The 61 Best Look at Hand and Hand Reveal Cards in Magic Ranked

Last updated on February 13, 2024

Mindclaw Shaman | Illustration by Slawomir Maniak

You ever boot up a console game with a friend, start a split screen match, and find yourself giving them the stink eye a few minutes later? Did they really earn that kill or were they screen-peeking? How about a game of cards? They can’t be rubbernecking, can they?

Luckily for us Magic players, we don’t need to cheat to look at our opponents’ hands. We can just use some of our favorite spells and abilities to get opponents to show us the goods and reveal their hands. Which are the best, and where will they fit into your strategies?

You know what, Mr. Byrne? I think I will take a look at these hands!

What Are Look at Hand Cards in Magic?

Slayer's Bounty | Illustration by Aurore Folny

Look at hand cards are spells or abilities that allow you to see the cards in an opponent’s hand, a game zone that usually isn’t public information. Some spells are worded with “look at” text, while others are worded with “reveal” text. In a 1v1 format, this difference doesn’t matter so much. In a multiplayer format like Commander, it can be the difference between learning your opponent’s hand for yourself only and showing the entire table.

Looking at an opponent’s hand is mostly the black and blue realm, but the other colors have dabbled in it too. For our purposes, I’ve ignored cards that only reveal one or two cards of an opponent’s hand because that usually won’t be their entire hand. That means that the Fall half of Rise // Fall misses the cut.

Honorable Mentions

Un-Set Tomfoolery

Un-sets are full of fun stuff, and WotC hasn’t neglected to include looking at an opponent’s hand in them. Of course, they won’t always let you look at an opponent’s hand, but these are still plenty of fun, conceptually. Besides, some of them also point toward cards you’ll read about later.

Say hello to Defective Detective, Double Cross, Subcontract, Denied!, Frogkin Kidnapper, Sly Spy, Smart Ass, X, Urza's Contact Lenses, Truth or Dare, and The Grand Calcutron.

Revealing Yourself

Some cards pay you off for revealing your own hand, but that’s not really what we’re going for today. Still, I thought I’d bring up Hedron Alignment and Atemsis, All-Seeing to show you some of the most extreme examples of that.

Best White Look at Hand Cards

#4. Slayer’s Bounty

Slayer's Bounty is an Alchemy: Innistrad card that lets you look at the creature cards in someone’s hand. Other than gathering the information, it doesn’t let you do much with it, though it’s a Clue that lets you draft a card from its spellbook when you sac it or another Clue.

#3. Boareskyr Tollkeeper

Boareskyr Tollkeeper from Alchemy Horizons: Baldur’s Gate has an opponent reveal their creatures and lands when it enters the battlefield. You can then give one of those cards an ability that makes it enter the battlefield tapped.

#2. Anointed Peacekeeper

In singleton formats, Anointed Peacekeeper won’t do much other than tax one specific card. It’ll tax all your opponents if they cast it, but it’ll also tax you if you have the same card and want to activate its abilities. The real galaxy-brained play is to name a card that isn’t on the board, in a graveyard, or in your opponent’s hand.

#1. Elite Spellbinder

Elite Spellbinder’s ability is similar to Anointed Peacekeeper in that it taxes a card, but this ability is more repeatable. Bring Elite Spellbinder back for more enters-the-battlefield triggers and you can exile/tax more than one card, without the downside of taxing yourself if you’re running the same card.

Best Blue Look at Hand Cards

#8. Zur’s Weirding

Zur's Weirding affects the whole board, making everyone play with their hands revealed. You can trade life to send cards a player would draw to the graveyard, which is all kinds of shenanigans.

If you want the hand-revealing effect without the life-trading option, Wandering Eye is a flying illusion with that effect for one mana cheaper.

#7. Dragon’s Eye Savants

It doesn’t have much offensive potential, but Dragon's Eye Savants can take a solid punch. It lets you look at an opponent’s hand when you turn it face-up, and its morph cost is virtually nothing.

#6. Alhammarret, High Arbiter

Alhammarret, High Arbiter reveals each of your opponent’s hands. You only get to name one card, but the information gained from all their hands could help you pick something that some or all have in common. The body is about what you’d expect for a sphinx.

#5. Vendilion Clique

I love a lot of what Vendilion Clique has going for it. The combination of its mana cost, stats, flying, and flash is viable wherever you’d like to put it. It shows you an opponent’s hand on ETB, and you get lots of choice; you don’t have to put a card on the bottom of your opponent’s library, and you don’t have to tell other players what you saw.

#4. Walker of Secret Ways

When you think about it, ninjas are a great tribe for looking at your opponent’s hand. Themes of stealth and gathering information fit perfectly.

Walker of Secret Ways specifically gives you that when it deals combat damage to a player, which is facilitated by its ninjutsu ability. The cherry on top is its ability to return ninjas you control to their owner’s hand. It doesn’t even tap to do it!

#3. Telepathy

Telepathy will either bait your opponent’s enchantment destruction or stay on the field to give everyone information while you maintain some privacy.

#2. Peek (and pals)

Peek shows up in peak form here, and I hope it piques your interest.

Clairvoyance is virtually the same card, but it delays the card draw to the next turn’s upkeep. Sorcerous Sight keeps the immediate card draw but is only at sorcery speed.

If you really want the dirt on your opponent’s deck, Spy Network also lets you look at their face-down cards and the top card of their library. And you get to mess with your own library too!

#1. Gitaxian Probe

If we’re talking simply looking at your opponent’s hand, Gitaxian Probe is the picture of minimalist elegance. One blue Phyrexian mana to look at their hand without revealing it to the table and draw a card is lots of value in a tight little 1-drop.

Best Black Look at Hand Cards

#20. Mesmeric Fiend + Kitesail Freebooter

I’d like Mesmeric Fiend better if it permanently exiled the card that you choose when it ETBs. In terms of creatures that have this as an enters-the-battlefield trigger, this horror is better and cheaper than lots of the older, less supported creatures.

Kitesail Freebooter gives you the same effect, although restricted to a noncreature, nonland card. It’s got a few more homes given its human pirate typing.

#19. Entomber Exarch

Modal ETB effects are interesting, but anything modal is usually slightly worse than the sure thing. In this case, Entomber Exarch doesn’t let you force an opponent to discard a creature. Returning a creature from your graveyard to your hand is useful, though it’s not as good as returning to the battlefield.

#18. He Who Hungers

Okay, but like, this is cannibalism, right?

He Who Hungers offers you a spirit-specific sacrifice outlet that gets you a Pilfer effect. It’s costly to get out, but the flying and soulshift add to the spirit theme.

#17. Infernal Kirin

Infernal Kirin gives your spirit decks a whole lot of extra value for a look at hand effect. It triggers every time you cast spirits and arcane spells, and you force your opponent to discard everything as cheap as or cheaper than what you cast.

#16. Extract the Truth

Extract the Truth’s look at hand effect is slightly worse than Pilfer, but it doubles as a form of enchantment hate. You don’t get to choose which enchantment, but the sacrifice effect gets around hexproof and indestructible.

#15. Bala Ged Thief

Bala Ged Thief is one of the better black allies available, with a trigger that activates from and cares about your allies. The more you have, the more of an opponent’s hand you can see. You also aren’t limited in terms of card types.

#14. Concealing Curtains / Revealing Eye

The difference between Concealing Curtains and a Pilfer effect is that you also give your opponent a card in the process. It costs one more mana than a Pilfer to transform your Concealing Curtains into a Revealing Eye, which feels less than ideal until you remember that this eye horror is a 3/4 with menace.

If you just want the first part on a card, look no further than Ostracize.

#13. The Cruelty of Gix

Read ahead is nice, but it defeats our purposes today: the hand-revealing is part of the first chapter of The Cruelty of Gix, so using read ahead bypasses it. Having the discard be creature or planeswalker-specific isn’t ideal, although it ties into the graveyard-robbing theme of the third chapter.

#12. Pilfer + Pilfering Imp

There are a lot of cards like Pilfer that are costed at three or four mana, but two is so much more efficient. You can’t force opponents to discard lands, but any other target is fair game. Distress is virtually the same card, but it has two black pips in its casting cost. You can get a one-mana Pilfer if you cast Devour Intellect with Treasure.

You can also get a Pilfer effect on an imp; Pilfering Imp is a 1-drop flier that you can sac to look at someone’s hand and force a discard.

#11. Leshrac’s Sigil

Leshrac's Sigil makes me happy because of the parallel casting cost and activated ability costs. Two black mana each. It’s like it rhymes.

You can activate this enchantment’s first ability any time an opponent casts a green spell. Aiming for green limits it slightly, but it’s still a decent enchantment.

#10. Divest + Despise

Divest gives you a look at hand effect that discards only creatures or artifacts, but it costs the right amount for its limitations. Despise is the creature/planeswalker version, but it costs just the same. I think that Dreams of Steel and Oil could take Divest’s place someday since it’s basically the same effect, except you have more cards to target and you exile them instead.

#9. Biting-Palm Ninja

Get it? Biting-Palm Ninja? Oh, the dad jokes never stop.

Biting-Palm Ninja’s ninjutsu should help to get it to trigger its look at hand ability at least once. You’ll have to take awake its menace trigger, but that matters less if you’re returning this ninja to your hand with Walker of Secret Ways or running proliferation.

#8. Grief

Oh, good Grief.

Whether you evoke it or cast it or cheat it onto the battlefield, Grief gives you a Pilfering ETB. So menacing too.

#7. Psychotic Episode

Psychotic Episode gives you a little more information than a typical hand-revealing spell given that you can look at and choose the card on top of their library. Sending cards to the bottom of the library isn’t that effective if you opponent is running tutors, but the extra information is nice.

#6. Mind Slash

With Mind Slash, you get a repeatable Pilfer effect on a sacrifice outlet enchantment. It’s at sorcery speed, as most of these effects are, but you don’t have to tap the enchantment to get the effect. In theory, you could reveal everyone’s hand once per turn with enough creatures to pump in.

#5. Pelakka Predation

Pelakka Predation gives you a pretty standard reveal/force discard package on the front face of a MDFC. The back face is a black land that comes in tapped, but we always love the versality of having a spell that can be a land.

#4. Duress

Duress doesn’t let you target a creature card to discard, but it’s that much cheaper for it. There’s still a lot of fair game, and a lot of it can be powerful, including enchantments or artifacts that are combo pieces.

Duress also serves as the second chapter of Elspeth's Nightmare.

#3. Inquisition of Kozilek

Bet nobody expected this one.

Inquisition of Kozilek may be restricted to a three-mana-card or less, but there are a lot of great cheap cards to target in efficiently-built decks.

#2. Thoughtseize

It may cost you two life on top of the one mana, but Thoughtseize is one of the most effective reveal/discard combos available.

#1. Word of Command

Word of Command is one of the older look at hand cards in the game, and you get to force that player to play the card you choose. There’s lots of potential here, like casting a creature that you’ll then destroy, wasting an instant/sorcery on illegal targets, using their own cards to hurt their board… Its price is a function of both how good and how old it is.

Best Red Look at Hand Cards

#4. Sirocco

Hating on blue is fun, don’t lie. Sirocco lets you force a player to choose between paying life or discarding their blue instants. For some players, that hurts. Some.

#3. Blood Oath

Blood Oath is like Sirocco in that it deals damage, but it measures it based on the presence of a card type when your opponent reveals their hand. Marginal improvements are still improvements.

#2. Reversal of Fortune

There’s something better coming, but Reversal of Fortune lets you copy an instant or sorcery from your opponent’s hand. They don’t lose access to the spell, though, so they could hit your right back depending on the card.

#1. Mindclaw Shaman

Mindclaw Shaman gives you an ETB that lets you steal an instant or sorcery after you’ve had your opponent reveal their hand. “Steal” as in “cast without paying its mana cost; no, you can’t bank it for later, you greedy little gremlin.” Also “steal” as in “cast the card,” not “cast a copy.”

Best Green Look at Hand Cards

#3. Kamahl’s Summons

I’m probably cheating here with Kamahl's Summons, but green really needs some representation. Revealing cards is optional, and only creatures are eligible. “Show me your creatures and I’ll give you a green Bear” also sounds kind of creepy out of context.

#2. Revelation

On balance, Revelation is a card that should probably be left in the past. Sure, 1-drop enchantments are useful just as triggers, but you’re included in the revealed-hands party. Revelation sure is revealing. Perhaps a little too revealing.

#1. Fertile Imagination

I’ll admit, I’ve been accused of having a Fertile Imagination once or twice. As a card, it’s an option for your saproling token deck. You get to gamble based on the card type you pick, but that’s all there is to it.

Best Multicolored Look at Hand Cards

#11. Sin Collector

Rather than discarding, you’re exiling the card that you choose with Sin Collector. You’re limited to instants and sorceries with its ETB, but that’s still useful.

#10. Thought Erasure

Thought Erasure gives you one of the standard look-at-hand payoffs: making your opponent discard. It also lets you change your next draw, which is a great bonus to both black and blue decks.

#9. Psychic Intrusion

The ability to scour an opponent’s graveyard and hand for a target to exile is very intrusive indeed. The card you choose depends on whether you intend to leave it in exile or cast it for yourself, although the option makes Psychic Intrusion that much more flexible. It’s costed just right at five mana and sorcery speed.

#8. Extract Brain

Extract Brain is a spell theft card with an X in its casting cost. With the right amount of mana, you can see your opponent’s entire hand and cast something from it without paying more.

#7. Covetous Urge

Did I say Psychic Intrusion was costed correctly? My mistake; meet the four-mana Covetous Urge.

#6. Mindleech Mass

Ew.

Mindleech Mass lets you look opponent’s hand whenever you deal combat damage. The card theft makes it much better than the similar Ghastlord of Fugue. I also prefer the trample to the unblockable in terms of balance.

#5. Crosis, the Purger

You shouldn’t really be surprised to see a dragon with a look-at-hand ability, and Crosis, the Purger gives you a pretty good one. When Crosis deals combat damage to a player, you can pay to force them to discard cards according to a color of your choice. Crosis, the Purger is in great colors to be running discard strategies, and it’s significantly better than Darigaaz, the Igniter, which deals damage according to that color’s presence in their hand.

#4. Zara, Renegade Recruiter

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate’s life for me! Zara, Renegade Recruiter is a fun temporary creature-stealer. Recruiter indeed. It fits nicely into pirate-centered strategy. I like cards that bring variety to game; every deck you face gives you different recruits to target.

#3. Valki, God of Lies / Tibalt, Cosmic Impostor

Valki, God of Lies is a modal double-faced card from Kaldheim, and it’s just so good. It’ll reveal all your opponents’ hands when it enters the battlefield and let you exile creatures from each of their hands until Valki LTBs. While it’s on the field, you can pay X to turn it into a copy of any of the exiled creatures. Word of caution though: it won’t keep its activated ability, so you won’t be able to toggle between creatures like a Pokémon trainer.

#2. Silent-Blade Oni

I’ve never played ninjas, but Silent-Blade Oni may have just convinced me. Its own ninjutsu ability is fine, but I like it better if Satoru Umezawa is in the deck. Of course, you could always double up on combat damage triggers by having Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow around. Plus, maybe Donatello or Leonardo once Wizards drops a TMNT Universes Beyond product. Just speculating, but that would be heckin’ fun.

#1. Sen Triplets

Sen Triplets can be a worthy commander for you, allowing you to play lands and spells from an opponent’s hand during yours. This is so powerful, especially given the colors the card covers on its own. With the right mana rocks in play, you’ll be able to cast practically anything that opponent has.

Best Colorless Look at Hand Cards

#5. Scrying Glass

The name’s a little confusing given what we understand scrying to mean. Scrying Glass also enables those gamblers who think they can guess the number of cards of a particular color in a person’s hand. Between the activation cost and the uncertainty, it’s a lot to go through just to draw a card.

#4. Thought Prison

You’d better hope for a wealth of choice in an opponent’s hand when you cast Thought Prison. My gut tells me that your best bet is to choose a 1- or 2-drop since cheaper spells should be more common. Either way, Thought Prison is too costly and too unreliable to be of much use.

#3. Sorcerous Spyglass

Sorcerous Spyglass will do more work for you in a non-singleton format if your opponent has multiple copies of a card in hand. Otherwise, it’ll just lock down one card’s activated abilities.

#2. Glasses of Urza

Spectacular! Er… not so much, although Glasses of Urza only costs one mana to bring out, and it doesn’t cost mana to activate. I’m feeling the flavor of when grandparents play cards with kids who don’t know how to hide their hand.

#1. Thought-Knot Seer

Yeah, the top colorless card would be an Eldrazi, wouldn’t it? Thought-Knot Seer has an opponent reveal their hand, and you get to exile something from it. No built-in mechanism to bring it back, nothing. Sorry, Eldrazi make me scowl. Are you scowling?

Best Look at Hand Payoffs

Just as looking at someone’s library can help you decide who to mill next, looking at someone’s hand can help you decide who to force to discard. It’s all about gathering information and using it to your advantage, planning your moves so that they have the most impact.

Ninjas are probably the best tribe to build around if you want lots of hand-peeking built onto your creatures. Wizards and specters each have those kinds of effects over the game’s history, sometimes as an ETB on commons.

Of course, you can always use one look-at-hand ability to make a second one, one that asks you to name a card or characteristic first, go without a hitch. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should plan on it or anything, but it’s there.

Wrap Up

Crosis, the Purger | Illustration by Chris Rahn

We truly are in the information age. Just as in any game of strategy, information is key to sound tactical analysis. It’s also probably one of the more “invasive” things you can do to a player, but it’s all in good fun, no?

Which cards do you use to look at your opponents’ hands? How do you like to use these effects? Let me know in the comments below or over on the official Draftsim Discord.

Now take a look at these hands!

Everything Everywhere All at Once