Lifelink is one of those mechanics that feel deeply unfair when it's on the other side of the table and gloriously beautiful when it's on yours.

Some players like to throw a lot of spells around and Storm their way to victory. Some strive to summon countless monsters, each the size of apartment buildings, to overrun the battlefield. Some may even strive to draw so many cards a turn that their opponents can leave the table to watch and finish a movie, and their turn may still not be over.

And then there are those of us who approach the game of MTG with a "What if I simply refused to die?" mentality.

If you, too, are looking to fend off aggro players the world over, allow me to give you my picks for the 25 best Lifelink cards in MTG out there today.

The 25 Best MTG Lifelink Cards

25. Ratchet, Field Medic

Ratchet, Field Medic is not on this list because it's the scariest Lifelink card ever printed. It's here because it does something life gain players are physically incapable of ignoring: it miraculously turns life gain into more cardboard.

A small Lifelink body is already much-appreciated for stabilizing early, but Ratchet gets a lot more interesting once you start cashing in those life-gain triggers to rebuy cheap Artifacts, especially if your board is full of Artifacts that don't mind taking a trip to the graveyard.

24. Deafening Clarion

Not every great Lifelink card is a Creature.

Deafening Clarion is here because flexibility wins games. This Sorcery lets you choose between dealing three damage to each Creature on the board, or giving your entire team Lifelink until the end of turn.

This is one of the greatest because flexibility is king. Sometimes it's a sweeper. Sometimes it turns your entire team into a life-padding horde.

23. Regal Caracal

Cats. An Anthem effect. And it even grants Lifelink?

Regal Caracal is a lord, a token producer, and a stabilizer all wrapped into one feline package. Two Lifelink Cat tokens plus a team-wide buff means this card can singlehandedly swing games against aggro decks and, all the while, help fill out Cat-tribal decks as yet another top-end threat.

22. Chromanticore

Chromanticore is a Flying, First Strike, Vigilance, Trample, Lifelink monstrosity that looks like someone just dumped a bag of keywords onto the table and called it good game design.

And somehow, it actually works out pretty well for a large majority of games.

As a Creature, it's a massive pile of combat stats and abilities, and has a power and toughness of 4/4.

And as a Bestow card, which works like an Enchantment, you can attach to a Creature. If you can pull off the insane mana cost, you give the equipped Creature +4/+4 and the beautiful keyword soup that is Chromanticore.

21. Charismatic Conqueror

Charismatic Conqueror makes a lot more sense when you stop looking at it as an aggro tokens-matter card, but more as a Stax piece. Especially in faster formats like cEDH, this inconspicuous Conqueror punishes opponents for trying to play the game on curve, all while quietly adding little Lifelinkers to your board.

Now, this Conqueror didn't make this list because it's another Lifelink payoff. It's here because I really wanted to highlight the idea that Lifelink decks, especially the grindier midrange ones, often benefit from the same thing Stax decks do: extra time.

20. Soulfire Grand Master

Soulfire Grand Master is likely one of the slickest Lifelink cards ever printed because it gives all your Instant and Sorcery spells Lifelink.

How does your opponent's Birds of Paradise feel about a Lightning Bolt?

It doesn't matter cause it's gone now, and you also gain 3 life for your troubles.

Is that a Boltwave going at all your opponents' faces?

That's a 9-point swing right there.

Are you casting a Blasphemous Act on a full board?

Let's break out the calculator.

This Grand Master is not physically strong, a 2/2 for , but it does a lot of heavy lifting for a little guy.

19. Archon of Sun's Grace

For player's that love Enchantments, Archon of Sun's Grace is a dream.

For , you get a 3/4 flyer with Lifelink, which is already respectable. This guy also makes Pegasus tokens every time an Enchantment enters and grants all Pegasus Creatures you control indefinite Lifelink.

A card like this is where things often get out of hand fast.

18. Tymna the Weaver

Tymna the Weaver is undisputedly one of the best Commander cards ever printed, and yes, the Lifelink actually matters quite a bit.

Tymna rewards attacking by drawing cards, which already makes her incredible. Then, once we add in the Lifelink, she helps you recover all the life you've been frivolously spending on all your fetch Lands, Necropotence(s), and even her own ability.

In truth, it's efficient cards like this that make players really look inward and think about whether they're playing the right Commander.

17. Batterskull

Batterskull is a bit of a weird one. It's an Equipment Artifact but also a living weapon. It creates a 0/0 token Creature alongside itself and then equips. The resulting Creature is a 4/4 with Vigilance and Lifelink.

Getting an immediate 4/4 Lifelink with Vigilance for is already strong, but what really pushes Batterskull over the top is how difficult it is to answer cleanly.

If the Germ dies, you can simply pick it back up for mana, redeploy it later, or even just move it onto another Creature and keep the pressure going.

16. Lyra Dawnbringer

You always knew Angels were going to show up on this list, and Lyra Dawnbringer is one of the best.

Lyra's a 5/5 Legendary Angel with Flying, First Strike, Lifelink for . That's already, debatably, better than the last card we talked about (Sorry, Batterskull). And if her base stats weren't enough, Lyra also pumps up other Angels with +1/+1, and gives them Lifelink.

Is it finally time to put together Angels-tribal?

15. Elenda and Azor

So, what do you get when Vampires and Sphinxes collaborate?

If you ask Elenda and Azor, you get card draw, token production, and enough life swing potential to make you target number one at just about any Commander Bracket.

For , you can cast this Legendary Vampire Knight Sphinx. In the perfect color scheme for a lifegain deck, this card lets you pay to draw X, and through a few steps, gain that X in Vampire Knight 1/1s with Lifelink.

Along with feeding lifegain strategies with mini vampires, it's brutal at 6/6.

14. Dream Trawler

Control players, this one's for you.

Dream Trawler is a Flying, Lifelink finisher that draws cards, protects itself, and quickly takes over the game once it resolves.

For , you'll cast this 3/5 Sphinx that can fly over blockers to smack your opponent's life total directly if they can't answer it. At the beginning of your upkeep, he becomes a 4/5.

From there, every attack snowballs your advantage: you gain life, refill your hand, and always have the option to discard and keep it safe. If it sticks, the game usually ends in short order.

13. Resplendent Angel

Resplendent Angel is one of the best dedicated life gain payoffs ever printed, as it rewards you for doing the thing your deck already wants to do: gaining life.

A 3/3 for three, she's a Flyer that offers you the chance to pay extra mana to make her a 5/5 with Lifelink. Then, any time you gain at least five life in a turn, you get an additional 4/4 Angel token with Flying and Vigilance.

In more optimized decks, Resplendent Angel can not only gain you insane amounts of life just on its own, but it can also generate a flock of airborne reinforcements for you to pump with a Lyra Dawnbringer later down the line.

12. Wurmcoil Engine

Wurmcoil Engine's 6/6 Deathtouch, Lifelink body is already a solid Avengers-level threat. Then it dies, leaving behind two colorless Wurm Artifact Creatures in its place: one with Deathtouch and one with Lifelink.

Modern Tron players loved it back in the day, and so do I now.

11. Shanna, Purifying Blade

Shanna, Purifying Blade is one of those Commanders that lulls you into a false sense of security right up until she buries you in card advantage.

A 3/3 Lifelinker for three is already respectable, but what makes Shanna really scary is that every bit of life gain can be turned into cards at the end of the turn.

I've got a buddy who runs Shanna, and once that deck hits the late game, trying to stop it is nigh impossible. It's time to forget about paying the

for Rhystic Study; it's time to start paying the for Opt, so you can try to find an answer for Shanna.

10. Sorin of House Markov

Sorin and life gain go together the same way Lightning Bolt goes with Red mages.

Sorin of House Markov starts out as a compact little value engine, with Lifelink and Extort helping you chip away at opponents while padding your life total. Then, once you've decided to gain enough life in a turn, he flips into his Planeswalker side and turns all that incidental life game into a potential one-turn kill.

Alternatively, you can also create a Food token. It's always nice to have options.

9. Solitude

Yes, Solitude is on this list. And yes, a Flash Creature with Lifelink that also doubles as essentially free removal is absurdly good.

8. Whip of Erebos

Whip of Erebos gives all your Creatures Lifelink. That sounds pretty good to me.

But wait, there's more.

The whip's tacked-on reanimation effect is not only useful but also incredibly flavorful of the whip's primary wielder, Erebos, God of the Dead.

I mean, of course, the God of Death himself would hand you a weapon that not only feeds you life through combat but also yanks something out of the underworld to do your bidding from time to time.

7. Serra Ascendant

In a normal 20-life game, Serra Ascendant is strong on curve. For , you get a 1/1 with Lifelink that can scale as you start to put your strategy in motion.

In Commander, where your life starts at 40, Serra Ascendant is almost always a one-mana 6/6 Flying, Lifelink beater that your opponents always seem to start with on turn one.

6. Phyrexian Fleshgorger

A Menace, Lifelink threat is already annoying to race, but what makes this card so brutal is how it scales the longer the game goes.

Thanks to Prototype, Phyrexian Fleshgorger can come down early as a respectable body to help stabilize the board and then show up again later as a massive beater that's outright painful to try and remove.

It starts as a 3/3 and easily can turn to a 7/5. On top of that, its Ward cost is equal to its power. It was a real heavy hitter in Standard for exactly this reason: no matter when you drew it, it was almost always relevant.

5. Basilisk Collar

Basilisk Collar is a one-cost Artifact that costs two to equip. It's a simple card, giving Deathtouch and Lifelink to the Creature you choose.

Giving a Creature Deathtouch and Lifelink for almost nothing is already fantastic. But it also didn't take too long for players to realize that if you put a Basilisk Collar on a pinger like Goblin Sharpshooter, then everything just dies.

Oh, and as a bonus, you also get to gain one life per target via this combo.

Yay, life gain!

4. Shadowspear

If Basilisk Collar is the efficient assassin, Shadowspear is the polished executioner.

For just 1 mana to cast and two to equip, this Legendary equipment gives a Creature two of the best combat keywords you could possibly ask for: Trample and Lifelink.

If that's not enough, Shadowspear also has an activated ability to strip Hexproof and Indestructible from all your opponent's permanents. This ability doesn't even require it to be equipped! You're more than welcome to activate this ability in response to someone casting a Heroic Intervention in response to a Damnation.

3. Griselbrand

Griselbrand's grisel-banned in Commander, and for good reason.

If you can pay , you get this 7/7 Legendary flyer on the board. Then, this giant Lifelink Demon turns life directly into cards, which is exactly as fair as it sounds.

Once it hits the battlefield, the window to answer it becomes incredibly small, because even a single attack can put its controller so far ahead on both life and resources that the game starts feeling like a formality.

And this is all just the icing on top. Don't even get me started on how disgustingly busted Griselbrand is in Reanimator strategies.

2. Heliod, Sun-Crowned

Heliod, Sun-Crowned is one of the best life gain payoff cards in MTG, but let's be honest: a huge part of that reputation comes from one very silly interaction: Heliod, Sun-Crowned + Walking Ballista.

For those of you unfamiliar with this infamous combo, once you give Walking Ballista Lifelink with Heliod's activated ability, you can remove a +1/+1 counter to ping something, gain life from the damage, then Heliod immediately replaces the +1/+1 counter since you've gained life. From there, you're welcome to rinse and repeat until the entire table surrenders.

None of this is to say that Heliod is bad without Walking Ballista. The ability to grant Lifelink at a moment's notice provides you with some level of flexibility, and its +1/+1 counter triggered ability means every incidental life gain helps grow your board for free.

Oh, and it can even become a 5/5 Indestructible beater with enough Devotion on the board. It's surprising how many people just forget about that part.

1. Ocelot Pride

We've made it to number one, and honestly, it was hard for me to put anything else here. Ocelot Pride is the pride and joy of Modern's Boros Energy deck for a reason: it's cheap, efficient, and gets wildly out of hand if left alone for even a couple of turns.

Its cheap mana cost, in particular, is a huge part of what makes it so absurd.

In Boros Energy, specifically, it fits perfectly into a game plan that wants to apply pressure quickly, build out the battlefield, and punish opponents for stumbling even a little. Not to mention, in the mirror match, every life gained matters, so whoever played the cat first should often have a significant advantage.

All of this is why it earns the top spot for me. Ocelot Pride has the ability to take something as straightforward as Lifelink and turn it into almost a one-card win condition from turn one (power creep, much?).

What is Lifelink in MTG?

Lifelink: Damage dealt by this Creature also causes you to gain that much life.

Lifelink is a static ability in Magic: The Gathering that has a player gain life equal to the amount of damage they deal to a player or permanent, at the time that damage is dealt. It's most common to see this keyword ability on Black and White cards.

Lifelink doesn't particularly care whether damage is going to a player, a Creature, or another permanent that can be dealt damage. If damage is dealt by a source with Lifelink, life will always be gained right alongside it.

Seems like a pretty good mechanic, huh?

Surprisingly, this wasn't always the case. Before the Magic 2010 rules update, Lifelink actually functioned as a triggered ability that utilized the all-powerful stack. And this meant combat damage would happen first, and then, only after that, would the life gain trigger(s) attempt to resolve afterward.

As you can imagine, under these rulings, your blocking Lifelink creatures could deal Lifelink damage in combat, and you could still tragically lose the game to your opponent's unblocked creatures before your Lifelink triggers go to resolve.

So, imagine you take a swing at your opponent with Eirdu, Carrier of Dawn // Isilu, Carrier of Twilight, a 5/5 with Flying and Lifelink on both sides. Whether you deal direct damage, or deal damage to a Creature or Commander, you're going to gain that life.

What's more, this applies to noncombat damage, too. Instants and Sorceries can provide Lifelink. It also has some great synergies depending on your strategy. For example, if you have a card that allows you to add counters or tokens when you gain life, Lifelink allows you to use these abilities.

Hurray! We don't have to lean on Baneslayer's First Strike to not lose anymore.

Lifelink Rulings

I'll be the first to admit that Lifelink looks pretty straightforward at first. A Creature hits something, you gain life, everybody's happy (probably not your opponent, but you know what I mean).

But as with most things in Magic, the rulings behind a mechanic always play a role, and knowing them can often be the difference between losing on the spot and clawing your way back to 20+ life.

Lifelink Only Works When Damage Is Actually Dealt

In Magic, Lifelink only works if damage is actually dealt. If damage is prevented, reduced to zero, or otherwise doesn't happen, you won't gain any life. Lifelink isn't a separate trigger so, no damage means no Lifelink.

Lifelink Is a Static Ability, Not A Triggered Ability

As I mentioned above, Lifelink no longer uses the stack to gain life. The life gain happens simultaneously with the damage being dealt.

This means that if combat damage would reduce both players to 0 or less life, the player gaining life via Lifelink may survive because the life is gained immediately.

Stranger things have happened.

Multiple Lifelink Sources Create Separate Life-Gain Events

If two Creatures with Lifelink deal combat damage at the same time, each one creates its own life-gain event. This especially matters for cards like Sunbond or Essence Channeler that trigger whenever you gain life.

Ajani's Pridemate is another good example. If two Lifelink creatures deal damage in combat, this card will see two separate instances of life gain and will trigger twice.

Keep in mind, though, if a Creature somehow gains Lifelink more than once, it doesn't gain extra life because of that. Having Lifelink twice is the same as having it once.

Conclusion

To me, Lifelink has always been one of the more satisfying mechanics in Magic because it does something players never get tired of: not losing the game.

In Standard, a strong Lifelink threat can completely swing a race. In Modern, cheap and efficient cards like Ocelot Pride prove that even small bursts of life gain can spiral into oppressive board states. And in Commander, Lifelink often scales into something even sillier, where one big swing can potentially undo several turns' worth of game actions, all while immediately triggering a half-dozen life gain payoffs.

It also helps that Lifelink is simple to understand. You don't need to be a judge to understand why a Ghalta, Primal Hunger, equipped with a Shadowspear as a toothpick, is terrifying.

So, at the end of the day, whether you're suiting up a Pinger with a Basilisk Collar, burying the table in value with Shanna, or slamming a rule-zeroed Griselbrand to combo off, it goes without saying that Lifelink remains as one of the most entertaining ways to take over a game.

After all, in Magic, there are plenty of decks that can win.

But there's probably nothing more satisfying than winning while also refusing to lose.