The 35 Best 5-Mana Commanders in Magic Ranked

Last updated on February 12, 2026

Tergrid, God of Fright | Illustration by Yongjae Choi

Commanders need to hit a certain sweet spot of mana value and impact. You want a cheap commander that’s easy to recast once your opponents remove it, but you also want a certain amount of bang for your mana. Aside from access to certain colors, what good is a cheap commander if it doesn’t do something?

Five mana is a good benchmark. As long as the power and toughness aren’t completely out of line, the abilities on a 5-mana commander should be both good enough and fair enough to make it playable. Many 5-mana commanders are among the most popular in the format, too, and it isn’t just because there’s WUBRG () build-arounds and precon face commanders.

But the question is, which 5-mana commander will you run?

What Are Five-Mana Commanders in MTG?

Korvold, Fae-Cursed King | Illustration by Wisnu Tan

Any card that’s eligible to play from the command zone and has a mana value of 5 is a 5-mana commander. It can be a legendary creature, spacecraft, or vehicle, it could be a planeswalker with the “can be your commander” text, or it could be a background enchantment.

There’s a noticeable lack of backgrounds among my picks because there aren’t many that cost 5 mana. Most legendary vehicles weren’t designed with the command zone in mind, so they’re quite absent, too.

Honorable Mention: Richard Garfield, Ph.D.

I can’t pass up the chance to honor the man without whom none of us would be here discussing Magic cards. We salute you, good sir.

As a card, Richard Garfield, Ph.D. has you play a weird form of Magic that’s as Unhinged as the set it came from; just note that its ability does care about color, so you can’t play a Twiddle and call it Path to Exile, for example.

#35. Karlach, Fury of Avernus

Karlach, Fury of Avernus is one of the most aggressive and flexible background commanders out of Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur’s Gate. The most viable backgrounds all grant Karlach attack triggers, like Sword Coast Sailor, Flaming Fist, or Hardy Outlander, while Raised by Giants makes your commander into a 10/10, something that pairs beautifully with extra combats to take someone out through commander damage. However you build around Karlach, this is a fierce extra combats commander that puts your opponents on notice.

#34. Temmet, Naktamun’s Will

Temmet, Naktamun's Will has been outshone somewhat by the alternate commander from the Eternal Might precon, Hashaton, Scarab's Fist, but it’s no slouch as an Esper () zombie commander, enough to compete with Varina, Lich Queen.

#33. Tevesh Szat, Doom of Fools

As a planeswalker with partner, Tevesh Szat, Doom of Fools is already doing two atypical things as a commander. It gets more cEDH play than casual, mainly with Thrasios, Triton Hero, but you can also build it alongside Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh or Kraum, Ludevic's Opus for different flavors. That ultimate ability is no joke.

#32. Lord Windgrace

Between the likes of Icetill Explorer and Ancient Greenwarden, we have plenty of options that make Lord Windgrace’s -2 ability redundant. But that just means you can focus on building up loyalty to pull off that ultimate ability. You can play all your favorite Conduit of Worlds and Exploration variants here, mix in some landfall abilities, and go to town. The World Shaper precon from Edge of Eternities reprinted a lot of this deck’s core pieces.

#31. Betor, Ancestor’s Voice

If you ever wanted a commander that rewards you for treating your life total like a yo-yo, Betor, Ancestor's Voice is for you. While you might be tempted to build around both parts of its end step trigger, Betor is also flexible enough that you can focus either on lifegain and +1/+1 counters or paying life to reanimate creatures. I’m a fan of any commander that lets me visualize turning sliders up and down on different playstyles.

#30. Tergrid, God of Fright / Tergrid’s Lantern

Cards that allow you to play with your opponents’ decks are always ripe for a Rule 0 conversation, but this one’s strong enough that’s it’s on the Commander Game Changers list and among EDHREC’s saltiest cards. In the command zone, Tergrid, God of Fright rewards you for forcing your opponents to discard and for playing edicts, which are both right up black’s alley. If you go the discard route, don’t forget to bring a Waste Not along for additional discard payoffs.

Individually, the card is certainly more powerful than some of the other 5-mana commanders, but it works even better when you have more colors to support and protect Tergrid.

#29. Gonti, Canny Acquisitor

All versions of Gonti steal spells from your opponents’ decks, but Gonti, Canny Acquisitor adds more colors for more potential saboteurs and payoffs. Tasha, the Witch Queen fits in here, as do Kotis, the Fangkeeper and Toski, Bearer of Secrets. The easiest ways to trigger it are small unblockable creatures like Triton Shorestalker or Invisible Stalker.

#28. Marina Vendrell

So many sets get a 5-color commander that lets you play every card that features a shiny new mechanic or a newly supported creature type, and it’s not just a Universes Beyond thing. Marina Vendrell is that commander for room enchantments, although its enters trigger lets you filter the top of your library for any type of enchantment. If you play rooms, you’ll want lots of ramp and some extra land abilities to make sure you can unlock any door that you want. Rooms are also fun because they’re essentially two cards in one, which leads to lots of variability.

#27. Edward Kenway

It’s really easy to turn Edward Kenway into an extra turn engine with Time Sieve, but it’s also the card that represents Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, one of the most popular in the series. That combination makes it a rather popular Grixis commander (), even among other pirate commanders like Admiral Brass, Unsinkable or vehicle commanders like Dr. Eggman.

#26. Inalla, Archmage Ritualist

Was eminence a design mistake? If it is, Inalla, Archmage Ritualist isn’t the worst offender, though it opens up a lots of interesting possibilities. You’re definitely a wizard deck if you have Inalla in the command zone, but there’s lots, and I mean lots of good Grixis wizards to copy, and Wizards of the Coast just keeps giving us more. We are Magic players, after all.

#25. Disa the Restless

It’s a Conspiracy! Or rather, one of the better places to play it.

Disa the Restless is an interesting spin on the graveyard and reanimator deck that gives you tokens that care about the permanent types in all graveyards. Mill, discard, and edicts are some of the best ways to force cards into your opponents’ bins. Just be sure you bone up on what’s a card type and what’s a supertype before you sit down at the table – kindred (formerly tribal) and battle are eligible card types, but snow and legendary are not.

#24. Marrow-Gnawer

For the longest time, Marrow-Gnawer was virtually the only viable rat commander, with apologies to Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni. It operates similarly to Krenko, Mob Boss, but I’d argue it’s more potent. Marrow-Gnawer is a fantastic rat lord since it grants them all fear (including your opponents’, so beware the mirror match), but you can also tap it and sacrifice a rat to quickly binfest the board with rodents. It gets stupid when most of your deck is Rat Colony cards, too: Each activation pumps your Rat Colony copies exponentially.

#23. Éowyn, Shieldmaiden

Éowyn, Shieldmaiden just blows all of Éomer’s cards out of the water. #GirlPower, #WomenDoItBetter.

There’s lots of ways to get multiple combat steps in this deck, too. Éowyn pairs with Breath of Fury to chain multiple combat steps one after the other, since its combat trigger continues to give you creatures that you can sacrifice. There’s also the combo of Combat Celebrant with Helm of the Host, and since this one doesn’t need you to sacrifice creatures, Éowyn keeps wave after wave of reinforcements coming until they overwhelm the table.

#22. Lord of the Nazgûl

Cheap cantrips are among the best ways to fill your board with Lord of the Nazgûl’s wraith tokens so that you can pump them up to 9/9s in no time. I appreciate the protection from Ring-bearers, since there’s some Ring tempts you cards that are used outside of Lord of the Rings decks, like Boromir, Warden of the Tower. It’s the perfect deck in which to run nine copies of Nazgûl, too.

#21. The Scarab God

The Scarab God is one of the better gods from the plane of Amonkhet to run in the command zone, and it’s a really potent zombie commander to boot. Go wide enough and that upkeep trigger is a game-ender.

#20. Anikthea, Hand of Erebos

Anikthea, Hand of Erebos plays in a really interesting intersection for an Abzan commander (). It acts as an enchantment creature lord, and its attack trigger reanimates one of your enchantments as a 3/3 zombie. Anikthea lets you build around creatures that are already enchantments, like some of the Theros gods and creatures or the glimmers and overlords from Duskmourn, or you could build around sagas if that’s your preference.

#19. Judith, Carnage Connoisseur

Murders at Karlov Manor was a fairly mid set, but dang if it doesn’t have some good and fun cards. The fetchable surveil lands, Archdruid's Charm, Warleader's Call… oh, and a fairly good Rakdos () spellslinging commander in Judith, Carnage Connoisseur.

Your spellslinging payoff here is modal, which is just great. Your burn spells now don’t need to cover a creature’s full toughness to kill it, but they can also widen your board if you need that more. The imp tokens are great chump blockers, especially if you also stack them to kill an opposing threat; you can trade in two imps to kill a 4/4, while you also burn each of your opponents for 4 damage. And of course, you have access to damage amplifiers in red like Torbran, Thane of Red Fell.

#18. Yarok, the Desecrated

Yarok, the Desecrated doubles up on enters abilities, and it’s in the perfect color trio for self-milling and reanimating. Not to mention that it’s any permanent, so that means landfall triggers, constellation triggers, and artifact-fall triggers are all game, plus alliance and other creature-fall abilities, too.

#17. Omnath, Locus of All

That may look like a daunting amount of text, but Omnath, Locus of All basically acts as a mana storage card and an extra draw at the beginning of your first main phase. And you just might add 3 mana depending on the mana symbols in that card’s cost. You can maximize the mana you store by playing extra land cards and mana dorks, and it’s the perfect place to run weird combinations of tri-color spells like Abzan Charm, Helga, Skittish Seer, and whatever else you feel like playing. Definitely a commander that rewards creativity.

#16. Marneus Calgar

Esper may not be the first color combination you think of for tokens, or even the first deck you think of when you want Commissar Severina Raine to be your win condition (though maybe that’s just my Mardu () tendencies showing). Marneus Calgar turns tokens into card draw, and you can surround it with support like Lotho, Corrupt Shirriff, Prince Imrahil the Fair, and Elspeth, Storm Slayer.

#15. Galadriel, Light of Valinor

Abilities that trigger when other creatures enter the battlefield are always good, but Galadriel, Light of Valinor has three (!!!) modes to choose from. It’s not quite busted because you can only pick a mode that hasn’t been chosen during the same turn, so it’ll only go off three times, but Bant () colors are perfect for any combination of these abilities.

#14. Captain N’ghathrod

How to Make a Popular Dimir Commander (): A Guide

• First, take horrors, add some mill, and a dash of reanimator and spell theft.
• Next, season with pirate-y flavor. Remind everyone that they loved Bill Nighy as Davy Jones.
• Finally, stick it in a Dungeons & Dragons precon, and give the deck a punny name with fantastic mouthfeel (who doesn’t love to exclaim, “Mind Flayarrrs” in their most pirate-y brogue?).

Et voilà! You’ve just made Captain N'ghathrod. Oh, and don’t forget that sweet Secret Lair x Iron Maiden reprint as Eddie, Ghost of the Navigator.

#13. The First Sliver

It may not be the only 5-color sliver, but it’s certainly the best. Is cascade a broken mechanic? Who’s to say. But The First Sliver gives all your sliver spells cascade, so if you cascade into another sliver… okay, yes, cascade is a broken mechanic.

#12. Xyris, the Writhing Storm

Xyris, the Writhing Storm encourages you to build around card draw in some form. You can play it as group hug with a touch of aggro and pillow fort; build up enough snake tokens and nobody will want to attack you without a sweeper first. You can also play some fun combos with The Locust God and Skullclamp.

#11. Kraum, Ludevic’s Opus

Okay, so I may overrate Kraum, Ludevic's Opus. After all, while it sees play in cEDH as a partner commander for Tymna the Weaver, it’s mostly there to give Tymna access to blue’s counterspells, the Thoracle win condition, and exceptional red cards like Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer, Birgi, God of Storytelling, etc. All that, and if you have to cast Kraum, it’s a hasty flying beater, and at least you won’t help your opponents like you would with Ludevic, Necro-Alchemist, the other potential Izzet () partner.

#10. Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER

Fallout’s Scrappy Survivors precon gave us a take on a Naya () equipment deck, but Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER cranked the dial up on that archetype in the Final Fantasy Commander Limit Break precon. Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER auto-equips when it enters and can attack right away, then fills your hand and creates Treasure to cast extra spells if the conditions are right. The precon is fairly fun out of the box, but you can also build around Cloud on its own (I’ve built a soldier typal deck for it because sometimes I get an idea and just have to follow through, power level be damned).

#9. Kefka, Court Mage / Kefka, Ruler of Ruin

Grixis really is a good cEDH shard, isn’t it? If you manage to transform Kefka, Court Mage into Kefka, Ruler of Ruin, it can go infinite with just a Psychosis Crawler or Niv-Mizzet, Parun and set you up for a Thassa's Oracle or Laboratory Maniac win in no time.

#8. Tom Bombadil

Tom Bombadil is the saga commander, no matter how much Terra, Magical Adept wants to swipe the crown. Just make sure you run a few counterspells to dodge the inevitable enchantment sweeper.

If you aren’t a saga player, you may not have noticed the neat combos you can pull off with them. There’s one with Clockspinning and There and Back Again, while Esper Terra combos with any of Estrid's Invocation, The Apprentice's Folly, Copy Enchantment, or Yenna, Redtooth Regent. What was once a goofy “oops, all sagas” deck now has a path to multiple game-winning combos, which has really tuned up the power potential.

#7. Ygra, Eater of All

Ygra, Eater of All declares that friends are food, and Golgari () colors make it perfect for a sacrifice-focused theme. It’s an incredibly flexible cat: You can build around food specifically, but I like the idea of creating a story. You can surround it with squirrels and forage cards from Bloomburrow, and I suspect there’s a path to a neat hybrid of an earthbending and land sacrifice theme, too.

#6. Korvold, Fae-Cursed King

A very fitting commander in Jund () colors, Korvold, Fae-Cursed King is all about the sacrifices you make on your way to glory. The wording is wide open: Korvold doesn’t care what kind of permanent you sacrifice. It was reprinted in the EOC World Shaper precon, which is a land sac deck. There’s lots of possibilities for a Treasure token deck, naturally. And you can run all kinds of Warren Soultrader combos, the Chatterfang, Squirrel General/Pitiless Plunderer combo, and virtually anything that a Golgari aristocrats deck would. Plus, you have access to red for extra Treasure from Xorn, some Impact Tremors effects to ping your opponents to death if you’re sacrificing and reanimating a creature…. Someone stop me before I make a “versatile” joke.

#5. Voja, Jaws of the Conclave

After multiple Tolsimir cards that made Voja legendary tokens, we finally got a proper Voja card, and it doesn’t disappoint. Elves can go incredibly wide with token generation, and you’re in perfect colors for Aggravated Assault combos using Selvala, Heart of the Wilds or Baylen, the Haymaker. Add an indestructible enabler to ensure that Voja, Jaws of the Conclave can keep swinging freely, and it’s game over.

#5. Ulalek, Fused Atrocity

This is definitely not a beginner-friendly commander. Ulalek, Fused Atrocity needs you to master the stack and how to use it, especially if you run Echoes of Eternity in the same deck. I like that it gives a Commander home to all those devoid cards from Battle for Zendikar and Modern Horizons 3, since devoid and color identity don’t gel terribly well.

#4. Nekusar, the Mindrazer

Nekusar, the Mindrazer is just so, so good, and the mayhem cards from Marvel’s Spider-Man have given it at least a few more tricks up its sleeve (at the very least an extra Grixis land in Oscorp Industries). This zombie wizard is often paired with wheels and other mass draw and discard effects to drain opponents in chunks. It has vastly outperformed the face commander from the Commander 2013 precon in which it first appeared, Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge.

#3. Pantlaza, Sun-Favored

If cascade is broken, discover is very close to it. Pantlaza, Sun-Favored wants you to run beefy dinosaurs and hopefully gives you a two-for-one discount the first time one enters the battlefield each turn, though discover lets you put the card in your hand if you don’t want to cast it right away. The combination of its ability and mana value have all contributed to its popularity as a dinosaur commander.

#2. Jodah, the Unifier

Jodah, the Unifier is one of the best legendary creature lords and such a strong commander. Each legend you cast from your hand has a discover trigger that pulls a friend out onto the battlefield, or a legendary equipment, one of the Theros enchantment artifacts, a background…. Jodah is specific in that in cares about legends, but as Wizards keeps printing more and more of them, the possibilities can only continue to diversify.

#1. Kenrith, the Returned King

Some commanders are flexible because they support multiple different strategies, and you get to tune the deck the way that you want to. Kenrith, the Returned King is more of a blank canvas, a generically good 5-color, 5-mana commander with five useful activated abilities. Some players have built cEDH combo decks around it, while others have built all kinds of other 5-color decks, whether it’s for under-supported creature types, a Birthing Pod strategy, or even a political or group hug type of deck.

Those abilities don’t specify you have to benefit, so go ahead and broker some deals! Give your opponents’ creatures haste and trample. Give the player who can’t seem to hit their land drops an extra card. Stabilize an ally you need to keep in the fight if you want to defeat the Bolas at the table. Whatever you need to do to get just that little bit closer to a victory of your own.

Commanding Conclusion

Gonti, Canny Acquisitor | Illustration by Anna Podedworna

Many 5-mana commanders pack a punch or encourage you to build around interesting themes, but some of them stand as some of the most fun or flexible in the game.

In the interest of space, I had to make a lot of heartbreaking cuts to this write-up. There’s just so many good 5-mana commanders that I had to kill some of my own darlings. And I even had to cut some jokes and references. Guess I’ll keep my human supremacist jokes about Éowyn, Shieldmaiden’s rules text for the Mass Effect crossover, if it ever happens (if TMNT is anything to go by, I just have to mention it three times like I’m trying to summon Betelgeuse).

Which of your favorite 5-mana commanders did I overrate, underrate, or just completely leave off? Are there any that you think could join these ones if only they had better support? Let me know in the comments below or over on the Draftsim Discord.

Until next time!