All 19 Insect Commanders in Magic Ranked

Xira, the Golden Sting | Illustration by Mila Pesic

Insects can be equally fascinating and frightening. I love to look at insects and learn about their behavior… at least through mesh or glass or something. They’re an important part of the food chain in many ecosystems, and can play a role in decomposition processes.

It shouldn’t be a surprise that many insect commanders in Magic interact with the graveyard in some way, whether they care about what’s in there, let you mill cards, or help you to reanimate creatures and lands.

One thing’s for sure: There’s almost no blue magic around here. That’s water bug and diving beetle erasure if you ask me.

What Are Insect Commanders in MTG?

Fumulus, the Infestation | Illustration by Takotto

Insect commanders are legendary creatures and other eligible commanders that have insect in their type line, that create insect tokens, or that buff or care about insects in some way. They’re primarily have a Golgari () color identity, and many of them interact with your graveyard.

Honorable Mentions

The Locust God, Izoni, Thousand-Eyed, and Old Rutstein all generate Insect tokens of some description, but they don’t necessarily want you to build around the insect theme. If you want to build around insects in Golgari (), the legendary insects are far better options than Rutstein or Izoni. The Locust God is an effective commander for discard and wheels, but you aren’t in good colors for insects.

#19. Altanak, the Thrice-Called

Altanak, the Thrice-Called wants you to discard it from your hand, and you can only play one copy of Say Its Name in Commander, so you have absolutely no incentive to run it in the command zone.

#18. Thriss, Nantuko Primus

A 7-mana 5/5 has to do a lot these days, and Thriss, Nantuko Primus’s activated ability doesn’t cut it. Make it cheaper and turn it into some kind of keyword enabler, then get back to me.

#17. Xira Arien

Xira Arien enables a group hug/group slug playstyle that makes your opponents draw cards only to force them to discard their hand. You can also build around insects if you prefer.

#16. Blex, Vexing Pest / Search for Blex

Lord of many creature types, master of none. Search for Blex stocks your graveyard, while Blex, Vexing Pest gives your other insects a buff and works well as sacrifice fodder. You can gain a bunch of life if you can reanimate and sacrifice it consistently, too. But as a commander for an insect theme, it doesn’t excite me all that much.

#15. The Swarmweaver

There are more explosive or more consistent insect token generators than The Swarmweaver, and there are more impactful lords and payoffs that don’t need you to enable delirium. At least this scarecrow cares about spiders, too. You can do worse for an insect commander, but you can absolutely do better.

#14. Vrestin, Menoptra Leader

This isn’t your usual insect commander, since Vrestin, Menoptra Leader swaps black magic out for white. Selesnya () is a good color identity for counter doublers and token doublers to help make the X in Vrestin’s mana cost count for more.

#13. Amzu, Swarm’s Hunger

Amzu, Swarm's Hunger is a good insect lord as a menace enabler, and it synergizes well with what many Golgari insect decks want to do with its trigger when cards leave your graveyard. It supports many other decks very well, but its price is definitely related to its ex-Clue-sivity. If it were in a set like Bloomburrow, we’d probably play Amzu out of the command zone at least twice as much. It’s good, but without reprints, it won’t be a commander you build around just because you found it in a booster and thought it was neat.

#12. Fumulus, the Infestation

Fumulus, the Infestation rewards you for building a deck full of sac outlets and edicts, and it’s a good reason to run less-played black insects like Brood of Cockroaches. Tons of mono-black commanders lean into this aristocrats playstyle, but I like how Fumulus puts a fun typal spin on it.

#11. Aatchik, Emerald Radian

As with any good 6-mana commander, Aatchik, Emerald Radian pays you off for the time you take to set up your strategy before you bring it in. You can go wide with other insect token generators, and you can support those tokens with other good insects, both legendary and non. Then adjust to whether you want a deck that’s more of a miller or more of an aristocrat, and you’re off to the races!

#10. Grist, Voracious Larva / Grist, the Plague Swarm

Grist, Voracious Larva leans into the reanimator section of Golgari’s toolbox; you especially want to surround it with reanimation abilities so you can transform it into Grist, the Plague Swarm. This Grist planeswalker riffs on Grist, the Hunger Tide’s abilities, but the main difference is that the Plague Swarm’s ultimate gives you copies of the creatures in your graveyard rather than mass life drain. Creatures with enters abilities can turn that into a much bigger swing in board presence, especially with creatures that have removal-based enters abilities or that create tokens when they enter.

#9. Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp

Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp is a modular-matters commander with a +1/+1 counter adder that’s tied to that ability. Its activated ability lets you destroy your own artifacts, which is perfect to trigger those modular abilities and move some counters around. Boros () has good modular and artifact creatures, plus access to more counter adders like Lae'zel, Vlaakith's Champion and Wake the Past as a mass reanimator and haste enabler.

#8. Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest

Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest is another Golgari sacrifice commander. It rewards you if you go wide and are unafraid to sacrifice your troops and your resources for profit. If you don’t care about insects as much, Mazirek has combos you can exploit with Basking Broodscale, or with Scurry Oak and your favorite sac outlet.

#7. Xira, the Golden Sting

Now here’s a fun design; egg counters are so unique. Xira, the Golden Sting gives you card advantage and board presence every time you attack, which makes me want to strive for extra combats. You can also comfortably build it with an insects theme, since you’ll always have plenty of sacrifice fodder and chump blockers to target with egg counters.

#6. Szarel, Genesis Shepherd

Szarel, Genesis Shepherd, from the World Shaper Edge of Eternities Commander precon, is right at home in a land sacrifice build. You could probably also build an insect theme here since Zask also lets you play lands from your graveyard, and there’s insects alongside it in the precon and the main Edge of Eternities set.

#5. Kathril, Aspect Warper

Kathril, Aspect Warper is a fun, somewhat unique commander that allows you to build around a full keyword soup theme. You need to fill your graveyard with creatures to set up its enters ability; self-mill is a good start, but entomb effects are better. Sire of Seven Deaths is the perfect creature card for this build, if you can manage it.

#4. Vishgraz, the Doomhive

It’s funny that we have two insect commanders from Abzan precons () (plus one from a Jund precon ()). Vishgraz, the Doomhive makes for a good commander for an infect or a Phyrexian creature theme. As long as you get poison counters onto your opponents, that’s all you need to make Vishgraz into a threat for commander damage, too.

#. Zask, Skittering Swarmlord

If it weren’t exclusive to Jumpstart 2022, we’d probably see even more Zask, Skittering Swarmlord decks. It both fuels your graveyard and lets you bring insects and lands back, which is some great internal synergy. With enough mana, it’s effectively a lord for your insects, although you’d probably like to have The Swarmweaver on the field in support.

#2. The Wise Mothman

The Wise Mothman is certainly the most popular insect commander, at least in terms of the number of decks built around it according to EDHREC. It supports mill, +1/+1 counter, and mutant themes very well, and you aren’t in the worst colors to run insects if you absolutely want to.

#1. Grist, the Hunger Tide

Due to its unique static ability, Grist, the Hunger Tide can be your commander. It’s perfect to build around the insect creature type: It gives you a lot of impact as a 3-mana planeswalker, its +1 loyalty ability widens your board and stocks your graveyard, its -2 is a sac outlet and removal ability, and its -5 ability has the potential to be a finishing move. This insect commander provides so much value that any new legendary insect in Golgari colors has to do something interesting and different to justify running it over Grist.

Why Can Grist, the Hunger Tide Be Your Commander?

Grist, the Hunger Tide’s first ability states, “As long as Grist, the Hunger Tide isn’t on the battlefield, it’s a 1/1 Insect creature in addition to its other types.” This is a characteristic-defining ability that applies to Grist at all times. If Grist is in the command zone, it isn’t on the battlefield. Its full type line in the command zone is “Legendary Creature Planeswalker – Insect Grist”, which allows it to be your commander.

It’s a very roundabout way to say, “Grist, the Hunger Tide can be your commander”, but this wording also lets you reanimate Grist with creature reanimation abilities, grab Grist from your library with creature tutors, and drop it from your hand with abilities like Ghalta, Stampede Tyrant.

Commanding Conclusion

Grist, Voracious Larva | Illustration by Chris Rahn

Insect commanders stick very closely to Golgari colors, so it isn’t surprising that many of them have graveyard synergies. While I might like more variety, I see how graveyards play thematically with what a lot of insects do, and it makes it easier to run a lot of legendary insects together in the same deck.

Which insect commander do you like to run? Which ones have I underrated? What do you want to see from future insect commanders? Let me know in the comments or over on the Draftsim Discord.

And with that, it’s time for me to bug out.