Magic: The Gathering Formats, Explained

September 14, 2026

"What format do you play?" is the first question anyone will ask you at a game store, and it is genuinely confusing if nobody has explained what a format is.

Here is the whole landscape, what each one costs to get into, and which one you should probably start with.

Why formats exist at all

Magic has been printing cards since 1993. Tens of thousands of them exist, and some of the old ones are absurdly powerful and absurdly expensive.

A format is just a rule about which cards you are allowed to use. Restrict the pool to recent sets and the game is cheaper, simpler, and changes regularly. Open the pool to everything and it becomes deeper, faster and far more expensive. Neither is better — they are different games sharing one rulebook.

The two families

Constructed means you build a deck at home from cards you own, then bring it. Standard, Modern and Commander are Constructed formats.

Limited means you turn up with nothing, open sealed packs on the spot, and build a deck from only what you opened. Everyone starts equal, and your collection is irrelevant.

If you are new, Limited is the friendliest way to play competitively, because nobody can outspend you.

Limited formats

Booster Draft

Eight players open a pack each, pick one card, pass the rest, and repeat until the packs are gone. Then everyone builds a deck of at least 40 cards from their picks.

This is the format most stores run weekly, and it is the best value in Magic: you pay for a few packs, play several rounds, and keep everything you opened.

Sealed Deck

You get six packs, open them all, and build at least a 40-card deck from the contents. No passing, no drafting. Simpler than Draft and slightly more luck-driven. This is what Prerelease events use.

Cube Draft

Instead of sealed packs, you draft from a cube — a curated pool of cards someone has assembled by hand, shuffled into makeshift packs. Because the pool is chosen rather than random, a cube can be built around any theme, any power level, or any era of Magic.

Cubes are reusable, so a playgroup buys the cards once and drafts them forever. It is one of the cheapest long-term ways for a regular group to keep playing Limited.

Arena runs digital versions of this. Arena Powered Cube returned in September 2026 and draws from some of the most famous and powerful cards in Magic's history — Wizards have also been experimenting with variants like Planar Cube and Remix Draft.

Constructed formats, from smallest card pool to largest

Standard

60-card minimum, 15-card sideboard, maximum four copies of any card.

Only recent sets are legal. Once a year, after the first premier set Prerelease of the year, the six oldest sets rotate out and disappear from the format.

This is the cheapest competitive Constructed format and the easiest to learn, because the card pool is small enough to actually know. The trade-off is that your deck has a shelf life — cards you buy today will rotate out eventually.

Worth knowing for anyone arriving through a crossover set: Universes Beyond sets released from 2025 onward are Standard legal like any other set. The Hobbit, Marvel Super Heroes, Avatar: The Last Airbender, FINAL FANTASY and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are all currently in Standard.

Pioneer

60-card minimum, four-copy limit, does not rotate.

Everything from Return to Ravnica (2012) forward. Think of it as Standard that never rotates — you keep your deck, and the pool only grows. A reasonable step up once Standard feels small.

Modern

60-card minimum, four-copy limit, does not rotate.

Everything from Eighth Edition (2003) forward — over eighty sets and two decades of cards. Powerful, fast, and a real financial commitment, because the good lands and staples have been expensive for years. Decks last forever, though, which is part of the appeal.

Legacy

Nearly every card ever printed is legal, with a banned list removing the genuinely broken ones. Extremely powerful and extremely expensive — some staple cards are decades old and were never reprinted in quantity. A small, dedicated community.

Vintage

The deepest pool of all. Rather than banning the most powerful cards outright, Vintage mostly restricts them — you may play one copy. This is the only format where the most notorious cards in Magic's history are legal, and it is priced accordingly.

Pauper

Only cards printed at common rarity. The result is a surprisingly deep competitive format where a full deck can cost less than a single card in Legacy. If you like Constructed but not the price tag, this is the answer.

Commander — its own thing entirely

Commander is the most popular way people play Magic, and it works differently enough to deserve its own section.

100 cards: one legendary creature as your commander, plus 99 others.
Singleton: only one copy of each card, except basic lands.
Colour identity: every card in your deck must match your commander's colours.
Multiplayer: usually three to five players, free-for-all.
40 life instead of 20, so games last longer.
Command zone: your commander starts there and can be recast if it dies, costing an extra 2 mana each time.
Commander damage: 21 combat damage from a single commander eliminates a player.

The whole card history is legal, with its own banned list. Because it is singleton and social rather than cutthroat, it is far more forgiving on budget — you need one of each card, not four.

This is also why preconstructed Commander decks are so popular: you get a complete, playable 100-card deck in one purchase and can upgrade it slowly.

Digital-only formats

If you play on MTG Arena you will also see formats that exist only online — you cannot play these with physical cards.

Brawl — a Standard-legal, singleton, commander-style format. Wizards have called it one of their growing formats.
Historic — a deep digital pool including digital-only cards.
Timeless — the digital home of the most powerful cards, with minimal restrictions.
Alchemy — being retired. Wizards have announced Alchemy will be removed from MTG Arena on February 2, 2027, with the 2027 rotation. Digital-only Alchemy cards stay playable in Historic, Timeless and Brawl. Related to this, over 200 rebalanced tabletop cards revert to their original printings on September 22, 2026, with banned list updates following for Historic and Brawl.

If you are choosing a digital format to invest time in, that retirement is worth knowing before you build an Alchemy collection.

So which should you start with?

Start with Draft or Sealed if you can. You need no collection, everyone is on equal footing, and you keep the cards. It is the cheapest genuine on-ramp in the game.

Start with Commander if you have a group. Buy a preconstructed deck, play it as-is, upgrade over time. It is social, forgiving, and the most likely format to be running at any given kitchen table.

Start with Standard if you want competitive play at a store. Small pool, lowest entry cost of the Constructed formats, and events run everywhere.

Do not start with Modern, Legacy or Vintage. They are excellent formats and they will still be there in two years, by which point you will know whether you want in.

What this means for what you buy

Being straightforward about this, since we sell sealed product and not singles:

Draft and Sealed are what booster boxes are for. A Play Booster Box supports multiple drafts; a Draft Night box is a drafting kit for four players in one purchase.
Commander is served well by preconstructed decks — one purchase, one playable deck.
Standard is a mix. Packs get you started, but competitive decks are usually finished with specific singles.
Modern, Legacy, Vintage and Pauper are effectively singles formats. You will be buying individual cards from a singles marketplace, not sealed boxes, and we would rather tell you that than sell you packs that will not get you there.

Common questions

Can I play any deck in any format?
No. Each format has its own legal card pool and banned list. A Modern deck is usually illegal in Standard.

Do my cards stop working when a set rotates?
Only in Standard, and only for Standard. Those cards remain legal in Pioneer, Modern, Commander and beyond — nothing you own becomes worthless, it just moves formats.

Which format is cheapest?
Limited per session; Pauper for a permanent Constructed deck; Commander if you count fun per dollar, since one deck can last years. For a regular playgroup, a shared cube is cheap over time because you buy it once.

Which format is most popular?
Commander, by a wide margin, especially outside competitive events.

How do I know if a card is legal in my format?
Check the set it came from. Some crossover releases split across multiple set codes with different legality, so the code on the card is what matters, not the box it came in.