The 10 Best MTG White Board Wipes [Updated]

Ever since Alpha, white has been known for clearing the board effectively and efficiently. No other color has as many powerful and versatile options, but what makes white board wipes so strong?

White board wipes can answer a wide variety of threats. They have options for clearing almost any permanent type, and many let you choose what you want to destroy. They also have unconditional effects at fairly cheap costs. Board wipes in other colors are often situational or expensive, but you know you’re getting an efficient and consistent effect when you cast a white sweeper.

With so many great options, it can be difficult to know which ones you should include in your decks. This article will explain the pros and cons of white’s most powerful board wipes so that you can control the battlefield during your next game night.

Table of Contents:

1. White Board Wipe Pros and Cons
2. Why Are They So Strong?
3. Honorable Mentions
   1. Slaughter The Strong
   2. Damning Verdict
4. Top 10 Best White Board Wipes
   1. Cleansing Nova
   2. Martial Coup
   3. By Invitation Only
   4. Hour of Revelation
   5. Terminus
   6. Austere Command
   7. Farewell
   8. Doomskar
   9. Four Mana Sweepers
   10. Vanquish the Horde
5. Which Are Right For You?

White Board Wipe Pros and Cons

Why Are They So Strong?

There are plenty of reasons why you should run white sweepers. Even though they have their downsides, they’re one of white’s biggest strengths.

Advantages

First, white can remove a lot of different permanents. While other colors excel at destroying just one or two card types, white can consistently remove creatures, artifacts, and enchantments. There are also some cards that destroy all nonland permanents. These cards can serve as universal answers that will almost always be useful.

White board wipes are also much cheaper than those in other colors. There are exceptions to this, such as Toxic Deluge or Blasphemous Act, but other colors generally have to pay more for these effects.

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Finally, white sweepers are consistent sources of removal. You never have to worry about how much damage you’re dealing or if your opponents will recast their spells on the next turn. White board wipes offer unconditional removal, plain and simple.

Disadvantages

Still, white board wipes are far from perfect. To start, they’re almost always symmetrical. Only a few of them can be one-sided, so they’ll probably remove some of your cards as well. Some decks may not care too much about this, but it can be devastating for others.

Additionally, there are practically no white sweepers that you can cast at instant speed. This means that your opponents will be able to rebuild faster than you. Sure, you might have the mana to play something right after wiping the board, but your opponents will have all of their mana to start casting spells again.

Honorable Mentions

Not every card is strong enough to work in every deck, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t consider them. Cards with niche synergies or uses can still be great options depending on your meta, so let’s take a look at two of my favorites.

Slaughter the Strong

Slaughter the Strong has niche uses, but it’s fantastic when you want it. It forces each player to sacrifice their large creatures, which can be a devastating effect. Not only does this punish decks that run lots of big beaters, but it also gets around indestructible. For three mana, this card can remove your opponents’ most problematic creatures.

It’s biggest drawback is that there are plenty of great creatures with low power. It can’t deal with Blood Artist, Esper Sentinel, Tatyova, Benthic Druid, and more. Your opponent also gets to choose what they keep, so you won’t always get what you want out of this card.

Recommended Format: Commander

Damning Verdict

In the right deck, Damning Verdict can be one of your best sweepers. Strategies built around beneficial counters typically want to spread them out anyway, and Damning Verdict rewards you for doing so. Even if you load all your counters on just one or two creatures, they’re likely the most important cards in your deck.

The payoff this card offers you is incredible. A one-sided board wipe for just five mana is a very cheap rate, and Damning Verdict will win you games when it plays out like that. Of course, there’s no guarentee it’ll truly be one-sided. Plenty of decks have the occasional +1/+1 counter, and you could also run into other decks built around counters. As a result, Damning Verdict is too inconsistent for me to fully recommend.

Recommended Format: Commander

Top 10 Best White Board Wipes

Now that we’ve gone over the strengths and weaknesses of white sweepers, which are the best of the best? Any of these could be amazing in the right situation, but they’re ranked based on high their ceiling is and how often you can reach it. I’ve also considered situations in which they might not get the job done for you.

#10: Cleansing Nova

Cleansing Nova is useful in a ton of different situations. It has a simple effect, but the choice that it gives you makes it really versatile.

If you have the best creatures on the board, maybe you want to blow up the artifacts and enchantments. The opposite could also be true. If both modes would hurt your board state, then you’re likely in a great position and aren’t looking to cast a sweeper anyway. What’s more likely is that you’ll set your opponents back while keeping your best cards.

The only real drawback to Cleansing Nova is that it costs five mana. That isn’t terribly expensive, but it’s inefficient no matter which mode you choose.

Recommended Formats: Commander, Historic

#9: Martial Coup

Martial Coup is a niche pick, but it could be the best board wipe in a token deck. Even outside of token or soldier synergies, this card can act as both a sweeper and a threat at the same time. As long as you have tons of mana to pump into it, it can leave you with a dominant board.

Martial Coup isn’t exactly one-sided, but it does leave you with the only creatures on the board. That’s a big upside, but you’ll want to have ways to really leverage that advantage. Some of my personal favorite cards to pair with this are Cathar’s Crusade and Intangible Virtue. Martial Coup doesn’t remove them, and they’re excellent payoffs for making lots of tokens.

In decks that can make use of tokens, Martial Coup can accelerate your game plan while shutting down your opponents’.

Recommended Format: Commander

#8: By Invitation Only

At first glance, it might be surprising that By Invitation Only is so low on the list. Making your opponents sacrifice creatures is great, and most decks won’t have more than 13 creatures out at a time.

My biggest issue with this card is that it can fall flat against token strategies. When these decks really pop off, it’s not unreasonable for them to have more than a dozen tokens. There are also multiple combos that create infinite tokens. Normally, board wipes would be able to save you in these situations, but By Invitation Only wouldn’t be enough.

RELATED: MTG Infinite Combos: An Ultimate Guide

Of course, some token decks are a problem before they get more than 13 creatures. In those cases, you’ll still be glad to draw this sweeper. By Invitation Only will usually get the job done, but it does carry a bit of uncertainty.

Recommended Format: Commander

#7: Hour of Revelation

Having a catch-all answer in your deck is incredibly useful. When you draw Hour of Revelation, you’ll have security in knowing you can remove just about any threat (so long as nothing has indestructible). The only problem is that you’ll lose all of your permanents, too.

Since it will likely cost three mana in a game of EDH, you’ll almost always be able to rebuild right away. Still, it can be painful to cast this if you’ve committed lots of cards to the board. There will be times when you need to reset everything, but that doesn’t mean you won’t get hurt in the process.

Recommended Format: Commander

#6: Terminus

Don’t underrate Terminus just because it’s only #6. With the right circumstances, it can outshine any other sweeper on this list.

Returning creatures to the bottom of their owners’ libraries is often much better than just destroying them. Especially in Commander, it’s fairly common for decks to interact with their graveyard. Although your opponents can get these creatures back with tutor effects, these effects are much more scarce than graveyard recursion.

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The miracle cost is the cherry on top. Terminus is still good at six mana, but it’s amazing when you cast it for one. One of the best feelings I’ve experienced in Magic is drawing a miracle right when I need it, and Terminus has definitely saved me on more than one occasion. It gains even more value in decks with top deck manipulation since you can add consistency to the raw power of miracle.

Recommended Formats: Commander, Legacy

#5: Austere Command

The real strength of Austere Command is its flexibility. You get to destroy two out of four kinds of permanents, and that choice enables you to get a huge lead in the game.

This card is best when you can make it nearly one-sided. For example, destroying large creatures can be great if you’re playing a token deck. It’s also nice that Austere Command separates artifacts and enchantments since so many white board wipes lump them together.

Of course, six mana is quite expensive, especially if you’re just using it to destroy all creatures. Unless you can make the most out of its flexibility, this sweeper is more inefficient than just about every other option on this list.

Recommended Format: Commander

#4: Farewell

Out of all white’s expensive board wipes, Farewell is the strongest. Not only does it exile instead of destroy, but its variety of options makes it good in just about every scenario.

Much like Austere Command, Farewell splits up the ability to remove creatures, artifacts, and enchantments. This division makes it easier for you to keep your best cards while dealing with your opponents’. Exiling is also much more permanent solution than destroying. Finding removal for the same threat over and over can be a big challenge, and exiling cards makes it much more difficult to recur them.

I also like that such a powerful sweeper has incidental graveyard hate. Decks that can use their graveyard as a second, larger hand can be incredibly strong, so it’s important to have answers to them. Still, I have a hard time including cards that have no use besides exiling graveyards. Attaching this effect to a strong card you’d run anyways makes it an even more powerful tool.

Recommended Format: Commander, Historic, Pioneer, Standard

#3: Doomskar

Doomskar is an interesting twist on the classic white sweeper. It might be more expensive overall than Wrath of God, but the ability to split that cost between two turns is subtly powerful.

In the early game, you can foretell Doomskar when you might not have another play. Later on, you can foretell it and cast another spell on the same turn. Either way, foretell lets you use more of your mana throughout a game, which will give you wins in the long run. Paying five to cast Doomskar from your hand might feel bad, but that’s still a pretty good floor.

Recommended Format: Commander, Historic, Pioneer

#2: Four Mana Sweepers

I might be cheating a little here, but I didn’t think these board wipes were different enough to warrant their own spots. Instead, I’d rather talk about all the four mana sweepers at once:

• Day of Judgment
• Depopulate
• Shatter the Sky
• Sublime Exhalation
• Wrath of God

Out of these four, Wrath of God and Day of Judgment are definitely the strongest. Shatter the Sky and Depopulate might draw your opponents cards, which isn’t ideal. Even if you’re drawing too, the last thing you want after wiping the board is to give your opponents more gas.

Sublime Exhalation will often be about the same as Wrath of God, but only in four-player commander games. If you have less than three opponents, it’s just not on the same level as the others.

Ultimately, four mana is right where you want to be for this effect. No matter which of these cards you run, they bring consistent removal at a reasonable mana cost.

Recommended Format: Commander, Historic

#1: Vanquish the Horde

No other white sweeper matches the efficiency of Vanquish the Horde. At just two mana, none of the others even comes close.

That cheap mana cost is pretty easy to reach, too, especially in Commander. There only need to be six creatures on the battlefield, and you usually wouldn’t wipe the board if there were fewer than that, anyway. When there are only two or three threats out, it would be better to cast single target removal than waste a board wipe.

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Even outside of commander, you’ll likely get a significant discount. Consider this: if there are only four creatures on the battlefield, this card is the same as Day of Judgement. And that’s just an ok scenario for this card! There’s too much upside here for me to put anything else at #1.

Recommended Format: Commander

Which White Board Wipes Are Right for You?

Although some of these cards will typically be stronger than others, that doesn’t mean you should only run the ones that ranked highest. Even at the lower end of the list, there are some powerful options. Which ones you pick will depend on your preferences, decks, and metas. If your play group has lots of artifact decks, for example, you might want Cleansing Nova more than Vanquish the Horde.

No matter which sweeper you decide to run, I hope this article has given you the tools you need to clear a path to victory.