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"This year was incredible. Since we returned to play, millions of players - including more new players than ever before - have joined us in local game stores to gather and play Magic," says Wizards of the Coast game producer Hilary Thompson during the preview panel at MagicCon: Atlanta 2025.

While Wizards didn't release hard data on how many new players it's tracking to say 2025 had more new MTG players than ever, an airship-sized portion of it would easily be attributed to the recent crossover set with Square Enix's Final Fantasy. Overall figures have not been released, but the CEO of Wizards' parent company, Chris Cox, has said that the MTG x Final Fantasy set earned $200 million in revenue in one day at its initial release - beating what was until then its best-selling set ever (MTG x Lord of the Rings), which raked in $200m in six months. And a good portion of that would presumably be new MTG fans, coming in from an awareness and fondness for Final Fantasy.

"2025 might just be Magic's best year ever, but we're going to try and top it," Thompson added.

While these MTG crossover sets will continue to be a big portion of its line going forward, Wizards of the Coast is being careful and intentional to balance them with its own characters, planes, and settings. 2026 will feature two sets serving as sequels to previous ones - Lorwyn Eclipsed and Secrets of Strixhaven  - with a multiverse-spanning mystery set called Reality Fracture coming in October and several of its disparate characters and planes crossing over.

Hasbro CEO Cox has said that crossover sets like Lord of the Rings and Final Fantasy are "partially what's powering our backlist," leading these new fans deeper into the lore of MTG -- past just the crossovers. To aid in that, Wizards of the Coast is beginning with a new product aimed at new MTG players, with a completely playable deck for less than $25 for its Standard play format.

"These are 60-card theme decks, preconstructed, ready to play right out of the box. These are fast and fun and playable and meant to introduce players 60-card constructed," says Wizards of the Coast's communications director Blake Rasmussen at MagicCon Atlanta. "They'll be standard legal, and we are going to do these releases along with Magic Multiverse sets. So expect more of those throughout the year."

The first two of these new-player-friendly sets are themed - or typal, as the company calls it - around two fictional archetypes: Pirates and Angels. Each deck is built around that theme, and Wizards has built them to be good antagonists against each other - and future decks in this series.

"The decks are meant to play well against each other and decks we release later in this series," says Rasmussen. "They even come with info on tips on how to upgrade them as you kind of go along your player journey."

Each of these decks will come with a 60-card themed deck, a deck box, 5 double-sided token cards, and two cards explaining strategy and references.

The first two of these new-player-friendly decks are to be released in January 2026, concurrent with the new series Lorwyn Eclipsed. There will be more released in April, pairing with the Secrets of Strixhaven set, and then in October 2026 with Reality Fracture.

Whether you are a Commander player, a regular at your local game shop's FNM event, or simply love collecting Magic: The Gathering cards, you've landed in the right place. From Universes Beyond to the furthest reaches of the Magic Multiverse, we've got you covered here at Popverse. 

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