MTG Shadow Explained: How Shadow Works, All 39 Shadow Creatures, Every Card That Gives or Blocks It and a Budget Lyna Commander Deck (2026)

Shadow is the Magic: The Gathering keyword that puts a creature on its own battlefield. A creature with shadow can be blocked only by creatures with shadow, and it can block only creatures with shadow. Against almost every deck, that means it can’t be blocked at all, and it also can’t block for you.

We pulled every shadow card from Scryfall and counted what can actually stop one. There are 39 creatures with shadow out of 18,361 creatures in paper Magic, plus three creatures that can block them anyway. That’s 42 possible blockers, or 0.23% of all creatures. Flying is stopped by 19.5% of creatures and fear by 29.3%. The price is toughness: 27 of the 39 shadow creatures have exactly 1 toughness, and you can buy all 36 that have been released for $25.27 in total.

This guide covers the exact rule, the timing tricks, who can block shadow, what the keyword costs in stats, all 39 shadow creatures, every card that gives shadow or answers it, the first three legendary shadow creatures (they arrive in Mystery Booster Commander Edition this November), legality in every format, and a $54.38 budget Commander deck built for the new shadow commander, Lyna, Veil of Vengeance.

What is shadow in MTG?

Shadow is a static evasion ability. Here is the rule in full from the current Comprehensive Rules (effective 25 September 2026):

702.28a Shadow is an evasion ability.
702.28b A creature with shadow can’t be blocked by creatures without shadow, and a creature without shadow can’t be blocked by creatures with shadow. (See rule 509, “Declare Blockers Step.”)
702.28c Multiple instances of shadow on the same creature are redundant.

The reminder text on the card is shorter: “This creature can block or be blocked by only creatures with shadow.” Three facts cover most rules questions:

• Shadow works in both directions. It makes your creature very hard to block, and it stops your creature from blocking anything that doesn’t have shadow.
• It only matters when blockers are declared. Shadow does nothing against removal, damage spells, fight effects or board wipes.
• Two instances do nothing extra. A creature with shadow twice behaves exactly like a creature with shadow once.

How shadow works: the rules in plain English

Can a creature with shadow block?

Only if the attacker also has shadow. Rule 702.28b says a creature without shadow can’t be blocked by creatures with shadow. So a board of ten Soltari and Dauthi creatures gives you no defence against an ordinary attack. This is the real cost of the keyword, and it’s why shadow decks carry cards like Ghostly Prison and Propaganda.

Is shadow the same as “can’t be blocked”?

No. A creature that “can’t be blocked” has no legal blockers at all. A creature with shadow can be blocked by any creature with shadow, and by three creatures that have a special ability to block them (Heartwood Dryad, Wall of Diffusion and Aetherflame Wall). In a normal Commander game nobody has one of those on the battlefield, so the two play almost the same. They stop being the same in a mirror match, or when someone gives a creature shadow in the middle of combat.

When is shadow checked?

Only at the moment blockers are declared. Rule 509.1b says that if an attacking creature gains or loses an evasion ability after a legal block has been declared, the block isn’t affected. The official ruling on shadow cards says the same thing: once a creature has been blocked, it stays blocked and deals and receives combat damage even if it or the blocker gains or loses shadow afterwards.

That gives you a simple timing rule. To get an attacker past blockers with Shadow Rift or Dauthi Embrace, give it shadow before blockers are declared, in the beginning of combat step or the declare attackers step. Doing it after blocks does nothing.

Giving shadow to a blocker, yours or theirs

Every card that says “target creature gains shadow” can target any creature. That opens two more plays:

• Defence. When a shadow creature attacks you, give one of your untapped creatures shadow before you declare blockers. It can now block the attacker.
• Removing a blocker. Give your opponent’s best blocker shadow before blocks. A creature with shadow can’t block creatures without shadow, so it can’t block your ordinary attackers this turn. Dauthi Trapper does this every turn for free by tapping.

Shadow plus flying (and other evasion)

Evasion abilities stack. Rule 509.1b ends with “Different evasion abilities are cumulative”, and the ruling on shadow cards spells it out: if an attacker has shadow and flying, a blocker has to satisfy both. Stronghold Overseer is the only creature printed with both shadow and flying, so the only creature that can block it without help is another Stronghold Overseer. The same logic applies to shadow plus menace, fear or intimidate, or protection: Soltari Priest has shadow and protection from red, so a red creature that somehow gains shadow still can’t block it.

What is a shadow counter?

Shadow is one of the keywords that can exist as a counter. Rule 122.1b lists flying, first strike, double strike, deathtouch, decayed, exalted, haste, hexproof, indestructible, lifelink, menace, reach, shadow, trample and vigilance, and says a keyword counter on a permanent causes it to gain that keyword. The official ruling on Minas Morgul, Dark Fortress confirms it: “A permanent with a shadow counter on it has shadow.” Unlike Shadow Rift, a shadow counter doesn’t wear off at end of turn. Two cards make them: Minas Morgul and the new Lyna, Veil of Vengeance.

The “as though” blockers

Heartwood Dryad and Wall of Diffusion “can block creatures with shadow as though [they] had shadow”. Aetherflame Wall and the Aura Aether Web use a different wording: the creature “can block creatures with shadow as though they didn’t have shadow”. Both versions can block shadow and non-shadow attackers. The rulings on the Time Spiral pair add one odd detail: if Aetherflame Wall or the creature wearing Aether Web gains shadow itself, it can’t block anything at all, not even shadow creatures.

Who can block a shadow creature? The numbers

We counted, for each classic evasion keyword, how many creatures in paper Magic are able to block it.

Shadow has about 85 times fewer possible blockers than flying. Of these four, only horsemanship has fewer, and horsemanship is a one-way ability: its creatures can still block normally. In Commander, 39 of the 17,920 legal creatures can block a shadow creature, which is one in 459. When Mystery Booster Commander Edition is released, that becomes 42.

In practice the number is even smaller, because one card accounts for most of the shadow creatures people play. Dauthi Voidwalker is in 308,300 decks on EDHREC. All 39 shadow creatures together appear 550,348 times, so the Voidwalker is 56% of them. If one of your shadow creatures ever does get blocked in Commander, the blocker is probably a Voidwalker.

What shadow costs: the stat math

An ability this strong has to be paid for somewhere. Most shadow creatures come from five sets (Tempest, Stronghold, Exodus, Time Spiral and Future Sight), and creatures from those years were smaller than today’s. So the fair comparison is with the other creatures printed in the same five sets. We took all 563 of them and compared average power and toughness at each mana value.

The pattern is clear. Shadow creatures keep their power. At two mana they average 1.33 power against 1.35 for their set-mates, and at three mana they have slightly more (1.93 against 1.84). What they lose is toughness: about a third of a point at two mana and 0.70 at three mana. Across all 33 shadow creatures in those sets with a fixed power and toughness, the average is 1.82/1.36 against 2.22/2.33 for everything else.

The last column shows why shadow creatures look so small today. The average three-mana creature across all of Magic without shadow or flying is a 2.14/2.40. The typical shadow creature is a 2/1. Thirteen of the 39 are exactly 2/1, eleven are 1/1, and only four have more than 2 toughness (Augur il-Vec, Lyna, Stronghold Overseer and The Weaver King). That fragility matters more than anything else when you build with them: a single Pestilence-style effect or a board wipe clears the team.

Every creature with shadow: all 39

This is the complete list, sorted by how many Commander decks play each card on EDHREC. Prices are the cheapest ordinary printing. The three Mystery Booster Commander Edition cards have no price yet.

A few things stand out. Sixteen are mono-black, eleven mono-white and nine mono-blue. Soltari Guerrillas is the only one with red in it, and no green creature has ever had shadow. Three are vanilla creatures with nothing but the keyword, one for each tribe: Dauthi Marauder, Soltari Foot Soldier and Thalakos Sentry. And 31 of the 36 released creatures cost under a dollar.

Dauthi Voidwalker

The best shadow creature ever printed, and the most expensive at about $5. It’s a 3/2 for two black mana that exiles every card that would go to an opponent’s graveyard, which shuts off reanimation and recursion. You can then sacrifice it to play one of those exiled cards for free. Most decks play it as graveyard hate that also attacks; the shadow is a bonus.

Nether Traitor

A 1/1 with haste and shadow that comes back from your graveyard for one black mana whenever another of your creatures dies. It’s in 68,882 decks, mostly sacrifice decks that want a creature they can sacrifice again and again. It was reprinted in the Witherbloom Pestilence precon in April 2026.

Looter il-Kor

A two-mana blue 1/1 that draws and then discards a card whenever it deals damage to an opponent. Because it almost always connects, it’s a reliable card filter, and it’s one of the best early attackers for ninjutsu decks, which need an unblocked creature to swap out. It’s legal in Pauper and Modern and came in the Obscura Operation precon.

Vashta Nerada

The Doctor Who shadow creature: a three-mana 1/1 with indestructible and shadow that gets a +1/+1 counter at each end step if a creature died that turn. In a four-player game that happens most turns, so it grows into a large attacker that almost nothing can block or destroy.

The “attacks and isn’t blocked” cards

Three shadow creatures have an ability that triggers when they attack and aren’t blocked: Thalakos Deceiver (sacrifice it to gain control of a creature), Dauthi Mindripper (sacrifice it and the defending player discards three cards) and Zealot il-Vec (1 damage to a creature in place of its combat damage). With shadow, that trigger is close to guaranteed.

Soltari, Dauthi and Thalakos: where shadow came from

Shadow arrived in Tempest in October 1997. In the story, the artificial plane of Rath overlapped part of Dominaria, and three peoples were trapped in the space between the two worlds: the Soltari (white), the Dauthi (black) and the Thalakos (blue). They can see the battlefield and fight each other, but they pass through everything else. Ten of the 39 shadow creatures are Soltari, ten are Dauthi and six are Thalakos.

According to MTG Wiki’s notes on Wizards’ own design articles, the mechanic was designed independently by Mike Elliott and Richard Garfield. It returned in Time Spiral block (2006–07), which added the il-Kor, il-Vec and il-Dal creatures, and then disappeared for 14 years. Asked in July 2022 where shadow sits on his Storm Scale of mechanics likely to return to Standard, head designer Mark Rosewater answered, “I’d put it at an 8”. On that scale 1 means it’s sure to come back and 10 means it almost certainly won’t.

That rating has held. Every shadow card since 2007 has come in a set that isn’t legal in Standard: Dauthi Voidwalker in Modern Horizons 2, Vashta Nerada in the Doctor Who Commander decks, Minas Morgul’s shadow counters in the Lord of the Rings holiday release, and now three legends in Mystery Booster Commander Edition. Unfinity also put shadow on one of its sticker sheets (Urza’s Dark Cannonball). Planar Chaos is the only set in the two shadow blocks with no new shadow creature; its one shadow card is Jodah’s Avenger.

Every card that gives shadow

Fifteen cards can give shadow to a creature that doesn’t have it. Ten of them can give it to another creature; the other five can only give it to themselves.

Shadow Rift is the one that sees real play: one blue mana, instant speed, and it replaces itself with a card. It’s in 57,053 decks, mostly as a way to make a single huge attacker connect. Dauthi Embrace is the repeatable version for black decks. Minas Morgul, Dark Fortress is the most played card in the table. It’s a land that taps for black mana, and its shadow counter is permanent.

Be careful with Temporal Isolation. It’s usually played as removal, because the enchanted creature can’t deal damage. But the creature has shadow for as long as the Aura stays on it, so it becomes one of the few creatures that can block your shadow attackers. In a shadow deck, that’s the wrong removal spell.

How to beat shadow: every answer

You don’t need a dedicated card to beat shadow creatures. They’re small, so ordinary removal, damage-based sweepers and “each creature gets -1/-1” effects handle them well, and they can’t block, so racing them is realistic. Tempest and Time Spiral did print specific answers, though, mostly in red and green, the two colours that never got shadow creatures of their own.

Aether Web is the most useful of these today: it has flash, so you can put it on a creature after attackers are declared and block a shadow creature (or a flier, since it also gives reach) by surprise. If you play a defender deck, the two Walls on this list are among the cheapest ways to stop a Dauthi Voidwalker.

The first legendary shadow creatures: Lyna, The Weaver King and Boss Uramon

For 29 years there was no legendary creature with shadow, so there was no true shadow commander. That changes with Mystery Booster Commander Edition, which Scryfall dates to 9 November 2026 and which goes on sale at MagicCon: Atlanta on 13 November. Three of its new legends have shadow.

Are they legal in Commander?

Not yet, and yes once the set is out. Scryfall currently shows all three as not legal in any format because the set hasn’t been released. Wizards’ release notes for the set (3 August 2026) say the 59 new cards plus one card that was previously digital-only, collector numbers 1 to 60, “are legal in Commander, Legacy, and Vintage” and are not legal in Standard, Pioneer or Modern. Boss Uramon is number 13, Lyna is number 43 and The Weaver King is number 56, so all three are covered.

Lyna, Veil of Vengeance (white-blue-black)

Lyna is the one built for a shadow deck. She’s in exactly the three colours that have shadow creatures, she turns every one of them into a Looter il-Kor without the discard, and for three mana she puts a permanent shadow counter on another creature. Lyna isn’t a new character: she’s the Soltari emissary named in the flavour text of eleven cards, starting with Tempest. Before release she already has 789 decks on EDHREC, the most of the three.

The Weaver King (blue-black)

A six-mana 3/6, the highest toughness of any shadow creature. When it deals combat damage to a player, that player mills that many cards, and then you take a creature from each opponent’s graveyard that was milled this turn. Players are building it as a mill and theft deck (284 decks so far), not a shadow deck.

Boss Uramon, Shadow’s Reach (black)

A four-mana 2/2 that gives your attacking Ninjas and Rogues deathtouch and makes a 1/1 Rat Rogue whenever they deal combat damage to a player. It has 85 decks as a commander and is more likely to end up in the 99 of Ninja and Rogue decks.

“Shadow” cards that don’t have shadow

A lot of searches for “MTG shadow” are looking for a card with Shadow in its name. None of these have the shadow keyword:

• Shadow the Hedgehog (Secret Lair, July 2025) is a black-red 4/2 legend with haste that draws a card whenever it or another of your creatures with flash or haste dies. It leads 11,991 decks on EDHREC. Here’s a community Shadow the Hedgehog deck on our site.
• Shadow, Mysterious Assassin (Final Fantasy Commander, June 2025) is a three-mana black 3/3 with deathtouch from the Final Fantasy VI precon. It’s in 26,543 decks.
• Yuriko, the Tiger’s Shadow has commander ninjutsu, not shadow. Our ninjutsu guide covers her, and Looter il-Kor is a good fit in her deck.
• Death’s Shadow, Shadowborn Apostle and Shadowfax are all named for something else.

Shadow legality in every format

Shadow has never been banned. None of the 39 creatures is on any format’s banned list. No shadow creature is legal in Standard or Pioneer, because the keyword hasn’t been in a Standard set since Future Sight in 2007. Modern has 13, all from Time Spiral block plus Dauthi Voidwalker. Pauper has 18 commons, including Looter il-Kor, Dauthi Horror and Thalakos Seer. Premodern has the 24 from Tempest block. On MTG Arena the only one is Dauthi Voidwalker, in Historic, Timeless and Brawl.

Shadow creatures have been rare in preconstructed Commander decks too. Out of the 174 precons we track, five contain a shadow creature, and each has exactly one: Looter il-Kor in Obscura Operation, Dauthi Horror in Mind Flayarrrs, Vashta Nerada in Masters of Evil, Dauthi Voidwalker in Sultai Arisen and Nether Traitor in Witherbloom Pestilence.

Budget Lyna, Veil of Vengeance Commander deck ($54.38)

This is a 100-card shadow deck built around Lyna. The other 99 cards were checked against Scryfall for Commander legality and colour identity and priced at their cheapest ordinary printings: $54.38 for the 99. Lyna herself has no price yet and becomes legal when Mystery Booster Commander Edition is released in November. Until then, the same 99 work under any white-blue-black commander that likes evasive attackers, such as Kamiz, Obscura Oculus.

The plan is simple. Play cheap shadow creatures on turns two and three, attack every turn, and draw a card for each one that connects. The deck has 35 lands, 32 creatures and an average mana value of 2.66.

• 32 creatures, and every one has shadow. Dauthi Voidwalker, Nether Traitor, Vashta Nerada and Looter il-Kor are the best of them. Soltari Champion gives the rest of the team +1/+1 when it attacks, and Dauthi Warlord’s power equals the number of shadow creatures on the battlefield.
• Four more ways to draw on damage. Bident of Thassa, Reconnaissance Mission and Coastal Piracy each copy Lyna’s trigger, and Mask of Memory draws two.
• Skullclamp. 23 of your 32 creatures have 1 toughness, so equipping Skullclamp kills them and draws two cards for one mana. It turns late-game 1/1s into fresh cards.
• Defence that isn’t blocking. Your creatures can’t block, so Ghostly Prison and Propaganda tax attackers instead. Our stax guide explains how those “pillowfort” cards work.
• Board wipes that miss you. Dusk destroys creatures with power 3 or greater, and 27 of your 32 creatures have a printed power of 2 or less. Later, Dawn returns the small ones from your graveyard to your hand. Citywide Bust destroys toughness 4 or greater, which hits only your Stronghold Overseer.
• Answers for other shadow creatures. Dauthi Cutthroat destroys a creature with shadow, and Maze of Shadows prevents the combat damage of an attacking shadow creature. Both are there for an opposing Dauthi Voidwalker, the one creature your opponents are likely to have that can block your team.

One warning from the numbers above: Glorious Anthem and Spear of Heliod push your 2-power creatures to 3 power, which puts them in range of your own Dusk. Cast Dusk before the anthems, or hold it for a board where you’re behind.

The ten most expensive cards make up more than half the cost:

If you want to upgrade, Minas Morgul, Dark Fortress gives you a second source of shadow counters, Training Grounds cuts Lyna’s ability to one mana, and Teferi’s Protection covers the turn someone wipes the board. You can paste the list into our budget swaps tool to find cheaper versions of any card, run it through the deck analyzer, or browse community decks for other evasion builds. New to the format? Start with our step-by-step Commander deck guide, or see more cheap leaders in our best budget commanders list.

Shadow FAQ

What does shadow do in Magic: The Gathering?

A creature with shadow can be blocked only by creatures with shadow, and it can block only creatures with shadow (rule 702.28b).

Can a creature with shadow block a creature without shadow?

No. That’s the drawback. A creature with shadow can block only attackers that also have shadow.

Can a creature with flying or reach block a shadow creature?

No, unless it also has shadow. Flying and reach only answer flying. Aether Web is the exception: it gives the enchanted creature reach and lets it block shadow creatures.

Is shadow the same as unblockable?

No. Shadow creatures can be blocked by other shadow creatures and by Heartwood Dryad, Wall of Diffusion and Aetherflame Wall. Only 42 of the 18,361 creatures in paper Magic can block one, so it’s close.

How many creatures have shadow?

39, including three from Mystery Booster Commander Edition that aren’t released yet. 24 are from Tempest block, 10 from Time Spiral block, and one each from Modern Horizons 2 and Doctor Who.

What happens if I give a creature shadow after it’s been blocked?

Nothing. The block stays. Shadow is checked only when blockers are declared (rule 509.1b), so give your attacker shadow before that.

What is the best shadow card?

Dauthi Voidwalker. It’s in 308,300 Commander decks on EDHREC, more than all the other shadow creatures combined, and it’s legal in Modern, Legacy and on Arena.

Is there a shadow commander?

From November 2026, yes. Lyna, Veil of Vengeance, The Weaver King and Boss Uramon, Shadow’s Reach are the first legendary creatures with shadow, and Lyna draws a card whenever one of your shadow creatures deals combat damage to a player.

Is shadow legal in Standard, Modern or Pauper?

No shadow creature is legal in Standard or Pioneer. Modern has 13 and Pauper has 18. Commander, Legacy and Vintage allow all 36 released shadow creatures.

Does Shadow the Hedgehog have shadow?

No. Shadow the Hedgehog has haste and a card-draw ability. The name is the only connection.

Will shadow come back in a Standard set?

Probably not. Mark Rosewater rated it 8 on the Storm Scale in 2022, and every shadow card since 2007 has been printed in a supplemental set.