The 10 Best Commander Cards of 2026

Last updated on November 12, 2026

Gleaming Splendor | Illustration by Kekai Kotaki

2026 printed an incredible number of sets and cards into Magic, and it’s time to review them. Today, I’m checking out the 10 coolest Commander cards from 2026. That is, the best cards to put in the 99 of your deck—though some of these are legendary creatures, they’re not being rated as commanders.

#10. Pia, Aether Ascetic

I have adored Pia, Aether Ascetic since it was spoiled because it goes beyond being a simple enchantment tutor. Demonic Tutor is just a tutor (and the stronger card, don’t get me wrong). But Pia can be expanded into the core of a deck between the enters ability and the discard outlet. You can tutor up Teleportation Circle, then start flickering Pia to tutor more enchantments. Or you can exploit the discard by pitching a creature, then grabbing an Animate Dead or Tortured Existence or something to that effect. It does so many cool things, and isn’t that what Commander’s all about?

#9. Gleaming Splendor

Gleaming Splendor received incredible hype from The Hobbit and while it’s very good, I don’t think it’s game-breaking. It does very well at high-powered tables but I’ve found it mixed at lower-power pods. Still, this ramp enchantment makes a ton of Treasure in the right circumstances, and the activated ability can even be a win condition with infinite mana.

#8. The Queen of Dale

The Queen of Dale works best when you capitalize on recruit. Maybe you have discard payoffs like Hashaton, Scarab's Fist or Monument to Endurance, cards like Teferi's Ageless Insight and Psychosis Crawler for the card draw, or token payoffs. Those are broad categories but sill necessary to make this worth including. I’d also say this, similar to Gleaming Splendor, can be dicey at lower Bracket pods that emphasis creatures.

#7. Wizard’s Staff

I don’t think ability doublers are always worth playing but Wizard's Staff has low enough costs I’m interested. This barely costs anything when equipping a wizard commander, so spellslinger decks ought to be interested. The cost is less efficient without a wizard, but being an equipment offers decent utility: You get to attach this to a creature then, when it dies, stick it somewhere else.

#6. Hexing Squelcher

Hexing Squelcher started the year strong with hype that players could tell the blue players to [Redacted]. A 2-mana creature that shuts down countermagic and punishes targeting your permanents is pretty sick. It’s even broken into cEDH as a way to protect win conditions.

#5. Erode

Removal is key to good games of Magic, and Erode is one of the best kill spells of the year. It’s effectively Path to Exile, except it trades exiling for the flexibility of destroying a planeswalker. One mana to remove any creature or planeswalker is a killer rate as it’s almost always mana efficient. The only downside is giving your opponent that basic land, so this isn’t an effective answer to commanders.

#4. Irma, Part-Time Mutant

Irma, Part-Time Mutant is a lovely twist on a clone: It doesn’t enter as a copy of a creature, so you don’t get enters triggers, which cards like Spark Double often do. But! It keeps its name, so it doesn’t invoke the legend rule, which makes it the perfect way to copy commanders with non-enters abilities. Think Ezuri, Claw of Progress or Rootha, Mastering the Moment. It triggers every combat, so you aren’t restricted to one copy. Maybe you don’t need Ezuri for a turn, maybe you need another Gyre Sage. It feels like it was overlooked due to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ unpopularity.

#3. Formidable Speaker

Tutors are powerful in every format and Formidable Speaker is one of the coolest. Rather like Pia, that’s mostly because of the synergy space. You can discard a creature and tutor for Superior Spider-Man or another creature-based reanimation spell, or flicker this to turn lands into good spells. Since this is a creature, you also have lots of other creature tutors to chain it with. For example, you could Chord of Calling for this, then tutor up a creature to cast next turn that would be too expensive to Chord for, or use Imperial Recruiter to find this, which then tutors for a creature that Recruiter couldn’t find.

Also, that untap ability is far from irrelevant with mana dorks that tap for multiple mana like Circle of Dreams Druid or Bloom Tender.

#2. Turbulent Lands

Though 2026 has not concluded the turbulent land cycle, with the Selesnya () and Gruul lands () waiting until 2027, these are absolutely fantastic. They’re effectively fetchable slow lands, except the multiplayer angle keeps the price lowish because they don’t appeal to 60-card players. We can expect great things from these in 2027, especially with Gavin Verhey’s comments on Good Morning Magic promising additional reprints.

#1. Geist of Saint Thalia

Geist of Saint Thalia will never be your deck’s flashiest card, but its cost reduction is incredible. Many spellsinger decks already run Goblin Electromancer; why not also make that Arcane Signet mana neutral? Etherium Sculptor making Sensei's Divining Top cost 0 for a combo is very important, but why not make the Demonic Tutor enabling it cost ? I’m honestly impressed Wizards managed to power creep 2-mana cost reduction so strongly.