For years, Commander players and designers at Wizards of the Coast have been debating changing the rules to allow other Legendary permanents in the command zone. The most common request among players is to allow Legendary Planeswalkers to be commanders, as they are fun to play and usually feature the characters most important to the lore of Magic: The Gathering. However, many feared that allowing them to lead decks without restrictions would go against the spirit of the Commander and inevitably break something.

In 2014, Wizards decided to circumvent the issue with the face commanders of the Commander 2014 preconstructed decks. These decks featured the first Planeswalker commanders, which were each printed with the line of rules text: "(Name) can be your commander." Since then, there have been twenty-one Legendary Planeswalkers printed with this text, and I'm going to give you the rundown on every single one.

The Original Five (2014)

The first batch of Planeswalker commanders was a cycle of five mono-colored Planeswalkers, one for each color.

The White member, Nahiri, the Lithomancer, cares a lot about equipment. She can create creature tokens and attach your equipment to them for free and she can put equipment from your hand directly into play. Eventually, she creates her own token equipment that can't be destroyed and makes the creature holding it large. She is the most straight-forward commander of the five, most commonly serving as either the commander of an equipment deck or in the 99 of other equipment decks.

Teferi, Temporal Archmage, the Blue card of the cycle, offers the standard card draw and can untap permanents. The real draw is an incredibly powerful ultimate that allows you to activate your Planeswalkers' loyalty abilities on your opponents' turns. Teferi's abilities are more flexible than Nahiri's, allowing him to lead a variety of decks, from Planeswalkers to artifacts to big mana.

Ob Nixilis of the Black Oath is the Black Planeswalker of the cycle. He has the quintessential Black ability of draining your opponents' life. He can also make Demon tokens, and allows you to sacrifice creatures to draw cards. Unfortunately, while Ob Nixilis' abilities make him a solid fit for Demon decks, life gain decks, and sacrifice decks, he is the least popular of this cycle.

On the other hand, Daretti, Scrap Savant is the most-played card on this list, which just makes sense. He's an excellent Mono-Red Artifacts Commander that also perfectly fits into the 99 of any other Artifact deck with Red in its color identity. His primary ability is to discard cards to draw cards. His utility truly lays in his ability to swap artifacts on your board for artifacts in your graveyard. If you're able to reach his ultimate, you'll get to bring any Artifacts sent to your graveyard back at the end of each turn.

Finally, the Green Planeswalker of this cycle is Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury, an important character from some of Magic: The Gathering's earliest stories. She's able to create elf creature tokens that tap for mana (Llanowar Elves) and destroy Artifacts and Enchantments. If you control a lot of Green Creatures, you can draw a bunch of cards with her ultimate. Her abilities are flexible and strong, allowing her to fit into many Green decks. However, as a Commander, she mostly leads Elf and ramp decks.

Battlebond and Commander 2018

In 2018, Wizards of the Coast brought back Planeswalker commanders in two different supplemental products: Battlebond and Commander 2018. The two from Battlebond, Will Kenrith and Rowan Kenrith, are a partner pair, meaning you can play both of them as your commander or cast one and search your library for the other if they're in your deck.

Will Kenrith is a Blue Planeswalker with the ability to neutralize creatures for a turn. He can also draw cards and reduce the costs of instant, sorcery, and Planeswalker spells. His ultimate gives you an emblem that copies all your instant and sorcery spells for the rest of the game.

While Will's abilities are defensive, Rowan Kenrith, the Red Planeswalker, has more aggressive and disruptive abilities. She forces creatures to attack, deals 3 damage to each tapped creature, and has an ultimate that can copy every one of your activated abilities for the rest of the game - as long as they aren't mana abilities. Together, Will and Rowan primarily helm Planeswalker and spellslinger decks. They are also popular in other Planeswalker decks and in forced combat decks like Firkraag, Cunning Instigator, mainly for their ability to control the flow of attacks and shut down particularly scary creatures.

Like Commander 2014, Commander 2018 featured preconstructed decks each helmed by a Planeswalker. Unlike 2014, these commanders were given multiple colors this time around.

The first and most popular of the four is Lord Windgrace, a Jund () Lands-matter commander. His first ability lets you discard Lands to draw cards. He can then use his second ability to return Lands to the Battlefield from the Graveyard play. His ultimate can destroy six nonland permanents and give you six 2/2 creature tokens. While you probably won't activate his ultimate very often, his other abilities make it an excellent inclusion in Lands decks.

Aminatou, the Fateshifter is an Esper () Planeswalker that can fix the top card of your library, blink your permanents, and completely swap control of permanents in play among players. Like Lord Windgrace, you probably won't be activating her ultimate much. The first two abilities make Aminatou a great choice for a blink or miracles commander deck.

Saheeli, the Gifted is a Red/Blue artifact commander that can make Artifact Creature tokens. She greatly reduces the costs you pay for playing Artifacts, and has an ultimate that makes temporary copies of every Artifact you control. She's a little generic, but her abilities are straight-forward and powerful. Putting big Artifacts in play ahead of the curve can potentially win the game if you can pull off the ultimate.

The final commander from this bunch is Estrid, the Masked, a Bant () Planeswalker that likes enchantments. Her abilities are quite strong. She lets you untap your enchanted permanents and put auras on your permanents that protect them from being destroyed. Her ultimate returns all enchantments from your graveyard to the battlefield. Estrid is an excellent pick for either an Enchantress deck or an Aura deck. She gets extra points for being one of the few Commanders for these types of decks that gives you access to Blue mana.

Commander Legends

2020's Commander Legends would be the next set to include Planeswalker commanders. This time around, there were just two: Tevesh Szat, Doom of Fools and Jeska, Thrice Reborn. Like most of the Mono-color legends in the set, both Planeswalkers have Partner, a mechanic that allows you to have two commanders if each one has the Partner keyword. That means they can be paired with each other or with another creature in the Command zone.

Both Planeswalkers are very powerful, but Tevesh Szat, Doom of Fools is slightly more popular both as a Commander and in the 99 of other Commander decks. This five-mana Black Planeswalker can create expendable creature tokens and sacrifice your creatures and Planeswalkers to draw cards. He has an ultimate that puts all Commanders onto the battlefield under your control, even if they're in the Command Zone.

Tevesh Szat is a very popular card in Aristocrat and sacrifice decks, as it both creates tokens and can sacrifice them to draw cards. It even has a home in CEDH as a way to add the Black color identity to decks led by Thrasios, Triton Hero, Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh, and Kraum, Ludevic's Opus.

The other Planeswalker from the set, Jeska, Thrice Reborn is a Red Planeswalker that gets more loyalty the more you cast your Commander(s) from the Command Zone. She has two activated abilities that can triple the combat damage of one of your creatures or send direct damage to up to three targets. Jeska is both an aggressive card that can speed up Voltron wins or a combo piece for decks looking to infinitely cast their commanders. She's most commonly paired with Ishai, Ojutai Dragonspeaker, Tymna the Weaver, and Dargo, the Shipwrecker.

Battle for Baldur's Gate

In 2022, Commander Legends: Battle for Baldur's Gate brought us Tasha, the Witch Queen, Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes, and Elminster.

Tasha is a Blue/Black Planeswalker that cares about casting spells you don't own, allowing you to exile Instants and Sorceries from your opponents' graveyard and cast them for free and making Demon tokens in the process. Elminster is a White/Blue scry matters commander, reducing the costs of your instants and sorceries by the amount you scry. He also allows you to exile cards from the top of your library to make a number of flying creature tokens equal to their mana values.

Finally, Minsc & Boo is a multi-format menace. He's a Red/Green Planeswalker that makes Boo creature tokens, grows your creatures with +1/+1 counters, and throws those creatures to deal direct damage and draw a bunch of cards if they were a hamster. Minsc & Boo are right at home in just about any Red/Green Commander deck thanks to their power and utility. They also see play in Eternal formats like Legacy and Canadian Highlander where Planeswalkers are much harder to remove.

Dominaria United

Dominaria United Commander also brought us three new Planeswalker Commanders in 2022. Two came to us in the preconstructed Commander decks and one in the bonus sheet for the set.

While Daretti boasts the highest play rate among Planeswalker commanders, the real queen is Dihada, Binder of Wills, who leads the most decks as a Commander. This Mardu () Planeswalker cares a lot about Legendary permanents. Dihada gives your Legendary creatures a bunch of keywords, mills cards, makes treasures, and draws more Legendary permanents. She even has a back-breaking ultimate that gives you control of every nonland permanent until the end of the turn.

The other precon Commander, Jared Carthalion, is a five-color Planeswalker that rewards you for playing as many colors as possible. He makes tokens that are all colors, grows your creatures based on how many colors they are, and provides some recursion, ramp, and card draw with its last ability.

Finally, from the bonus sheet, Sivitri, Dragon Master is a Blue/Black commander that is most popular as a Dragon commander. She slows down your opponents' attacks, tutors dragons from your deck, and then destroys all non-dragon creatures so you can swing out unopposed.

Commander Masters

Commander Masters from 2023 gave us another preconstructed Commander deck led by a new Planeswalker commander, Commodore Guff. What makes Guff stand out from the other Planeswalkers is that this Jeskai () Commander is explicitly designed to lead Planeswalker decks. His abilities put loyalty counters on your Planeswalkers, create tokens that can make mana to cast Planeswalkers, and draw cards and burn your opponents equal to the number of Planeswalkers you control.

Secrets of Strixhaven

Finally, there is one more Planeswalker commander on the horizon. Early previews for Secrets of Strixhaven revealed Quintorius, History Chaser. This Planeswalker perfectly captures the essence of the Lorehold college, making spirits when cards leave your graveyard, filling your graveyard with discard and mill, and temporarily giving your spirits Double Strike and Vigilance. Since Quintorius isn't out yet, it's hard to say how powerful or popular he'll be, but he seems like a strong commander for Reanimation or Spirit typal strategies.

Wrapping Up

We've reached the end of this exhaustive list of Planeswalkers you can run in the Command Zone! If you've never used a Planeswalker as your commander, give one of these a shot. If you want to read more about Planeswalkers in Commander, check out this article on the best ones in the format. Until next time!