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Instant spells in Magic: The Gathering tend to be among the strongest. They can be cast at any time, allowing them to be used as an interruption or when you’re opponents’ mana sources are all tapped out so they can’t be countered or interacted with. They also let you use unused mana during the end step of your opponent’s turn before you start your next turn, so you don’t have to waste mana casting that spell on your turn. Many of the best cards in the game’s history are instants, and these are the 13 best in MTG.
Best Instants in MTG
13. Swan Song
One-mana counterspells that can hit multiple targets are always going to be among the best. Swan Song can hit either enchantments, instants, or sorcery spells which are three of the most played card types in most Magic formats such as Commander and Draft.
Swan Song does leave the controller of the countered spell with a 2/2 Bird token. However, this creature is worth the trade-off as a creature with only flying is better to give your opponent than whatever powerful spell they tried to resolve.
12. Collected Company
Collected Company is a stable of many creature-based combo decks across many formats, the best of which is Pioneer where it shines the most. At instant speed, you get two creatures onto the battlefield for free. While these have to have a mana value of three or less, decks playing Collected Company are only playing creatures that fit that criteria.
There are some creatures where if they hit the battlefield together, you can win the game then and there as soon as your upkeep comes around. Since Collected Company is an instant, you can cast it during the end step to ensure your creatures won’t be summoning sick when you start your turn.
11. Veil Of Summer
Veil Of Summer may not seem like a strong card at first glance, and yet it’s banned in Pioneer and Historic. The effect to draw a card isn’t the main draw, but instead the ability to prevent your spells from being countered that turn.
Protecting all your spells for the rest of the turn lets you ensure all your spells resolve. Decks playing Veil Of Summer tend to be combo decks as it lets them perform their combo without having to worry about counterspells at all. As an added bonus, Veil Of Summer protects your both you and your permanents from blue and black sources to give an extra layer of protection.
10. Mystical Tutor
Tutors are among the best cards in all of Magic. They provide a layer of consistency that benefits any deck. They are especially strong in Commander where you have 99 card decks to ensure you always get access to a card you need.
Mystical Tutor is a way to get an instant and sorcery to the top of your library. What makes Mystical Tutor so good is that it can chain into other tutors so you can use it to reach any card type in your library. Since Mystical Tutor is an instant, you can cast it before you draw your card for turn to guarantee what your draw will be.
9. Counterspell
Counterspell is the most iconic counter of all time. Its effect is simple, it just counters any spell unconditionally. It is primarily played in decks that aren’t more than two colours as you need to have specifically blue mana to cast it.
The fact that Counterspell can ensure any card won’t hit the battlefield is what makes Counterspell so good. It hits any spell while not giving your opponent an opportunity to pay a tax to ignore the effect or give them anything on the battlefield. It’s one of the oldest cards in the game and remains one of the best.
8. Teferi’s Protection
Teferi’s Protection is one of the best instants when it comes to Commander. It gives you unconditional protection from everything, meaning you can’t be targeted and won’t take damage from anything until you start your next turn. Phasing out all your permanents means they can’t be targeted at all either as they aren’t treated like they exist.
Teferi’s protection only costs three mana, making it easy to always have mana up to cast it. If you are about to lose the game, Teferi’s Protection is a great way to grant yourself protection to buy extra time. You can also pair it with a board wipe so only your opponents’ battlefields will lose their permanents.
7. Lightning Bolt
The quintessential burn spell, Lightning Bolt is simple, dealing three damage to any target for one mana. What makes Lightning Bolt so good is that it can double as both a burn spell and a removal spell for any creature with three or less toughness.
Lightning Bolt is a great combat trick as well combined with creatures with prowess. In addition, it can turn a chump blocker into one that will trade with a stronger creature, dealing lethal damage with the damage that is already marked on it. Lightning Bolt is a defining card in all the formats it’s a part of, and you can’t always be safe knowing someone might be casting a Bolt. Lightning Bolt is the reason many burn and aggro decks are able to stay relevant in the meta of multiple formats, and thanks to how cheap Lightning Bolt is makes them great options for budget decks in more expensive formats.
6. Dark Ritual
Any card that cheats you ahead on mana is going to be powerful, and Dark Ritual is no exception. It’s one of the best rituals of all time, giving you three mana for the price of one. It’s a cornerstone of storm decks in particular that want to be casting as many spells as possible in one turn.
Even outside of storm decks, Dark Ritual lets you cast spells way ahead of your mana curve. This lets you play powerful spells before you’re “supposed” to be able to. As early as turn one, if you have multiple copies of Black Ritual in your hand you can generate five mana with two of them to cast something powerful before your opponent even has the opportunity to do anything. Dark Ritual is a staple of all the formats it’s a part of, and is the most iconic ritual of all time, both in storm decks and in general black decks that want to get big spells out early.
Swords To Plowshares is the best removal spell in the game. At the cost of giving your opponent some life, you exile any creature they control. While the lifegain can be large, the trade-off is more than worth it when they lose one of their most powerful creatures.
In a pinch, Swords To Plowshares can be used as lifegain on your own creatures. This isn’t going to come up often outside of desperation scenarios, but it’s an option to have. Swords To Plowshares hits any creature to let you ensure no problematic creatures stick to the battlefield.
4. Force Of Will
Force Of Will is the best counterspell in Magic: The Gathering. Although it costs five mana to cast, you are never actually playing it. Instead, you will be using the alternate cost of paying one life and exiling another blue card.
Force Of Will counters any spell without mana ever needing to be spent. Normally, being tapped out means you won’t have any way to interact with your opponents. However, in formats with Force Of Will in them, you always have to be vigilant. If your opponent is playing blue cards you have to be careful when playing spells as Force Of Will could be on the horizon.
What Are Blue Cards?
Force Of Will’s alternate casting cost specifically requires you to use a blue card. These are any spells that have a blue colour identity. Even if it doesn’t have a proper casting cost, if its identity is blue it can be pitched to Force Of Will. However, an Island cannot be used as it is not considered to have a colour.
3. Vampiric Tutor
Vampiric Tutor is the best tutor in the game. It lets you put any card from your library on top of it at the cost of two life. This life loss doesn’t matter, and the payoff of getting any card you want is worth much more than two life.
Since Vampiric Tutor is an instant, you can control what card you draw for turn as you can cast spells before you actually draw your card. Vampiric Tutor provides more consistency than any other card for very little investment. One mana for any card in your library is one of the best effects ever printed, so much so it’s banned in Legacy, restricted in Vintage, though is fully legal in Commander.
2. Brainstorm
Brainstorm is one of the strongest draw spells ever printed. While you only wind up drawing one card with it, what makes Brainstorm so good is being able to put two cards back into the library. The cards you return don’t have to be the cards you draw, allowing you to get rid of dead cards or store them in the library to keep them safe from being discarded against a Thoughtseize.
The strength of Brainstorm comes from formats with fetchlands because they let you shuffle your deck. You put the cards you don’t want back into the deck and then shuffle them away while you get a land out from the library. This is why Brainstorm is so popular in most formats it’s legal in while not being too strong in Pauper due to the format’s lack of fetchlands, Brainstorm needs them for its maximum potential.
1. Ancestral Recall
You can’t talk about the best instant spells without talking about Ancestral Recall. A part of the original cycle of cards that cost one mana and do three of something, Ancestral Recall lets either you or your opponent draw three cards. You are almost always going to be targeting yourself to draw the cards, but certain mill decks that can loop Ancestral Recall from the graveyard will target the opponent to force them to draw their entire deck to lose to mill when they start their turn.
Ancestral Recall only costs one mana, making it always a live card. The only format where Ancestral Recall is legal is Vintage, where it is restricted to one copy per deck. Even a weaker version of it, Ancestral Vision had to be banned out of Modern for a while because the effect is just that good.
The Power Nine:
The Power Nine is a term given to nine cards that are considered to be the nine best cards ever printed. These include Time Walk, Timetwister, Mox Emerald, Mox Pearl, Mox Ruby, Mox Jet, Mox Sapphire, Black Lotus, and the number one card on this list Ancestral Recall. All of them are only legal in Vintage and are restricted there with the exception of Timetwister, which is legal in Commander.
An instant spell is going to be better than any of the other card types thanks to how versatile they are thanks to being able to cast them at any moment. You can wait to cast an instant spell until you know your opponent is out of resources by baiting out interaction and counterspells before you cast your powerful instant spell. Practically every single deck in every format is playing instants, making them one of the most, if not the most played card type in the entire game, potentially even more than that of creatures. The power of instants is not to be understated, allowing for many decks and combos to thrive in the various formats of Magic: The Gathering. They’ve been around since the start of the game (though were at one point called an interrupt), and will be around until the game ends.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many instants can you play in MTG?
You can play multiple instants in one go, as long as you have the mana to pay for them.
Can you cast instants between the untap and upkeep phase?
You’re not going to be able to cast any spells in-between the untap and upkeep phase.
