All 13 Free Counterspells in Magic Ranked

Last updated on October 11, 2025

Force of Will | Illustration by Matt Stewart

Spells in Magic: The Gathering come in all color combinations and mana values, but without a doubt, the most irksome of them are counterspells. These spells often frustrate players because preventing them from resolving their game plan can be so aggravating that it sometimes leads to rage-quitting. Counterspells are a core part of blue strategies, and the cheaper they are, the better.

But what if I told you there’s a subset of counterspells that can be cast without spending any mana?

Today’s your lucky day! Let’s explore every free counterspell ever printed in Magic.

What Are Free Counterspells in MTG?

Flare of Denial | Illustration by Jason A. Engle

As their name implies, “free” counterspells in MTG are spells that counter other spells without requiring you to spend mana. Instead, they often have alternative costs, like exiling cards, discarding cards, or controlling specific resources. These counterspells are highly valued because they allow players to respond to threats even when tapped out, enabling powerful tempo plays.

For this list, I’ll include each spell that fits into the above definition. At the end of the day, you may just want to protect your board state or win condition on the stack.

That said, I’ll exclude the likes of Deflecting Swat or Flawless Maneuver as even though they can change a spell's target and thus “counter a spell” from time to time against spot removal and the like, they ultimately don’t prevent the spell from resolving, which is what we’re trying to accomplish here.

#13. Not of This World

I bet more than one of you didn’t know this kindred colorless instant existed, or at least you’d forgotten it did. The reason being is that paying 7 mana to cast Turn Aside is a bad investment, but there’s an argument to run it if your deck focuses on big Eldrazi like Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger.

#12. Thwart

Bouncing three islands back to your hand to cast a counterspell for free may seem excessive, but if it's between that or losing your win condition or even the game, I’d always pay the price happily. It’s all about self-restraint.

#11. Foil

Foil is a card I first saw way back when I was building my first Commander deck, inspired by one article Sheldon Menery wrote for cheap commanders, using Talrand, Sky Summoner as its blue commander. The trick here is that Foil is an unconditional counterspell that can be used to protect your board that also adds a 2/2 flier for free along with our merfolk commander. Along with other ones like Daze or Thwart, you’ll be almost guaranteed to have at least an island to ditch to cast it for 0 mana.

#10. Flare of Denial

Similar to Fierce Guardianship, Flare of Denial is a fair counterspell that lets you play it for free. However, the catch is that you need to sacrifice a non-token blue creature, which may be a hard pill to swallow. On the other hand, it can be used with the likes of Aura Thief, Chasm Skulker, and Enduring Curiosity to get extra value, so it has its niche uses with the right thought put on it.

#9. Pact of Negation

While you don’t pay any mana to cast Pact of Negation, you’ll be taxed on your next turn as you need to spend 5 total mana. Otherwise, you’ll lose the game. There’s a cute combo when you pair it along with Hive Mind, where you cast any of the Pacts, and then opponents are forced to copy the spell and inevitably lose for not being able to pay the tax.

#8. Mindbreak Trap

Mindbreak Trap is the perfect card against storm decks for a reason. The thing is that while this card doesn’t counter anything per se, it actually does a very similar job. In fact, it does it better as the spells are exiled. Players get to cast it if their opponents have played three or more spells, something storm players love to do, and it can also exile any number of target spells. If you were looking for the perfect sideboard card for less than $5, this is a top choice.

#7. Disrupting Shoal

Back when the Modern format was created, Blazing Shoal was a critical part of infect decks that loved to discard a Progenitus or Reaper King to pump a creature for a one-turn kill with counter back up. While the red Shoal was banned, the blue one, Disrupting Shoal, has recently seen a rise in popularity thanks to Goblin Charbelcher decks that run MDFC lands like Suppression Ray or Sea Gate Restoration to act as lands in a deck that doesn’t run any. The Shoal fits perfectly in it, as you’ll always have a card to ditch.

#6. Subtlety

Technically, it's not a counter, but it does a pretty similar job, at least against creatures and planeswalkers. Subtlety belongs to the Modern Horizons 2 elemental incarnation cycle, and this one can put a spell of the given type to the top or bottom of their library, the owner’s choice. While you may want to cast this for free, remember that you’ll lose the creature as it’ll go to the graveyard due to its evoke ability.

#5. Fierce Guardianship

While some counters don’t require you to have any particular card on the board to cast them for free, as in the case of Force of Will and Disrupting Shoal, there are others like Daze and Fierce Guardianship that need you to have a specific card type already in play. In this case, you only need to have your commander. In principle, this may sound awful, but it’s pretty good, as you can now have a 0-mana counter to protect it from any removal your opponents may have.

#4. Mental Misstep

Phyrexian mana was a design mistake, or at least, that's what I believe after seeing multiple cards like Gitaxian Probe and Mental Misstep banned from pretty much every Magic format they touch. In fact, the latter is banned in each of them except for Vintage, where it's restricted, since Eternal formats love playing cheap cards like Brainstorm and Ponder to craft their turns. Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer is very thankful that this card wasn’t legal along with it. Otherwise, it would hate it the most.

#3. Force of Negation

Force of Negation might be one of the most popular Modern cards, as it emulates the Legacy staple Force of Will. While it's significantly worse due to its casting cost restrictions and the targets it can hit, it compensates for being one of the few free counterspells available in the format and exiling the card it countered.

#2. Daze

Legacy and Pauper are the formats where Daze has seen most of its play, mostly due to being an Eternal relic. It was ultimately banned from Pauper since blue decks were too dominant at the time, and its extreme synergy with Mystic Sanctuary was too much for other fair decks. But maybe it’d be okay in the current meta.

#1. Force of Will

Of course, what else would you expect to be at the top of this list? Force of Will has been a staple for Legacy and Vintage decks since its introduction due to how powerful denying a spell for free is. It’s so powerful that cards like Roiling Vortex and Boromir, Warden of the Tower are printed from time to time to punish players for casting the likes of FoW, and yet, it seems not enough to stop the Force of Will.

If you don’t believe me, ask Chris Rock!

Best Free Counterspell Payoffs

Due to the nature of most of them being instants, these free counterspells can fit into a wide variety of decks. For example, some creatures like Young Pyromancer, Talrand, Sky Summoner, and Monastery Mentor love to run them due to their nature of creating creatures whenever instant or sorceries are cast.

Other creatures are more specific, like Baral, Chief of Compliance, as they work with just counterspells.

Of course, win conditions or Voltron commanders like Narset, Enlightened Master, or Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow, appreciate free counterspells to protect their game plan while keeping your mana available for proactive plays. These commanders often rely on spell-slinging or combat triggers to generate advantage, and having instant-speed, 0-cost interaction ensures they can safely execute their strategies without losing momentum.

Last but not least… if you’re into proxies, you get to play the funniest proxy of them all!

Wrap Up

Pact of Negation | Illustration by Jason Chan

While not all of these are Oscar-winning stars, the ones from the top five are among the most powerful cards printed in Magic: The Gathering for a reason. If you have access to them, it's a good idea to start running them in your decks.

What do you think? Would you like more of these printed in the near future, or are you okay with just these few? Let us know in the comments!

As always, thank you so much for reading up until now, and if you want to make sure to catch all of the important pieces of MTG-related news, remember to follow us on Twitter and join us on our Draftsim Discord server to always catch all of it.

Take care, and see you next time!