The 40 Best Cards in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Ranked

Last updated on February 25, 2026

Dark Leo & Shredder | Illustration by Thomas Chamberlain-Keen

Hello planeswalkers! It’s that time for a new set, and all I have to say is, Cowabunga! That's right, MTG is collaborating with the adjective-loaded turtles themselves. This highly anticipated set brings a ton of new and great cards in a cool, but rude kind of manner. And today, we check out the best cards that release across a few different sets, all related to TMNT.

We’ll preview the best cards (my opinion, and always up for debate) of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle (TMT), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Eternal (TMC), and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Source Material (PZA) sets. We can expect new mechanics, new versions of some of our favorite cards, strong ninjas, mutants, and turtles.

Oh, and if you're seeking a strictly Commander-focused rundown, look no further than our newest YouTube video!

Best Reprints and Bonus Sheet Cards

Supreme Verdict | Illustration by Raluca Marinescu

Reprints and bonus sheet cards are wonderful at bringing back some of the most popular and powerful cards in MTG, and they allow creators and players to enjoy some of their favorite cards with new art and flavor. We’ll keep these cards and the new cards in separate categories to highlight the best of the old and new cards you’ll find in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Magic products.

#16. Splinter of the Shadows

Along with some new cards in the TMT and TMNT Commander sets, Splinter of the Shadows is great for rat decks. This version of Ashcoat of the Shadow Swarm provides a huge pump for your army of rats and a method for rat recursion.

#15. Food Chain

Food Chain is a green ramp card that you’ll want to roster. This card turns an exile of one of your creatures into a huge mana ramp. Jumping the curve by sacrificing a creature like Coiling Oracle to get a creature like Hullbreaker Horror on turn 4 is just exciting!

#14. Heralds of the Shredder

Heralds of the Shredder is a new representation of Vigor. This powerful green creature turns damage done to your creatures into +1/+1 counters for them. If your opponents have direct damage removal or a creature-heavy strategy, this card should lead you to a swift victory.

#13. All Will Be One

Get your infinite combos ready for this one! All Will Be One is back and ready for all the counter strategies in TMT and TMC. I think this is a great addition to the set and a great card to build decks around.

#12. Waste Not

Waste Not is one of the greatest cards to include in a black discard deck. You get benefits no matter what kind of card your opponents discard. Pair this enchantment with discard cards like Dark Deal and Rankle, Master of Pranks, and you should be rolling with the benefits.

#11. Trouble in Pairs

Trouble in Pairs is a premier white draw card. You get a card draw with the second occurrence of opponents attacking, drawing, or casting spells. This should provide a ton of card draw throughout games. Also, stopping extra turn effects is wonderful!

#10. Underworld Breach

The infamous combo card that is banned in three formats: Underworld Breach. With the right mana and graveyard setup, this enchantment becomes a stellar way to storm off.

#9. Sweepers

Aggro and creature decks beware, we have TMNT versions of some wonderful board wipes. Supreme Verdict can’t be countered, Blasphemous Act and Vanquish the Horde are great against opponents’ large armies, and I’ll add a potential one-sided bounce in Wave Goodbye for good measure.

#8. Donnie’s Bō

I could literally put down all the great and fan-favorite equipment variants that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle set revises. My choice for the best, though, is Donnie's Bō, a new version of Shadowspear.

The other great revisited equipment cards are Sword of Hearth and Home, Leo's Katana (Sword of Sinew and Steel), Commander's Plate, Ronin's Arsenal (Conqueror's Flail), and Raph's Jitte (Umezawa's Jitte).

#7. Doubling Season

Doubling Season is a crucial enchantment for token and counters decks. This fits well with a new Mutagen artifact token, which you can sacrifice to give a creature a +1/+1 counter. With Doubling Season, you can double the Mutagen tokens you create as well as the counters they distribute.

#6. Rhythm of the Wild

Get your Gruul () aggro cards charging in on top of dinosaurs? The art for the PZA Rythm of the Wild is just radical! This Gruul enchantment protects your aggressive creatures from counterspells, and it speeds or pumps them up upon ETB.

#5. Assassin’s Trophy

Assassin's Trophy is a popular removal spell that fits into the TMNT theme quite well, especially the art. The ability to target any kind of permanent for removal as early as turn 2 is incredible.

#4. Brainstorm

The top of the TMNT reprints list is all about 1-drops that provide so much upside. Brainstorm is a killer blue card to set up your curve and strategy quickly. Another blue reprint is Negate, which is beloved because of the early value and disruption it can bring.

#3. Dark Ritual

Can I just say, I want to be a “Nibblemancer”? Dark Ritual is the classic black ramp card. Not much else to say, other than you can play crazy 3-drops like Liliana of the Veil and Unstoppable Slasher on turn 1! I love the idea of a dark ritual being used to make pizza.

#2. Staple Mana Ramp and Fixers

Boy, did the TMC set really goes hard on many key mana ramp and fixer cards! Instead of flooding this list with all of them, I’ll just throw them all together. We now have TMNT versions of Command Tower, Arcane Signet, Exotic Orchard, Fabled Passage, Path of Ancestry, Chromatic Lantern, MID/VOW dual lands, Buddy dual lands, Cultivate, and even Sol Ring!

#1. Path to Exile

Path to Exile is a premier, and I mean premier white removal card. Exiling a creature at 1 mana and instant speed is just too good to pass up. Many of you are probably already rocking this card, and now you have some TMNT vintage art to gush over.

Best New Cards

Kitsune's Technique | Illustration by Rose Benjamin

#24. Renet, Temporal Apprentice

Renet, Temporal Apprentice might be an interesting addition to any control deck that uses blue (a good majority of control decks, I think). This flash creature returns all other nonland permanents that entered this turn to their owner’s hands. If you time it correctly, this card could be great disruption to a good number of strategies that rely on a single-turn massive play.

#23. Swift Demise

Every new set needs its good removal spells. Swift Demise is my choice from the TMNT sets for its instant speed, the possibility of a one-sided board wipe, and the relative ease to cast it.

Shellshock is another good removal spell with a chance to remove multiple threats and to create a ton of Mutagen tokens.

#22. Continue?

I think that Continue? is going to be a sneaky good card for white. This cheap instant spell is a wonderful response to board wipes and large combat swings. You can go wide with your creatures and have a backup plan if they're removed in mass.

#21. High Score

“Victory comes in endless forms” is flavor text at its finest. High Score isn't the best card in these sets for +1/+1 counter strategies, but it provides a great value at a cost-effective price. This enchantment facilitates more counter production and can lead to consistent card draw at a curve-friendly price.

Another +1/+1 counter card that almost made this list is Level Up for its potential to make huge creatures and draw cards.

#20. Agent Bishop, Man in Black

Is Agent Bishop, Man in Black our new and improved Luminarch Aspirant? I think so! And, heck, you could play both white pump cards together and dole out +1/+1 counters regularly each turn. This card is a solid addition to weeny white decks.

Leatherhead, Iron Gator is another powerful, combat-oriented counters card that’s a bit on the expensive side.

#19. Sally Pride, Lioness Leader

Another +1/+1 counter card to focus on is Sally Pride, Lioness Leader. This creature can create an army of mutant creature tokens based on the number of nontoken creatures you control when it enters. The real value comes from this cat’s attack trigger, which gives all your creatures a +1/+1 counter. This should see play in cat and white weeny decks alike.

#18. South Wind Avatar

South Wind Avatar is a tamer creature version for a Sanguine Bond strategy. Every time you gain life, each opponent loses 1 life. This card has its own lifegain trigger, and you can pair it with quick lifegain cards like Essence Warden, Blood Artist, and Queza, Augur of Agonies to ping all your opponents. Or, aim big for the knockout combo with Exquisite Blood.

#17. Raph & Leo, Sibling Rivals

Raph & Leo, Sibling Rivals is the ninja turtle combination I’ll highlight because of the potential of additional combat phases. This is a Boros card () through and through. It fits into the curve well, as it can untap two aggro creatures like Kinscaer Sentry and Anim Pakal, Thousandth Moon and then let them attack again. This card will be a menace in Limited formats, and I think it’ll find its way into many Boros decks.

Raphael, Tag Team Tough needs a mention as a more expensive but wider additional combat phase card to target if this is your strategy. And I should mention the PZA inclusion of Waves of Aggression, of course.

#16. Krang & Shredder

If the good guys get to team up, why not the villains as well? Krang & Shredder is a Dimir card () that steals your opponents' best cards. You get to exile powerful cards from each of your opponents when this card enters and attacks. Once the disappear mechanic is satisfied, which is ridiculously easy, you can steal one of these cards exiled for free. Sure, the mana value of this card is higher, but the payoffs could be tremendous!

#15. Turtles Forever

I must say up front that I can’t stand “outside the game” cards, because they mock deckbuilding and the appropriate limitations that come with it. Rant aside, it’s obviously an ultra-powerful strategy to have any card imaginable (that you own) at your fingertips. Turtles Forever is a white instant that lets you grab four legendary creatures from outside the game. An opponent picks which two you keep, but you still get absurd value from outside of the game.

North Wind Avatar can also bring a card from outside of the game into your hand when you cast it.

#14. The Cloning of Shredder

The Cloning of Shredder has the potential to be a killer saga. You have the possibility to create three creature tokens of any creature from your graveyard, and they aren't legendary. This saga isn’t cheap, but what a crazy idea to get three Valgavoth, Terror Eaters or Craterhoof Behemoths over three turns.

Shredder, Shadow Master is a pretty cool black creature that can halve the life of all your opponents if it’s free to attack them.

#13. Turncoat Kunoichi

Just like the sneak ninja turtles, Turncoat Kunoichi is a great card to sneak onto the battlefield. This card’s sneak cost is higher than its mana value, but this fox provides a much better ability if you pay it. If you do, you can exile a creature for good rather than until this card leaves the battlefield. With the vast number of cheap, evasive creatures in white and black, Turncoat Kunoichi should have no problem becoming a great removal creature.

#12. The Ooze

The Ooze needs to be included in these rankings as a The Ozolith-like effect with more steps. Instead of moving counters around, you create a ton of Mutagen tokens based on the number of +1/+1 counters on one of your creatures that left the battlefield. This has its advantages, creating a lot of artifact permanents and offering versatility in how you redistribute the counters.

The Ooze can also hugely benefit from other TMT cards like Mutagen Man, Living Ooze and Michelangelo, Weirdness to 11.

#11. Rare Technique Cards

The technique cards are awesome spells that have a sneak ability for greater surprise and cost reduction. There’s a rare technique for each color; some are instants, and some are sorceries. The sorceries like Raphael's Technique have a huge upside if you sneak them in at an instant speed and at a lower cost. They all fit different strategies, but if I had to rank them, I’d say:

• #5. Splinter's Technique
• #4. Michelangelo's Technique
• #3. Leonardo's Technique
• #2. Kitsune's Technique
• #1. Raphael's Technique

#10. Shark Shedder, Killer Clone

Not a ninja turtle with sneak, but a ninja shark octopus? Shark Shredder, Killer Clone is a killer way to steal cards from an opponent’s graveyard. The sneak ability hopefully gives you cover to get at the very least one trigger. The really cool part is that the ability is mixed with first strike. You can deal first strike damage, return a creature from an opponent’s graveyard to your side, and it’ll already be attacking that player for the regular combat damage phase.

#9. Weather Maker

Every set, and many decks, need some sort of mana rock artifact to ramp up decks. Weather Maker can do just that! This card gets charge counters from its landfall triggers, and you can turn those counters into colorless mana ramp or solid damage. With great landfall cards like Icetill Explorer or proliferation cards like Evolution Sage, this artifact should provide a ton of value.

#8. Heroes in a Half Shell

Why pick between the four ninja turtles when you can have all of them in one card? Heroes in a Half Shell is a 5-color typal card appropriately for mutants, ninjas, and turtles. This card pumps and provides card draw whenever one of these creature types deals combat damage to a player. Agent Frank Horrigan, Higure, the Still Wind, Fecund Greenshell, or even Kappa Tech-Wrecker are just a few ideas of typal plays with this card.

#7. Class Enchantments

With these TMNT sets, we get more class enchantments in each color. These enchantments have levels that you can pay to unlock and gain better effects for certain strategies. They all have a ton of value, but I want to highlight two of them.

Cool but Rude is a discard player’s dream card. Played alongside cards like Captain Howler, Sea Scourge, and Monument to Endurance, you can do a ton of damage. When you reach the final level of this class, you can fetch a discard game-winner like Zenith Flare.

Ninja Teen is an aristocrat card through and through. You can deal damage whenever one of your creatures leaves the battlefield, pump your creatures for extra damage, and open up your graveyard to bring creatures back.

#6. Rare and Mythic Sneak Ninja Turtle Cards

There are many versions of the four ninja turtles in this set, and another amazing cycle of them is the versions with sneak. Sneak works like ninjitsu, except for the downside of being counterable. This fixed version of the ninjitsu mechanic allows you to sneak bomb creatures in whenever one of your creatures goes unblocked. These sneak attacks can have huge upsides, like:

• #6. Leonardo, Cutting Edge’s Ajani's Pridemate-like potential.
• #5. Leonardo, Sewer Samurai’s reanimation potential for cards like Agent Bishop, Man in Black and Thalia's Geistcaller.
• #4. Raphael, the Nightwatcher’s potential game clinching mass double strike pump.
• #3. Michelangelo, Improviser’s ability to cheat huge creatures like Ghalta, Stampede Tyrant onto the battlefield.
• #2. Donatello, Gadget Master’s ability to copy powerful artifacts like Myr Battlesphere.

But the best sneak ninja turtle deserves a spot all its own.

#5. Dark Leo & Shredder

Dark Leo & Shredder deserves its own spot because it’s so good. This ninja can sneak onto the battlefield and turn all your ninjas deadly with deathtouch. The combat damage trigger is also incredible, halving an opponent's life total. So, get a ton of ninjas onto the battlefield with a card like Mist-Syndicate Naga, and even pair this card with “damage doublers” like Bloodletter of Aclazotz to win games outright.

#4. Super Shredder

Super Shredder is a great, cheap, small black creature that can swell up quickly. This creature gets a +1/+1 counter for any permanent that leaves the battlefield. Sacrifice a Treasure token, remove an opponent’s creature, use a fetch land like Evolving Wilds. All of these and more turn Shredder into a massive creature.

#3. Rat King, Verminister

We couldn’t go through the underground sewer world of TMNT without some rats, right? Rat King, Verminister is going to be a solid addition to rat and reanimation decks alike. The huge upside here is returning all creatures with the same name from the graveyard in one move. This can be tremendous if you have two copies of a bomb reanimation target like Summon: Bahamut in your graveyard, let alone an army of Relentless Rats.

#2. Krang, Utrom Warlord

Krang, Utrom Warlord is the bomb card you need for any artifact creature deck. This massive artifact creature has killer keywords and gives those same keywords to all your artifact creatures. Use cards like Hedron Archive to ramp up your curve, and then boost creatures like Technodrome and Karn, Legacy Reforged with great keywords.

#1. Mutant Ninja Turtle Partner Cards

The four turtles and their master, Splinter, all have a version with partner. This allows you to have two commanders with the partner ability to expand your color base and strategies. All these cards have a focus on +1/+1 counters or tokens, especially Mutagen tokens. If I were to rank the power of these partner cards, I’d go:

• #5. Splinter, the Mentor
• #4. Michelangelo, the Heart
• #3. Donatello, the Brains
• #2. Raphael, the Muscle
• #1. Leonardo, the Balance

You can partner these commanders together like Donatello, the Brains and Leonardo, the Balance, but because of the extra character select text, you can’t partner them with the likes of Vial Smasher the Fierce or Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh.

Wrap Up

Krang & Shredder | Illustration by Nestor Ossandon Leal

New sets are always a whirlwind for fans' speculations and imaginations to run wild. You mix that with a cult following like TMNT, and you have a very anticipated set. Hopefully, I’ve given you a bit of insight into what great cards to look for in packs or use your MTG Arena wildcards on. Have fun!

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Stay safe, and Cowabunga!