Powerful artifacts have been a staple inMagic: The Gatheringsince the first set was released in 1993. Many of the most powerful artifacts have huge impacts on the game, and they often find themselves extremely valuable to players and collectors.
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Some of the more valuable artifact cards have sold for thousands of dollars to private collectors under special conditions, such as being signed by the original artist, being a serialized card or having unique printing, or being graded by professionals, and are left out of this collection because of their unique nature.
The prices here will fluctuate depending on the relatively slow movement of many of these high-value cards. The prices are printing-specific and are taken on June 01, 2025, from TCGplayer’s Market Value or current listing prices when available.
11Mirror Universe (Legends) - $410.70
There’s a lot of text on Mirror Universe, but it boils down fairly easily. You can sacrifice Mirror Universe to swap life totals with an opponent. You can only activate this ability during your upkeep, making the window for this effect fairly narrow, and mostly ensuring your opponent gets a chance to respond before you activate it.
Mirror Universe comes from the early days of Magic, where the rules could be manipulated a little to your advantage. Before the rules were changed, unspent mana would deal one point of damage for each leftover mana as phases moved, as well as the fact that back in the day, having zero life didn’t mean an automatic loss; the game rules would only check your life total at the end of a phase. So you could bring yourself down to one life, activate Mirror Universe, in response, ping yourself for one damage to go to zero, swap life totals with your opponent, and move to your next phase, winning the game.
10Forcefield (Unlimited) - $457.50
A fairly straightforward artifact from Magic’s first set, Alpha, Forcefield lets you spend mana to stop incoming damage. For just one mana, you may reduce all incoming damage from an unblocked creature down to just one. With enough mana and a way to negate the relatively minor amount of damage coming your way, you’ll be safe from most incoming attacks.
The key component here is unblocked damage, so if your opponent can force your creatures to block, andtheir creature has trample, you’ll take the full amount of trample damage. Fun fact, the artwork for Forcefield and another card on this list, Mox Jet, match up when placed next to each other.
9Lion’s Eye Diamond (Mirage) - $485.00
There’s a trend among zero-cost artifacts that provide tons of mana; they’re typically very valuable to players and collectors. Lion’s Eye Diamond is no exception to this, though it is a little hard to maximize your value from it. Lion’s Eye Diamond requires you to discard your entire hand to sacrifice it and add three mana of one color to your mana pool.
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Since it is a mana source, you may activate it in response to a spell or ability, like a tutor effect, pitch your hand and get the mana, get the next spell you want to cast, and then have the mana to cast it. Because of the cost and amount of mana it produces, Lion’s Eye Diamond has been compared to Black Lotus in terms of power, helping it retain its value.
8Mox Diamond (Stronghold) - $610.01
The simplest reason why Mox Diamond is so valuable is that early mana wins games. When Mox Diamond enters the battlefield, you must discard a land; otherwise, you have to put it directly into your graveyard. While it might seem like a one-to-one trade, a land for an artifact, there are a few key points to keep in mind.
On your first turn, you can both play a land and then play Mox Diamond, netting you two mana on your first turn since Mox Diamond costs zero mana to cast. It also is a free way to discard a land, letting cards that can bring them back to your hand or even straight to the battlefield, like Restore, turn your discarded land into an extra land drop for the turn.
7Candelabra Of Tawnos (Antiquities) - $1,003.02
A deceptively powerful artifact, Candelabra of Tawnos can generate tons of mana under the right conditions. you may pay any amount of mana and tap Candelabra of Tawnos to untap that many lands.
When combined with lands and effects that produce more than just one mana at a time, like Cradle of Gaea or even a Voltaic Key to untap the Candelabra, you can easily combo off. Contributing to its high price is the fact that it was only ever printed once, back in the Antiquities set in 1994.
6Time Vault (Unlimited) - $1049.50
Since Time Vault’s original printing, the text of the card has received a few updates but is no less powerful because of it. Time Vault enters the battlefield tapped, doesn’t untap during your untap step, and requires you to skip your turn to untap it. But tapping Time Vault gives you an extra turn, making it an incredibly powerful card.
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Time Vault is incredibly easy to manipulate to let you take infinite turns. With effects that can untap artifacts, like from Voltaic Key, you’re able to tap and untap Time Vault as much as you like to never give your opponents a chance to take their turn.
5Chaos Orb (Unlimited) - $1,174.94
Back in the early days of Magic, there was a rumor that a player took their Chaos Orb, ripped it up, and let the pieces fly after activating its ability. Since Chaos Orb reads that after you flip it a foot in the air, and you destroy everything it touches once it lands, this player wiped their opponent’s board with one card. This rumor persists to this day, but whether it has ever happened is still up for debate.
Magic no longer prints cards that require some sort of dexterity or movement to activate effects, which is for the best. The legend of Chaos Orb went on to later inspire the Unglued card, Chaos Confetti, which replicates the rumor for real.
4Gauntlet Of Might (Unlimited) - $1,599.98
Sometimes a card is just so good that it’s impossible to ignore. When Gauntlet of Might was originally printed, it was the only card of its kind. While in play, this artifact grantsall red creaturesa bonus +1/+1 while letting all Mountains tap for an extra red mana.
This effect isn’t limited to just you either, it grants all red creatures in play +1/+1, and all Mountains now add an extra red. Gauntlet of Might saw a functional reprint in Gauntlet of Power years later, which lets you pick the color to give the boost, but it can’t hold a flame to the original.
3Mox Emerald, Mox Jet & Mox Ruby (Unlimited) - $2,499 - $8,500
Three of the five Moxs find themselves among some of the most expensive artifacts in Magic. These zero mana artifacts can tap to add one mana of their respective colors to your mana pool.
Much like Mox Diamond, the original Moxs let you ramp up in mana on your first turn, getting around the one land-per-turn rule and essentially starting you off on turn two while your opponent might still be sitting at one land.
2Mana Vault (Alpha) - $3,599.99
The sheer amount of value provided by Mana Vault makes it no surprise it’s one of the most valuable artifacts around. In many ways, Mana Vault is a supercharged Sol Ring. For one mana, you’re able to tap it to add three mana to your mana pool.
It does have the drawback of not untapping during your untap step, dealing one damage to you if it remains tapped, and if you want to use it again, you have to pay four mana to untap it. But like other artifacts on this list, if you have a cheap way to untap it, like our old friend Voltaic Key, you will find yourself with infinite mana for very little work.
