Looking back on Magic: the Gathering in 2025
Posted by Magic Madhouse on 19th Dec 2025
2025 has been a big year for Magic: the Gathering. The game has delved into the universes of Spider-Man, Final Fantasy, and Avatar. We also returned to classic planes like Tarkir and Innistrad and ventured off into new horizons with Edge of Eternities and Aetherdrift. Let’s look back over all of the different sets that 2025 gave us, and take a moment to remember the impact they had, and they shaped the game going forward.
2025 has been a big year for Magic: the Gathering. The game has delved into the universes of Spider-Man, Final Fantasy, and Avatar. We also returned to classic planes like Tarkir and Innistrad and ventured off into new horizons with Edge of Eternities and Aetherdrift.
Let’s look back over all of the different sets that 2025 gave us, and take a moment to remember the impact they had, and they shaped the game going forward.
This spooky January set launched Magic: the Gathering into 2025 with the haunting grace of an organ solo echoing through an empty cathedral. The plane of Innistrad is a cursed world filled with terrifying demons, twisted abominations of science, and sinister sentient trees.
Despite being a horrifying land of nightmares, Innistrad has consistently been one of the most popular Magic: the Gathering settings. Innistrad Remastered is a highlight reel of every shock, scare, and surprise that Magic’s bleakest plane has to offer. Whether you’re looking for Snapcaster Mage, or Bloodline Keeper, if there’s a card you remember fondly from Innistrad, chances are it’ll be available in a booster from this set.
As the first non-reprint set of 2025, Aetherdrift got things off to a racing start when it released in February. In Aetherdrift, Chandra, Loot, Winter, and a selection of other Magic: the Gathering characters sped across the multiverse in a massive interplanar race.
Aetherdrift introduced the start your engines mechanic, which rewards an aggressive playstyle where you regularly damage your opponent. It’s also, perhaps unsurprisingly, loaded up with vehicles enabling artifact synergies of all kinds. Aetherdrift is a set full of cards that can drive you towards success.
It has been 10 years since we last visited Tarkir, a world of three-colour strategies, feuding clans, and, of course, terrifyingly powerful dragons. In April, Tarkir Dragonstorm took us right back into the heart of the action, providing us with boosters full of fiery fury.
Whatever kind of gameplay you’re drawn to, one of the clans will have you covered.
The Abzan Houses use the endure mechanic to create spirits, or to buff up their creatures with +1/+1 counters.
The disciples of the Jeskai Way can storm off by using flurry which rewards them whenever they cast their second spell.
The Sultai Brood are perfect for graveyard focused players, as their renew mechanic allows them to exile dead creatures to gain beneficial effects.
The Mardu Horde are the faction for the aggro player in all of us, as they can mobilize in order to create aggressive attacking soldier tokens.
Finally, the Temur Frontier can use harmonize in order to recast sorceries from the graveyard.
Tarkir: Dragonstorm will be remembered for unleashing a maelstrom of powerful new dragons into the game.
When Magic: the Gathering crossed over with Final Fantasy in June, it brought in heroes and villains from all across the world map, from Ishgard to Rabanastre.
The set offered everything that you’d expect from a Final Fantasy crossover. There were chocobos, moogles, and a surprising number of different shop keepers. Of course there were also a selection of front page protagonists like Cloud, Terra, and Tidus
Final Fantasy’s iconic summon creatures were represented using sagas, that gradually activated a suite of different abilities as the turns ticked past. Mainstays like Ifrit and Shiva were there, alongside some deeper cuts like Yojimbo from Final Fantasy X.
Magic has crossed over with a lot of different series, and the Final Fantasy set was an absolute fan favourite.
This Sci-Fi set took Magic: the Gathering beyond the stars. When it launched in August, Edge of Eternities brought spacecrafts into MTG. From planet spanning superstructures like The Eternity Elevator, to smaller ships like The Seriema (Magic’s very own Millennium Falcon). These spacecrafts typically provide some value when they’re played, but can then be charged up, by tapping down creatures, to unlock their full planet-busting potential.
As well as Spaceships, Edge of Eternities also gave us planets (powerful lands with unlockable effects), warping cards that can navigate their way across a variety of different game zones, and a selection of full art shock lands with stunning science fiction artwork.
This futuristic expansion pressed Magic: the Gathering’s boundaries like never before.
Magic’s Spider-Man crossover swung its way into stores in September. If you’re looking for cards with Spider-based super heroes, you’re in luck, since this set gave us no less than 20 cards with “Spider-Man” somewhere in their name, and that’s not to mention all of the other comic characters that were included from Venom to Electro.
The poster mechanic for this set was web slinging, a cost effective way of swapping out tapped creatures on the battlefield for fresh, and often more powerful, cards from your hand. Villains also got to stir up trouble by taking advantage of the mayhem mechanic that allowed cards that would otherwise get discarded to instead head straight into play.
Spider-Man is just the first of several Marvel crossovers to come.
2025’s final set closed out the year with an explosive burst of elemental energy. The Avatar: the Last Airbender crossover released in November and brought the colourful world of the beloved Nickelodeon show onto the tabletop.
Characters in Avatar can manipulate the forces of nature using their “bending” skills, and this expansion allows players to do the same thing. Airbending lets you exile cards temporarily, getting your own creatures out of danger, or locking away threats controlled by opponents. Waterbending is an additional cost that can be paid to activate powerful abilities. Earthbending allows lands to come to life and fight for you. Finally, Firebending grants you extra mana in combat, so that you can unleash instant speed trickery.
By bringing all of the elements together, you can brew some powerful decks, and experiment with some exciting strategies.
Looking ahead to 2026
With January rapidly approaching, it’s not long before we make our way into another year of card slinging and spell casting. 2026 is set to seriously shake the game up. We’ll be getting everything from Marvel Super Heroes to twilit fairy tales in Lorwyn Eclipsed.
Of course, 2025 still has more to unpack and explore. Our piece analysing the best cards of the year delves into the details of the cards that defined the metagames of multiple formats and dominated Commander tables.
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