Legendary Robot Overtakes Zinnia as Most Popular Jeskai Commander

Last updated on August 26, 2026

Kilo, Apogee Mind | Illustration by Tuan Duong Chu

The top Jeskai () commanders on EDHREC have been shaken as Kilo, Apogee Mind has claimed the most popular spot with 18,118 decks overtaking Zinnia, Valley's Voice (18,102) by a handful of decks, and pulling ahead of other contenders like Captain America, First Avenger (15,469) by several thousand lists.

What Makes Kilo So Good?

Kilo, Apogee Mind was introduced in Edge of Eternities as the face commander of the Jeskai precon Counter Intelligence, built around spacecraft, charge counters, and proliferation. It was one of 2025’s best precons, plus proliferation is just super fun. If Balatro has taught us anything, gamers like making numbers go up, and proliferate is one of the best ways to do that in Magic.

Kilo’s an awesome proliferate engine, too, because you only need to tap it. The obvious synergy is with spacecraft like Inspirit, Flagship Vessel, but there are many ways to tap your creature without getting into combat. Ever heard of Springleaf Drum?

Kilo is also just an excellently designed commander for brewing. Proliferate provides a boundary—you must build around counters—but Jeskai can take that many directions, from spacecraft to artifacts with charge counters to +1/+1 counters to planeswalkers. Kilo needs to be tapped, but two players might look for two ways to tap it; one could use spacecraft, another suits Kilo up with counters and attack.

Was The Counter Intelligence Precon Good?

Counter Intelligence hit every note you could ask from a precon: An interesting face commander, great reprints, new cards and mechanics, and a functional gameplan (you’d be surprised at how few precons manage that).

Part of Kilo’s success should absolutely be attributed to leading a banger precon. This was one of the best of 2025, from one of the most interest in-universe sets of the past few years because of how it developed what we thought of as in-universe Magic. Add in the many build paths and flexible upgrades, and it’s no wonder it would take off like this. Heck, Draftsim’s managing editor, Tim, called it a year ago:

Magic: The Gathering Edge of Eternities - Commander Deck - Counter Intelligence

• SURPASS YOUR PROGRAMMING—Boost artifacts and proliferate counters with the aid of interstellar vessel, Inspirit, and its sentient navigational consciousness, Kilo
• 2 FOIL BORDERLESS COMMANDERS—Every Edge of Eternities Commander Deck includes 2 Traditional Foil Legendary Creature cards featuring Borderless art
• INTRODUCES 12 COMMANDER CARDS—Each deck introduces 12 never-before-seen Commander cards to Magic: The Gathering
• COLLECT SPECIAL TREATMENT CARDS—Each deck also comes with a 2-card Collector Booster Sample Pack containing 1 Traditional Foil card and 1 alt-border Rare or Mythic Rare (foil or nonfoil)
• THRILLING MULTIPLAYER BATTLES—Commander is a multiplayer way to play Magic, an epic, free-for-all battle full of strategic plays and social intrigue

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What Should I Play With Kilo?

I’d start by looking for cards that use counters and I want to proliferate. Luckily, the precon comes with lots of good toys, like Insight Engine, Empowered Autogenerator, and Crystalline Crawler.

Even if you focus on artifacts and charge counters, look for cards that use +1/+1 counters really well, such as Pollywog Prodigy and Pensive Professor. Big Mother Mouser turns counters into a bunch of artifact tokens.

Untap effects are also extremely important to maximize Kilo’s triggers. Sting, the Glinting Dagger and Drumbellower are great because they untap Kilo on each opponent’s turn. Unwinding Clock gets that plus extra mana from mana rocks.

Ways to tap Kilo are just as important as those untappers. I already mentioned Springleaf Drum, but it’s worth mentioning again. Paradise Mantle and Relic of Legends are also sources of mana and facilitate infinite combos with Freed from the Real.

Will Another Jeskai Commander Overtake Kilo?

The above image shows the top six Jeskai commanders on EDHREC. Realistically, the only commander I can see overtaking Kilo is Zinnia, Valley's Voice. The other cards are either a little narrow or have too big a gap to close without a sudden surge of support from Wizards, like another set with major energy or human support.

Zinnia is the previous top commander and the deck gap is super slim. It also shares many of the traits Kilo has: Creating token copies of your creatures via offspring is cool (two Terror of the Peaks, anybody??), tokens have ample support, like counters, it generates value but vaguely enough to build many ways, etc, etc.

Kilo being above Zinnia could be a rounding error, but I suspect it has staying power because it’s about to get more tools from Star Trek and the return of spacecraft. We’ve already seen U.S.S. Enterprise-D, Galaxy-Class which just draws a card every time you proliferate. Another few toys like that, and Kilo’s stocks will be out of this world.

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