The 28 Best Blue Instants in Magic Ranked

Last updated on March 14, 2024

Mana Drain | Illustration by Raymond Swanland

Instants are one of MTG's most interactive features. They’re spells that you can play whenever you have priority, including during your opponent's turn. Of Magic's five colors, blue is the instant-est color of all: if you search on Scryfall, you'll find 775 mono-blue instants, compared to 603 for white (the second instant-est color in MTG), and just about 450 for green or black.

There's no mechanical difference between blue instants and instants from other colors; an instant's “thing” is that it can be cast at any time, and that's true regardless of color. But there must be something that makes blue a bit more instant-y than other colors, right?

Let's find out what that other thing is and explore the best blue instants in MTG.

What Are Blue Instants in MTG?

Dramatic Reversal | Illustration by Eric Deschamps

In Magic: The Gathering, instants are spells that have the “instant” card type. Counterspell, Demonic Tutor, or Lightning Bolt are all instants.

What instants from all colors have in common is that you can cast them at any time you have priority: during combat, your opponent's turn, or in response to a spell they play. That’s what sets instants apart from other spell types like sorceries, creatures, artifacts, enchantments, or planeswalkers, which must all be played during your main phases when the stack is empty (what in MTG's lingo is called “being played at sorcery speed”), while instants only require you to have priority (and mana to cast them, of course).

Each color in the color pie does instants differently. Blue is the best Magic color at countering other spells, starting with the iconic Counterspell which has been a staple since Alpha. And countering spells is pretty much limited to instant speed. You can draw, scry, exile, destroy, and do all kinds of other things at sorcery speed or instant speed, but countering spells has to be at instant speed because it interacts with the stack.

Blue also tends to have some very good card-draw spells at instant speed, which are great to use when you’ve left mana open during your opponent’s turn. They’re in a “Damned if I do, damned if I don't” spot: if they play a powerful spell you counter it, but if they try to pass the turn you draw a bunch of cards.

Blue is also very good at bouncing permanents. And although it's far from the best color at removal, it does have a couple of options.

Honorable Mention: Ancestral Recall

Ancestral Recall is one of MTG's Power Nine: the nine most powerful cards ever printed. If we were to look at power alone, this would be the best blue instant by several landslides, and also one of the three best blue cards overall (three of the Power Nine cards happen to be blue).

I've given Ancestral Recall an honorable mention because it's pretty obvious that a Power Nine card will always be at the top of any ranking it fits and because your odds of facing it are slim to none. Ancestral Recall is banned from every format save Vintage, and even in Vintage it's restricted.

#28. Spell Pierce

Since countering spells is blue's signature effect, let's start with one of the most efficient counterspells: Spell Pierce. Early on, your foes won't have the mana; later on, they’re still spending more than you are. And every time you have one blue source untapped (even if you left it that way simply because you have nothing you can cast), your opponent will be wondering, “Do they have it?”

#27. Aetherize

Bouncing creatures back to their owner's hand is another of blue's specialties; bouncing a whole attacking board is akin to a fog with a huge tempo blowout on top, and that's exactly what Aetherize provides.

#26. Opt + Consider

Drawing and filtering cards for cheap is another of blue's tricks. Opt and Consider are known as MTG cantrips: cards that, besides their other effects, draw you one card. In Magic's lingo, “they replace themselves.”

Both cards allow you to check the top card of your deck before drawing; Consider also lets you populate your graveyard, which is important for several decks.

#25. Dramatic Reversal

Dramatic Reversal, paired with Isochron Scepter and enough mana rocks, can generate infinite mana. Mostly seen in Commander decks, it's common and powerful enough in that format to earn this card a spot.

#24. Chain of Vapor

Fairly common in cEDH as one of the quickest ways to bounce a nonpermanent (including artifacts and enchantments), Chain of Vapor can also start a bit of a political chain reaction if your opponent decides to copy it and either return the favor or pay it forward.

Notice that you can target yourself to bounce one of your permanents and decide not to sacrifice anything.

#23. Resculpt

Resculpt is an interesting card: stealing a page from white's book, it can exile the target, and just for 2 mana!

The trade-off is far from negligible and there’s a better version available. But if you need your blue deck to take care of a threat, Resculpt gets the job done.

#22. Frantic Search

Frantic Search is a great filter spell: the number of cards in your hand doesn’t increase (in fact, it goes down by one), but you get to dig for better cards in your library, keep the best cards from your whole hand, and populate your graveyard.

And since you untap three lands, you recoup Frantic Search‘s cost, or even get ahead with effects like Baral, Chief of Compliance.

#21. Snap

Snap can only bounce back creatures, but it's fairly cheap and recoups its cost, making it a great tempo play.

Like Frantic Search, Snap can even be mana-positive if you happen to have effects that discount a spell's cost like Baral, Chief of Compliance.

#20. Gush

A step above Frantic Search, you can cast Gush for 0 mana, and you get to keep the cards you draw. When you look at the mana spent per card drawn, this is an even better rate than Ancestral Recall itself!

Having to bounce two Islands back to your hand isn’t exactly painless, but remember that you can tap them before bouncing and use the mana for something else.

#19. Narset's Reversal

Blue is sometimes called “the fun police” given its fondness for saying “Nope!” to what your opponents play. Narset's Reversal is more thief than cop, letting you put your foe's spell to better use.

Do notice that Narset's Reversal isn’t a proper counterspell: your opponent still has the spell in hand, and if they have enough mana left, they may recast it this very same turn.

#18. Mental Misstep

Mental Misstep is a textbook case of how broken “free” spells can be. At first glance, countering a 1-mana spell doesn't seem like a big deal. But as it turns out, it was big enough to ban Mental Misstep from Modern and Legacy and restrict it in Vintage.

Commander players can still enjoy the joys of paying 2 life to counter 1-mana spells, though!

#17. Negate

There have been scores of variations of the original Counterspell, each tweaking the cost and the effects. Few have been as successful or as elegant in their simplicity as Negate: it’s a bit narrower in scope and a bit easier to cast makes for a staple across MTG formats that excels at protecting your boards and wincons.

#16. An Offer You Can't Refuse

Well, actually, pretty much everybody that's not playing Commander can refuse this offer, even when An Offer You Can't Refuse is legal in all formats, including Standard.

But it's very common in EDH decks, where even accepting this offer on turn 1 and giving your foe two Treasures may be a good idea to stop a Sol Ring or any 1-mana threat that could otherwise snowball.

#15. Dig Through Time

As the name implies, Dig Through Time is especially good at digging through your deck to find your combo's missing piece. It does require having a well-stocked graveyard to use its delve effect, but if you do then it's one of Magic's best card-selection spells.

#14. Swan Song

Swan Song is narrower than An Offer You Can't Refuse, but it's still ruthlessly efficient and the drawback is negligible: the 2/2 can be annoying if you have to cast Swan Song early on, but it's irrelevant if you're using Swan Song to protect your game-winning combo.

#13. Reality Shift

Like Resculpt, Reality Shift takes a page from white's book to exile a creature for just 2 mana.

It can sometimes backfire and put on the board something bigger and meaner. But to eliminate a key threat, and above all to disrupt a key combo piece, the cost and the risk are well worth it.

#12. Flusterstorm

At its worst, Flusterstorm is a weaker Spell Pierce, which may come in handy in a pinch but is far from extraordinary. In the middle of a counterspell war, with several spells already on the stack, Flusterstorm makes your opponents feel like they brought a knife to a machine gun fight.

#11. Pact of Negation

The first of the “Counterspell, but 0 mana,” Pact of Negation isn’t a spell that you can use early, but later on is perfect to either stop an opponent from playing their game-ending threat after you tap out or for protecting your own win condition the turn you go all-in for the kill.

#10. Arcane Denial

For your opponents, Arcane Denial is the gentler version of the more unpalatable counterspells here. You don't let them play their fun thing, but they get to draw two other fun things from their deck. In this regard, Arcane Denial is probably a good card for introducing MTG newcomers to the intricacies of counterspells.

Arcane Denial is card disadvantage down the line, but you can counter any threat now, and the mana cost is a bit easier than Counterspell.

#9. Fierce Guardianship

If Arcane Denial can feel fair(ish), Fierce Guardianship is anything but. The second most expensive card in this ranking (around $40), Arcane Denial lets you tap out to cast your commander and then protect it for 0 mana or prevent your opponents from trying to win the game in that spot.

#8. Mystical Tutor

Demonic Tutor is to black what Counterspell is to blue: a card so powerful and an effect so useful that “tutor” became part of card-game lingo to the point that players of other card games use the MTG term to describe the effect in those games.

Mystical Tutor is pretty tame by comparison, but overall it’s powerful enough to be banned in Legacy and restricted in Vintage, but it sees a lot of play in Commander.

#7. Counterspell

It's hard to find a bluer card than Counterspell: it's been around since Day 1, and it's still very relevant without being overpowered. It’s one of the simplest, most straightforward effects (just “Nope”), with a casting cost strict enough to require some deckbuilding concessions if you want to cast it reliably.

A staple of several formats including Modern, it's the most famous blue instant in Commander.

#6. Pongify + Rapid Hybridization

Rapid Hybridization and Pongify are an odd sight among blue cards, removing a creature for good by destroying it. And they can do so for very, very cheap as far as mana goes, even if they’re a bit messy and leave a 3/3 body behind.

#5. Force of Negation

Force of Negation is excellent during your opponent's turn. Paying 0 mana is huge, and unless you have just one card in hand, your opponent needs to consider you may have Force of Negation.

It's an expensive Negate during your turn, but it still works in a pinch and the exile clause isn’t irrelevant.

Unlike the stronger side of the Force, Force of Negation is playable in Modern.

#4. Force of Will

A Legacy staple and currently the priciest card in this ranking (around $50), Force of Will is the best of the “Counterspell, but for 0 mana” instants (and as such only playable in Eternal tabletop formats).

Force of Will still demands that you two-for-one yourself, and your deck needs a good number of blue cards. But the results are worth the cost: Force of Will counters any threat, at any time.

#3. Brainstorm

Brainstorm isn’t just another cantrip, but rather the best cantrip in the game: you rearrange your hand, sort your next draws, and if you have a way to shuffle your deck (like a fetch land) you can shuffle away your two worst cards. It's even useful in edge cases like “hiding” your key card in your library to avoid hand disruption spells like Thoughtseize.

It's not Ancestral Recall, but it's as close as it gets. It's legal in Legacy and Commander (where it's the third most popular of all blue instants) and restricted in Vintage.

#2. Cyclonic Rift

Cyclonic Rift is such a loved/hated staple that offers two useful effects for very different prices: the cheap effect bounces any enemy nonland permanent; the expensive effect pretty much ends the game on the spot since it bypasses color protection and hexproof.

The only way for our salty opponents not to lose the game is a counterspell.

Speaking of which…

#1. Mana Drain

A strictly better Counterspell,  Mana Drain is absolutely ridiculous. It's banned in Legacy, and therefore only legal in Vintage and Commander. You counter every spell type, but you also siphon the mana that your opponent has just spent and make your next turn huge.

Blue is, by a mile, the best Magic color when it comes to counterspells, and Mana Drain is the best of them.

Best Blue Instant Payoffs

One subtle payoff of an instant spell (of any color) is the window of opportunity that it provides for anything else that you can play at instant speed, making it harder for your opponent to play around your spells.

For example, let's say your deck's sole instant is Counterspell. If you go into your opponent's turn with two untapped Islands, your opponent can simply pass the turn without playing a spell, and make you burn your mana. There are still decisions to be made here (you may be bluffing, for example), but you present your opponent with a binary choice: you either have it, or you don't.

But if you have Counterspell and Brainstorm in your deck, then if your opponent decides to pass their turn without casting a spell, you can still cast Brainstorm at the end of their turn to be way ahead of them. Of course, the more instants you have, the more options you have in that spot (and the more spells your opponent needs to play around). In a way, one subtle payoff of instants (of any color) is that they make all your other instants better by making your opponent sweat (they don't know what you may do) and giving you more options.

Baral, Chief of Compliance is a great non-instant payoff for instants. Silly table-mates, thinking they'll get to play anything through your discounted counterspells and deluge of card draw!

If your palette allows for more than mono-blue, commanders like Kess, Dissident Mage are another option. Instants go to the graveyard as soon as they resolve, and Kess lets you sling them again right away.

But if it's about slinging instants, then the best color pairing is probably Izzet.

• Technically speaking, Jori En, Ruin Diver‘s doesn't specifically mention instants, but since this merfolk's effects can trigger each turn (not just your turn), it greatly rewards slinging instant on your opponent's turn;
• With Melek, Izzet Paragon, you get to play instants and sorceries from the top of your library and then get twice the fun;
• Mizzix of the Izmagnus provides Baral, Chief of Compliance‘s discount on steroids. Mizzix makes expensive card-draw spells like Dig Through Time very enticing.

And, of course, there are spell-slinging Izzet commanders, and then there's Niv-Mizzet, Parun, who’s big, mean, and full of pings. It makes each of your draws a painful experience for others and restocks your ammo every time your they dare cast an answer.

Wrap Up

Slip Out the Back | Illustration by Zara Alfonso

Instants are intrinsically intertwined with how MTG handles priority, letting you react to anything your foes do, at any time, even during their turn.

Instants are perhaps one of Magic's most distinct features when compared to other card games. After Hearthstone, many CCGs have opted for a simpler turn structure in which you do everything during your turn and nothing during your opponent's. In other words, in Hearthstone you could say that everything happens at sorcery speed.

Instants may require a bit more practice and head-wrapping than other MTG cards, and proper timing is crucial to use them well, but I would be willing to argue that instants in general, and blue instants in particular, are one of the “Magic-est” things about Magic: The Gathering.

I hope you've enjoyed this ranking of MTG's best blue instants, and if you have any comments (or fierce disagreement!), feel free to ask around below or in the Draftsim Discord.

And now, it’s time for me to Slip Out the Back!