The 66 Best Spirits in Magic Ranked

Last updated on April 20, 2026

Deadeye Navigator | Illustration by Lie Setiawan

I ain’t afraid of no ghosts. At least when I’m playing them!

Spirits can be a powerful force on the battlefield, whether that’s the mono-blue or Azorius tempo decks in various Constructed formats or some of the synergistic decks in Commander.

But more and more spirits are being printed across all colors, so there are plenty of them with unique and powerful abilities, even if you don’t want to join the ghostly procession and want something for your EDH 99.

Have a look at one of my very favorite creature types in MTG!

What Are Spirits in MTG?

Spirit Mantle | Illustration by Izzy

Spirit is a creature type that first appeared in Legends, but after the Grand Creature Type Update, Dancing Scimitar from Arabian Nights retroactively became the first spirit.

For a number of years powerful spirits have been printed in Azorius colors, but they appear in multiple colors and color combinations. With nearly 1,000 spirits printed, it’s among the most common creature types in the game.

This makes it difficult to rank them, since they’re doing really different things in different formats, although I’ll be aiming this list toward Commander.

#66. Shirei, Shizo’s Caretaker

A fun budget commander, Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker is a nice payoff for sac decks focused on small creatures.

#65. Agrus Kos, Eternal Soldier

This Jumpstart 2022 card seems like a cool riff on Zada, Hedron Grinder. Are there targeted abilities that you’d want besides Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker? I don’t hate using Agrus Kos, Eternal Soldier and building around things like Fallaji Vanguard, Duke Ulder Ravengard, Blessed Hippogriff, etc.

#64. Relic Retriever

If you can’t reliably remove cards from your graveyard each turn, Relic Retriever isn’t worth running. But if you can, it becomes a powerful source of Treasure and mana acceleration

#63. Horobi, Death’s Wail

This is a really fun commander to brew around, and Horobi, Death's Wail loves hanging out in a Killian, Ink Duelist deck when you get tired of mono-black.

#62. Dreamborn Muse

Cards that mill the whole EDH table are reasonably rare, so the fragile Dreamborn Muse and its constant mill every upkeep has its place.

#61. Bygone Bishop

It sounds like the name of a Garbage Pail Kid from the ‘80s, but Bygone Bishop does work in lots of builds, including investigate strategies, affinity, go-wide decks, and even party.

#60. O-Kagachi, Vengeful Kami

O-Kagachi, Vengeful Kami is your 5-color commander for spirits, and sometimes it’s a 5-color dragons commander, although the competition is pretty steep there.

#59. Katilda, Dawnhart Martyr / Katilda’s Rising Dawn

Katilda, Dawnhart Martyr is powerful in spirit typal, and it’s a great bit of card advantage for aura decks. Disturbing Katilda's Rising Dawn can make a threat out of just about anything you control.

#58. The Ancient One

There’s a lot to like about a 2-drop commander, and The Ancient One gives you synergies right from the start. Obviously attractive as a Fight Rigging or fight spell target, the flexible mill angle is worth exploring.

#57. Voice of the Blessed

Because Ajani's Pridemate needed a buff? If you hate seeing lifegain decks, you definitely hate seeing Voice of the Blessed hit the playmat.

#56. Vanguard of the Restless

Being a spirit typal lord intrinsically tied to Commander makes Vanguard of the Restless fairly narrow, but what a spirit lord it is! A scaling anthem that rewards you for having multiple or cheap commanders provides plenty of impact, plus the self-reanimation makes it safe to run out since you can (almost) always get it back.

#55. Drogskol Captain

The hexproof spirits lord is good! Drogskol Captain is good in any spirits deck that can run it.

#54. Karlov of the Ghost Council

Karlov of the Ghost Council is your lifegaining Orzhov commander for when your play group soft bans Liesa, Shroud of Dusk.

#53. Betor, Ancestor’s Voice

Despite having a novel’s worth of text, Betor, Ancestor's Voice is a fairly generic commander that wants you to lose and gain life—both of which are exceptionally easy within the Abzan colors (). It has great flexibility as a midrange commander. At the end of the day, it’s a 3/5 that drops three counters on something at the end of combat.

#52. Ethereal Valkyrie

This card looks goofy, but Ethereal Valkyrie is almost an engine itself within a blink Commander deck. It draws you at least a card per turn, and even discounts some of your spells via foretell.

#51. Abuelo, Ancestral Echo

This underplayed gem provides a lot of value for blink decks. Sure, that’s a crowded field for those 99 slots, but I’d rather have Abuelo, Ancestral Echo than a blink spell in most cases.

#50. Spell Queller

This popular control and spirits typal card just has a lot of uses in 60-card builds. It’s less good in EDH, but I do like saving my board wipe in response to a Teferi's Protection with Spell Queller. That’s niche, I guess, but it’s wicked cool.

#49. Empyrean Eagle

An MVP of birds and spirit decks alike: Empyrean Eagle is simple, and has been used as a generic flying payoff in multiple Core Sets.

#48. Ryusei, the Falling Star

Ryusei, the Falling Star is a huge dragon with a partial board wipe as a death trigger. Cool.

#47. Karador, Ghost Chieftain

Karador, Ghost Chieftain is the default Abzan commander for spirits, and it’s powerful, but it doesn’t quite keep pace.

#46. Yargle and Multani

The meme-lord Yargle returns to helm a meme deck or just to be thrown at enemies with something like a Thud. Yargle and Multani is always going to be less good than we hope it’ll be, but sometimes hope is all we want.

#45. Selfless Spirit

Selfless Spirit is for when you want an Unbreakable Formation effect on a body. And go-wide decks want that.

#44. Guardian of Faith

Guardian of Faith is Selfless Spirit, but way better and less telegraphed. The extra white pip makes it less sleek of a play, though.

#43. Deadeye Navigator

So. Many. Combos. Think about Deadeye Navigator soulbonded with, say, Peregrine Drake? Village Bell-Ringer? Plenty more to choose from.

#42. Bloodghast

Bloodghast is great card to fuel an aristocrats deck as well as various Sultai decks focusing on self-mill with cards like Prized Amalgam.

#41. Harvester of Misery

I love Harvester of Misery. Since you effectively channel it for the -2/-2 ability, it’s really hard for your opponents to stop you from interacting with their early board. In the late-game, it smashes aside small creature decks as a solid two-for-one. You can’t go wrong with this spirit in games focused around creatures.

#40. Malevolent Hermit / Benevolent Geist

It’s only a spirit on its backside, after it dies countering a spell, but that side is money for a control war! Ask your doctor if Malevolent Hermit/Benevolent Geist is right for you.

#39. Grey Host Reinforcements

Grey Host Reinforcements is Angel of Finality, but maybe better and with a better (#shotsfired) creature type?

#38. Kura, the Boundless Sky

Another big dragon with a sweet death trigger, Kura, the Boundless Sky can yoink all three Tron lands from your library if you want. Or something else, sure, but it tutors three land cards, no restrictions.

#37. White Orchid Phantom

White Orchid Phantom gives mono-white decks a cheap, aggressive threat that disrupts opposing lands. It’s a great way to punish low-basic, greedy mana bases and handles Field of the Dead, Cabal Coffers, and other lands that just win the game. Its mana cost works well with devotion, too.

#36. Vengeful Ancestor

Vengeful Ancestor: A card this annoying to play against has got to be goad, I mean, good.

#35. Ranar the Ever-Watchful

This is my favorite blink commander, and it’s #1 in my heart. I know that on raw power, other cards are better than Ranar the Ever-Watchful, but I have a lot of fun with the janky foretell synergies.

#34. Kira, Great Glass-Spinner

Kira, Great Glass-Spinner really makes opponents’ spot removal seek out targets on other players’ playmats.

#33. Lunarch Veteran / Luminous Phantom

Whatever happened to Lunarch Veteran, the lost lead singer of the Soul Sisters band, the most popular act in the lifegain genre? Their big comeback as Luminous Phantom was a surprising burst of fresh air in a stale genre.

#32. Final-Word Phantom

There are just so few cards that give you this ability to cast your sorceries or creatures or enchantments with flash, and Final-Word Phantom is just asking for a spot in EDH.

#31. Atsushi, the Blazing Sky

Hits fast and hard, like a good red creature should, but Atsushi, the Blazing Sky also makes Treasures or draws cards. It’s also a dragon. So that’s a lot of good stuff.

#30. Bogwater Lumaret

A Soul Sister variant does tons of work with the right setup. A lifegain deck gets a ton of triggers from Bogwater Lumaret, plus it enables combos with cards like Warren Soultrader and Lisette, Dean of the Root that require lifegain to establish their loops.

#29. Kami of the Crescent Moon

You need Kami of the Crescent Moon for your Alandra, Sky Dreamer deck. Add a Game Changer Narset, Parter of Veils while you’re at it, you big jerk!

#28. Eidolon of the Great Revel

Eidolon of the Great Revel is a Modern burn staple that has a place in red burn decks in EDH. Those decks are hard to make work given how much lifegain there is, but as decks get lower to the ground, this will get better.

#27. Millicent, Restless Revenant

Millicent, Restless Revenant is your Azorius go-wide spirits commander. It’s a good fliers deck that can go really fast.

#26. King of the Oathbreakers

Being able to turn chaff cards like Heaven's Gate or Cauldron Haze into Teferi's Protection at home is astonishingly annoying to play against if you haven’t had the pleasure. Facing King of the Oathbreakers and its phasing shenanigans feels like you are the orcs in Return of the King. You just sit there and lose as they grow their board.

#25. Spirit of Resilience

Spirit of Resilience exceeds the gravebreak archetype as a powerful tool for any deck that’s reanimating or recurring creatures and artifact. Imagining playing Rakdos and using Reanimate on Ancient Copper Dragon, only to attack with a copy that turn! The space is admittedly narrow, but a sandbox needn’t be big to be fun. You could even exile a Bolas's Citadel to your own Relic of Progenitus to set something up!

#24. Chupacabra Echo

People haven’t taken to Chupacabra Echo the way they did to Ravenous Chupacabra. Sure, we no longer have the Alesha, Who Smiles at Death combo with the cryptid ghost, but blinking this horror to deal with indestructible creatures is very efficient. I expect to see this climb the ranks of playability in Commander eventually.

#23. Dust Animus

Dust Animus is one of those Limited bombs that translates well to Cube. It’s an incredible threat for any archetype—midrange and aggro love the beater, and control doesn’t mind taking a turn off early to plot a large threat it can cast with plenty of countermagic backing it up.

#22. Primordial Sage

You’d rather have Beast Whisperer, but Primordial Sage is good, too, especially in a green ramp deck.

#21. Junji, the Midnight Sky

An amazing death trigger! Hard to want to destroy Junji, the Midnight Sky when they’ll just reanimate the best thing in any graveyard.

#20. Moonshaker Cavalry

Did Moonshaker Cavalry truly live up to its destiny as the white Craterhoof Behemoth? Not quite, but it does have one of the best ETB effects in white…

#19. Drumbellower

Drumbellower‘s effect of untapping all your creatures during your foes' untap steps is useful in most decks and broken in quite a few, like Belisarius Cawl, The Archimandrite, and Shorikai, Genesis Engine.

#18. Eidolon of Blossoms

Eidolon of Blossoms is happy to be invited to the enchantress party, and the select enchantment creatures club. It’s an honor just to be nominated, and there’s so much competition.

#17. Hinata, Dawn-Crowned

The bonkers leader of its own unique deck, Hinata, Dawn-Crowned is very, very powerful. It borders on completely unfair with targeted X-spells, and it's got a great best friend in Voracious Bibliophile.

#16. Teval, the Balanced Scale

Teval, the Balanced Scale will go down as the best Sultai lands commander, and one of the strongest from Tarkir: Dragonstorm. The combination of self-mill, ramp, and board presence drips with power and makes this a frontrunner for graveyard decks. In the command zone or the 99, you should play this if you care about the graveyard and have the appropriate color identity.

#15. Vega, the Watcher

It’s almost shocking to see a card with this kind of triggered ability not limited to once per turn. Because of that, Vega, the Watcher draws a lot of cards. The joke was to use this with foretell in Kaldheim, and it’s since been used as a blink deck staple, even as a commander. But as impulse-based card draw ramps up in red and in packages like the Doctor Who decks, Vega just keeps getting better.

#14. Spectral Sailor

I always want Spectral Sailor in just about every blue deck I play in any format. Whether it’s anchoring Curious Obsession tempo decks, spirits decks, or just providing a flashy, flexible mana sink, it’s always a decent topdeck.

#13. Strict Proctor

Annoying control card or enabler of your Lotus Field nonsense? Strict Proctor is both!

#12. Kami of Whispered Hopes

This Hardened Scales on a stick makes occasional waves in competitive brews and is just waiting for the right meta to start popping off. Kami of Whispered Hopes easily goes infinite with cards like Staff of Domination, making it especially scary to see on the EDH battlefield.

#11. Screaming Nemesis

Screaming Nemesis is a wildly powerful aggressive card, and one of the most comprehensive lifegain hate cards in the game. It’s just sheer, deadly efficiency.

#10. Brago, King Eternal

Brago, King Eternal, that old blinky warhorse, is holding onto the crown of most-played blink commander by the skin of its, well, I don’t know. I don’t think it has any skin, actually. It matters less as a card in the 99, as getting it online in time for its combat damage trigger to be relevant isn’t trivial later in the game.

#9. Karmic Guide

Karmic Guide classically goes infinite with Reveillark and a sac outlet. Blink, reanimator; there’s a lot of strategies that want this effect.

#8. Kodama of the West Tree

Kodama of the West Tree is a concentrated dose of ramp and aggression all at once, granting creatures trample and pulling lands from the deck as your modified creatures connect in combat.

#7. Soulherder

Iconic almost immediately for its wicked art and its reliable enabling of blink, Soulherder is a Cube staple for a reason.

#6. Skyclave Apparition

Awesome removal. Skyclave Apparition is so much better than cards like Fairgrounds Warden. It’s permanent exile even if it’s removed. Flickering this kor spirit is murderous.

#5. Laelia, the Blade Reforged

A strong card across formats, Laelia, the Blade Reforged hits hastily fast, grows with +1/+1 counters thanks to its exile payoff, and draws cards. It hasn't made much of an impact on Modern, but continues to be a presence in Commander and Cube.

#4. Wan Shi Tong, Librarian

Wan Shi Tong, Librarian is one of the most impressive cards from Avatar: The Last Airbender. Commander players exploit the draw trigger when your opponent searches extremely well—that’s fetch lands, tutors, and ramp spells, with three players to trigger it—while players in other formats use it in control decks as a massive threat that provides card advantage and doesn’t require you to tap out of your countermagic.

#3. Crypt Ghast

Crypt Ghast: For when you need a Bubbling Muck but also need to be able to reanimate it to go off again.

#2. Simian Spirit Guide + Elvish Spirit Guide

Good for the same reason cards like Lotus Petal are good, Simian Spirit Guide and Elvish Spirit Guide can help you power out broken starts. Their utility fades quickly, as they’re underwhelming creatures, but fast mana that breaks the rules is pretty much always a problem.

#1. Seedborn Muse

If Seedborn Muse looks broken, you’re correct. This is totally bonkers in Commander. Combo, control. Pick a reason you want a better Wilderness Reclamation.

Best Spirits Payoffs

The most obvious spirit payoffs are typal payoffs that reward you for controlling spirits. These are often lords, like Drogskol Captain, Supreme Phantom, and Vanguard of the Restless. The original Kamigawa block also introduced spirit payoffs, with cards like Celestial Kirin, Infernal Kirin, and Kyoki, Sanity's Eclipse standing out as options.

More broadly, spirits benefit from flying payoffs and cards that work well with fliers. Again, this leads to lots of lords like Empyrean Eagle or Kangee, Sky Warden, though spirit decks partake in additional payoffs like Jubilant Skybonder and Sephara, Sky's Blade. Card draw like Starwinder and Coastal Piracy pair well with these evasive creatures.

Most spirits are tempo-oriented, including staples like Spell Queller and Rattlechains that boast flash. Because of this, spirits often want you to play countermagic and instant-speed removal to keep your opponents on their toes.

Wrap Up

Kodama of the West Tree | Illustration by Daarken

Spirits are a wide-ranging creature type that appear in any color, and often sneak into many sets. While their strongest identity comes from Innistrad, where they’re all about flash and tempo and the like, most planes have a spirit or two.

I particularly appreciate the flavor of spirits, and how they often have interesting arts. What’s your favorite spirit? What do you appreciate about the creature type? Let me know in the comments below or on the Draftsim Discord, and check out our YouTube channel, The Daily Upkeep!

Thanks for reading and stay safe!