The best walkers do something the turn they land — generate a blocker, kill a creature, draw a card, or protect their own loyalty. A walker that just ticks up and waits is a five-mana enchantment your opponent gets to attack.
- Self-protection. A planeswalker that makes a blocker, gains loyalty fast, or removes the creature attacking it defends itself. The ones that don't are removal magnets that trade down.
- Loyalty floor vs. cost. A four-mana walker that enters at three loyalty and has a +1 is far more survivable than a five-mana walker that enters at four and only has minus abilities. Entering high and ticking up is how walkers survive a turn cycle.
The ultimate is almost never why a planeswalker is good. By the time you ultimate Teferi or Ugin, you were already winning. Walkers earn their slot on the value they generate before the ultimate — the ultimate is just the exclamation point.
S-tier: the format-warpers
These are the planeswalkers that got banned, defined formats, or both. Run them anywhere they're legal.
| Walker | Cost | Why it's S-tier |
|---|---|---|
| Wrenn and Six | {R}{G} | Two-mana walker. +1 returns a land from your graveyard, -1 deals 1 damage. Dominated Legacy for years |
| Oko, Thief of Crowns | {1}{G}{U} | Turns any permanent into a 3/3, makes Food, neutralizes threats. Banned across multiple formats |
| Teferi, Hero of Dominaria | {3}{W}{U} | +1 draws and untaps lands, -3 bounces a permanent, ultimate exiles the opponent's board. The control finisher |
| Ugin, the Spirit Dragon | {8} | Colorless. -X destroys every nonland permanent of a chosen color or no color. A one-card board wipe plus threat |
Wrenn and Six is the most efficient planeswalker ever printed for constructed. Two mana, enters at three loyalty, and the +1 returns a fetchland or any land from your graveyard while the -1 pings for 1. In Legacy it recurs Wasteland to lock opponents off colors, refills your hand with lands, and ticks toward an ultimate that gives you spell recursion. Two mana for that much value warps deckbuilding.
Oko, Thief of Crowns is the cautionary tale. It cost three mana, entered at four loyalty, and its +1 made a 3/3 Elk while its -5 turned your opponent's best permanent into a vanilla 3/3. It could elk your own Food token to gain loyalty, defend itself, and neutralize any threat. It was so dominant it got banned in Standard, Pioneer, Modern, Legacy, and Brawl. When a walker breaks five formats, it's S-tier.
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria is the platonic control planeswalker. The +1 draws a card and untaps two lands, meaning he protects your counterspell mana while building card advantage. The -3 bounces any permanent. The ultimate exiles three of the opponent's permanents and shuffles them away, which usually ends the game. Every white-blue control deck for years was built to land and protect this card.
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon costs eight, but in any deck that ramps there, he's a one-card board wipe that leaves a threat behind. The -X destroys every nonland permanent of a chosen color or colorless — point it at the dominant color and you reset the board while keeping a seven-loyalty walker. In Commander he's a colorless include that fits any deck.
A-tier: the reliable bombs
These don't break formats, but they're top-tier includes wherever they're legal. Every one of them does real work the turn it lands.
| Walker | Cost | Standout ability |
|---|---|---|
| The Wandering Emperor | {2}{W}{W} | Flash. Ambush an attacker for exile, make a 2/2 Samurai, or pump and give first strike |
| Liliana of the Veil | {1}{B}{B} | +1 makes both players discard, -2 forces a sacrifice. Disruption on a stick |
| Karn, the Great Creator | {4} | Shuts off opponents' artifacts and tutors any artifact from outside the game |
| Elspeth, Sun's Champion | {4}{W}{W} | +1 makes three 1/1 Soldiers, -3 wipes big creatures. Defends itself and the board |
| Narset, Parter of Veils | {1}{U}{U} | Digs for noncreature spells and shuts off opponent extra-draw. A cEDH staple |
| Nissa, Who Shakes the World | {3}{G}{G} | Doubles your Forest mana and animates lands into 3/3s. Explosive in mono-green |
The Wandering Emperor is the best of the bunch for flexibility. Flash means you hold up mana, ambush an attacker by exiling it, and leave a planeswalker behind — all at instant speed. That single trick (kill a creature, gain a walker, on their turn) is why it sees Standard, Pioneer, Modern, and Commander play simultaneously.
Liliana of the Veil is the disruption walker. Plus to make everyone discard, minus to force a sacrifice that gets around hexproof and indestructible. In 1v1 Modern and Legacy she strips the opponent's hand and removes their threats. In multiplayer Commander she's weaker — the symmetrical discard hits you too, and three opponents refill faster than one.
Karn, the Great Creator and Narset, Parter of Veils are the hatebears of the group. Karn turns off every opponent's mana rock and equipment, then fetches a silver-bullet artifact from your sideboard or, in singleton formats, your collection-as-wishboard where allowed. Narset stops opponents from drawing extra cards — devastating against Rhystic Study and wheel effects — and digs you toward gas. Both are cEDH and competitive-constructed staples.
A-tier walkers all share one trait: they affect the board the turn they enter. The Wandering Emperor kills something on flash. Elspeth makes three blockers. Liliana strips a card. None of them are "play it and pass."
B-tier: strong in the right deck
These need the right shell. In the deck they're built for, they're excellent. Outside it, they're filler.
- Nissa, Who Shakes the World straddles A and B — she's an absolute bomb in a Forest-heavy mono-green or Simic deck and unplayable anywhere that can't fuel her. We listed her in A-tier above because in her deck she's that good, but she's deck-dependent enough to flag here.
- Garruk, Cursed Huntsman, Vraska, Golgari Queen, and the Kaldheim sagas-walkers are solid value engines that need a midrange creature deck to shine. Good, not format-defining.
- Three-color "command tower" walkers like the various Niv-Mizzet and Atraxa-adjacent walkers are powerful but demand a specific manabase. Build the deck first, then slot the walker.
The honest rule for B-tier: if a walker only works in one archetype and that archetype is your deck, it's an auto-include. If you're slotting it into a generic goodstuff pile because "planeswalkers are good," you'll be disappointed. Match the walker to a plan.
Best planeswalkers by format
The same card lands in different tiers depending on the format. Here's the quick reference.
| Format | Top picks | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Commander (EDH) | Ugin, Teferi Hero, Karn Great Creator, Narset | Colorless or low-color, generate value across a long game, survive a turn cycle |
| Modern | The Wandering Emperor, Wrenn and Six, Karn | 1v1 means they only have to survive one attacker; value compounds fast |
| Legacy | Wrenn and Six, Oko (where legal) | Two-mana walkers in a format full of one-mana spells dominate |
| cEDH | Narset, Karn the Great Creator | Hatebears that lock opponents out of their core engines |
The big multiplayer caveat: planeswalkers are systematically weaker in four-player Commander than in 1v1. Three opponents means three sources of attackers, so a walker that survives easily in Modern gets ganged down in a pod. The walkers that hold up in Commander are the ones that protect themselves (Elspeth's Soldiers, The Wandering Emperor's ambush), wipe the board (Ugin), or generate so much immediate value that they pay off even if they die next turn (Teferi's draw-two-untap-two). For more on building around these in EDH, see our how to build a Commander deck guide.
How to actually protect a planeswalker
A planeswalker you can't defend is a five-mana spell that draws your opponent a removal target. Protecting them is half the skill.
- Land them when you have a board presence. A walker behind three blockers survives; a walker on an empty board dies. Don't dump your hand and then play the walker into nothing.
- Use plus abilities that make blockers. Elspeth and similar token-makers defend themselves. That's not a coincidence — it's the design.
- Hold removal for the biggest attacker. If the opponent has one threat that can kill your walker, kill the threat first. A Swords to Plowshares spent protecting Teferi is well spent. Our best removal spells guide covers the cheap interaction that keeps walkers alive.
- In Commander, deploy walkers when the table is pointed elsewhere. Politics matter. A walker that lands while two opponents are racing each other survives far longer than one that lands while you're the threat.
The flash walkers (The Wandering Emperor) cheat all of this by entering on the opponent's turn, already having done something. That's why flash is the most underrated keyword on a planeswalker.
Quick Action Checklist
Use this to evaluate any planeswalker before you sleeve it up.
- Does it do something useful the turn it enters, or is it "play and pass"? Cut the latter
- Can it defend itself — make a blocker, gain loyalty fast, or remove the attacker?
- Is the loyalty floor high relative to the cost? Enter-high, tick-up walkers survive
- For Commander: does it survive being attacked from three directions, or generate value before it dies?
- Don't slot a walker for its ultimate. Slot it for the per-turn value
- Match B-tier walkers to the exact archetype they're built for. Don't run them as generic goodstuff
- Hold cheap removal to protect your best walker from the one attacker that kills it
- Prioritize flash walkers (The Wandering Emperor) — entering at instant speed dodges most of the downside