I have scoured all of my Magic the Gathering belongings to find what I think are the best MTG accessories. One thing I really enjoy is seeing how people play this game and also what MTG accessories they are using. Seeing what others use gives me ideas for the future or finding a really cool MTG accessory that I can add to my ‘arsenal’, so to speak.
If you’re looking for some cool MTG accessories, look no further. You will find that this 2023 edition of best MTG accessories has got you covered. All sorts of MTG accessories will be covered, from the conventional ones such as binders, deck boxes, and sleeves, to some of the more quirky and unique MTG accessories. For Example, some custom MTG accessories, a handful of 3D printed accessories and even a few ways to use nontraditional items in your MTG game play. Follow along as we dive all into the MTG accessories world together!
Table of Contents
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The Best MTG Accessories
I have gone through a lot of MTG accessories and have finally settled on what I feel are the best MTG accessories. Everything showed is what I personally use and like for my MTG needs. The first section is going to be the basic MTG accessories. This would be your deck boxes, sleeves, dice, etc. The next section is what I call custom MTG accessories. These are items that I have customized a bit to be their own type of accessory. The last section is the 3D printed MTG accessories. First up, the basics!
Cool MTG Accessories – The Basics
This section is going to cover all of the ‘basic’ MTG accessories such as dice, deck boxes, sleeves, playmats, etc. Essentially, the accessories nearly every player uses, but just with my personal preferences and reasons why I use each item.
1. Dice & Dice Accessories
To start off the basic MTG accessories, we will discuss dice and dice accessories. I am a big fan of everything I carry/use to have a purpose and to work together. For starters, I carry about 30 or so total dice. I always have a few d20 die, a ton of d6 die, and even a Planar die. Ya know, just in case a Planechase match comes up. The first of many MTG accessories discussed is going to be a collapsible parts tray.
Collapsible Parts Tray
The first of the dice MTG accessories is a collapsible parts tray. I love this thing. It folds down to be very compact and easy to stow away and then opens up into a pretty decent sized bowl.
Once fully opened, it stands about 6in tall and has a diameter of about 5.5in. I can easily fit all of my dice and other knickknacks inside of it.
When not collapsed, the parts tray is big enough that you can easily thumb through everything to find the exact accessory you need at any given point. The bottom of the tray has a decent hunk of metal encased in rubber so it doesn’t become top heavy either. It is also magnetic, if that matters to you.
12mm Dice
You can’t talk about MTG accessories without talking about actual dice. These are my favorites, a set of 12mm dice. If you are at all familiar with the Pokemon TCG, these are the same size as those dice.
I really like these dice because they are much smaller than standard dice, which are 16mm. You can carry a whole bunch of these with you. Plus they look really great on cards without taking up too much room!
In terms of physical size, every three 12mm die is equal to roughly two 16mm die. In the photo, I have included a stack of the small 12mm die along with a couple of 16mm die to show the size comparison. As you can see, they take up a much smaller footprint compared to standard dice.
16mm Plus/Minus Counter Dice
This is one of the coolest MTG accessories. They are so simple, yet so clever. These are standard-sized (16mm) plus/minus dice.
As you can image, these were designed to be used as plus and minus counters. However, they can function as regular die as well, since each side is numbered 1-6.
These dice are great because they come in a 24 pack. You get 12 plus dice (white) and 12 minus dice (black). I actually only carry 6 of each with me. I have two sets of dice and have split up the 24 pack between my two sets. One set stays in my traveling MTG backpack and another set stays near my SpellTable setup for remote play.
Leather Dice Pouch
You will need something to haul all of your MTG accessories around with you and a dice pouch makes the most sense. I personally picked up a couple of really cool medieval leather pouches that I use as my dice pouch.
I have had mine for over 5 years and they both are holding up perfectly. Just a bit more broken in and not quite as stiff.
If you’re interested in one of these, make sure to look at all the different size options they offer and what will work best for you. I went with the rounded bottom version that is roughly 4in X 5in because most of my dice are the 12mm ones described above. If you have a lot of standard-sized dice (16mm), the medium size leather pouch might work better.
Metal D&D Dice Set
One of my favorite MTG accessories I own is this complete set of metal D&D dice. These things are very heavy for dice. And to be fair, that does make sense, being made of metal and whatnot.
Each dice is extremely high quality with a nice feel in the hand. Plus, there are a lot of other styles and colors available.
For any sort of dice rolling deck where you may need dice other than a d20 or a d6, a D&D dice set is needed. And this particular metal D&D dice set is not only functional, but very nice looking. A quick word of warning though, do not roll these dice on your cards, as the edges and heft of the dice will for sure damage your cards, even through sleeves! I only these dice using a dice tower (mentioned below).
2. Deck Boxes & Sleeves
The next set of MTG accessories being discussed will be all of the deck boxes and sleeves. I am not going to talk about storage or shipping. So MTG accessories such as team bags, penny sleeves, top loaders, long-term-storage boxes, etc. won’t be mentioned. These accessories are more focused on everyday/regular usage. With that being said, the first of these MTG accessories mentioned will be a deck storage box.
Deck Storage Box
A deck storage box is one of the best MTG accessories. You can use them to house format-specific decks, or group decks together. From my findings, each storage box can hold 5 of my Commander decks, or 6 of my regular 60 card decks.
If you are looking for the best of the best, you cannot go wrong with the Ultimate Guard Arkhive 400+. It has a very ‘premium’ feel to it and pretty strong magnets to keep the lid shut. The only downside is the cost.
I have also tried some generic Arkhive clones that are really comparable and overall great for my uses. In fact, for less than the price of a single Arkhive, you can get TWO generic ones, as they come in a 2 pack!
The generic ones are not nearly as ‘premium’ feeling as the Arkhives are, however. Also, the magnets are not quite as strong as the actual Arkhive’s magnets. Don’t get me wrong, they are still serviceable, though. Size-wise, both are the same and have the same tri-fold flap design. They can both hold the same exact contents as each other as well.
Commander Deck Boxes
This is where I think a lot of folks might not agree with my approach. The deck box I use for my Commander decks are the Ultimate Guard Boulder 80+. I only single sleeve my Commander decks because I want them to take up as little space as possible.
100 single sleeved cards fit PERFECTLY inside of these 80+ Boulders. I can fit 5 of these 80+ Boulders inside each deck storage box, mentioned above.
In fact, with the sleeves I primarily use (Ultra Pro Eclipse), I can easily fit 103-105 single sleeved cards inside each 80+ Boulder if I had to. A few of my decks use the Ultra Pro Printed Sleeves (such as the Selesnya sleeves in the photo), and each 80+ Boulder can snugly fit 102 of those sleeves.
If you’re wanting to double sleeve your Commander decks, you will need something bigger, like an Ultimate Guard Boulder 100+ deck box. These are just as good as the 80+, with the only difference being that they are larger to hold more cards. The deck storage box can hold 4 of these deck boxes inside of it.
60 Card Deck Boxes
The next of the deck box MTG accessories are the deck boxes for my 60 card format decks. For these decks, I just go with the tried and true Ultra Pro Deck Boxes. Overall, these are extremely affordable and will protect your decks.
Especially if you put these deck boxes inside of a deck storage box, as mentioned above. I can fit 6 of these deck boxes inside each of those deck storage boxes.
The deck boxes also have a place where you can write the deck’s name. Typically, I don’t use this but for the few times that I have, I just use a label maker and stick the label on the white space. That way I can reuse the box in the future if I decide to breakdown that specific deck.
Token Deck Box
The last of the deck box MTG accessories is a dedicated deck box for tokens. I have a single Ultimate Guard Boulder 40+ that works great for this purpose.
You can easily fit around 95 unsleeved tokens in this 40+ Boulder. And hey, if you have doubled-sided tokens, that is 190 different tokens you can carry in this small deck box!
The contents of my 40+ Boulder token deck box is as follows: 38 unsleeved tokens, 29 sleeved tokens, 8 dry erase tokens and 1 piece of felt fabric I use as a makeshift eraser for the whiteboard tokens. Coming in at just a hair over 1 and 3/8 inches thick, this thing is compact.
Sleeves
For nearly all of my decks, I use Ultra Pro Eclipse sleeves. I really like these sleeves and have had great luck with them. In combination with the Ultimate Guard Boulder 80+ deck boxes previously mentioned, I can fit every single card into those boxes easily. The sleeves fit the cards very nicely without have a ton of unused sleeve on the top.
Also, should you want to do it, you can use these sleeves with perfect fit inner sleeves to have a double sleeved deck. The Arixmethes shown in the photo is actually double sleeved (since it the Commander). These shuffle very smooth and I yet to have a sleeve split on. Although I do consciously try and shuffle carefully.
Printed Sleeves
I did want to briefly mention the Ultra Pro Printed Sleeves. I have a few sets of the Guild printed sleeves, such as the Selesnya printed sleeves in the photo. These sleeves are not nearly as good as the previously mentioned Eclipse sleeves. If you don’t care about artwork on your sleeves, I’d say to skip these for something else.
They are okay, but a bit hard to shuffle as the cards can sometimes stick together if they are smooshed together for any period of time, even as little as 2-3 seconds. Truth be told, I deal with it for the few decks I have as I am willing to sacrifice a bit for the artwork. To each their own, I suppose.
3. Binders
While not related to game play, one of the biggest MTG accessories a lot of people are curious about are binders. There are all sorts of binders out there. I have found that I like the ‘folio’ style binders with the plastic covering. They are not too rigid, but rigid enough that the protect my cards very well in my experience. I also chose these binders as they are very thin on their own, which is great for putting them in my MTG backpack when I am on the go.
9-Pocket Folio
I am not really a huge binder person. I know a lot of folks like to collect entire sets and have them inside of binders. But for me, the main reasons I use these binders are first, to hold my ‘expensive’ Commander cards that live in multiple decks. Secondly, I do have a few tribes that I collect and each one has its own binder. The binders I use are these CardGuard 9-Pocket Folio binders.
These folios are perfect for my needs. They fit inside of my backpack’s laptop compartment like a glove and can hold a total of 360 cards. There are 20 pages and each page can hold a total of 18 cards, 9 on the front and 9 on the back. I have yet to experience any pages ripping or splitting too.
4-Pocket Folio
Very similar to the 9-Pocket Folio, I have a 4-Pocket Folio version as well. This folio is obviously smaller than the 9-Pocket but it works perfectly for me. I keep my (super small, but ever growing) Sliver cards inside of it. Just like its big brother, these are 20 pages with each page being able to hold a total of 8 cards. 4 cards on the front of the page, and four cards on the back of the page.
Each 4-Pocket Folio can hold a total 160 cards. If you’re at all familiar with the Pokemon 4-Pocket Folios, you may be aware of how cheaply made they are. Thankfully, this one is so much better quality and has stood strong thus far. Just like with the 9-Pocket version, I have not had any tears or splits with this one.
4. Playmats
Everybody needs a playmat! Playmats are one of the most prominent ways to show off your style and flair. These two MTG accessories are all about playmats. The first is a custom playmat you can get made for you with any image you want. The second one is just a plain ole tube to carry your playmat.
Custom Playmat
A playmat is one of the best MTG accessories to really express your individual taste. The official MTG playmats from Ultra Pro are great, but you’re sort of forced to choose the artwork that they produce. I opted to go for a custom playmat so I could use a design of my choosing. If you go this route, you want to make sure that the image you want printed on the playmat is very high quality.
You basically want an HD desktop background, or image that has, at minimum, 1920×1080 pixels. If your image is not good quality and high resolution, the playmat will be blurry and grainy looking. There really is no major difference over a custom playmat compared to Ultra Pro’s official ones except the custom ones are a tad bit thicker.
Playmat Tube
A playmat case is going to be personal preference. I know some folks who just roll them up and stick them in their bags. I personally am not a fan of that and want to try and keep my playmat safe and protected. The first playmat case I ever got was this Ultra Pro Playmat Tube and it does what it is supposed to.
I roll my playmat up, remove one of the end caps and just slip it in without any fuss. It fits nicely inside of my backpack and also inside of my cabinet I keep all my other MTG accessories and cards. In fact, I have 2 of these tubes for both of my playmats. I keep one in my bag and one in my cabinet.
Custom MTG Accessories
Here are what I call my custom MTG accessories. Generally, these take random items and repurpose those items as MTG accessories. The first custom accessory is durable Ikoria Punchcard ability counters.
1. Ikoria Punchcard Abilities/Counters
When I think of cool MTG accessories, this is exactly what I picture. These are those Ikoria Punchcards with the ability counters punched out and placed inside of some penny coin capsules. If you like this idea and want to do it yourself, you will want to find some 19mm penny coin capsules. If you’re an eBay user, I recommend this specific set of penny coin capsules, as they are the exact ones I have and in the photo.
You may need to ever so slightly trim the punch out so it fits in the coin capsule without crimping or pinching. You can even squeeze in the thicker punchouts found in commander precon decks, though they will definitely get slightly crimped. You can use your thumbnail to make it look nice though.
2. Oversized Spindown Container
This is a goofy one, but a few years ago I was at a drugstore and saw this large container of Tic-Tacs. My MTG-riddled-mind immediately figured that would make for a cool container to hold some oversized spindowns. So naturally, I bought it; like who wouldn’t, right?
Turns out, it does work pretty well. Even though I only have 5 oversized spindowns, this container can fit 6 without any issues. It keeps them separate from everything else in their own little personalized container. Again, it is goofy, but I like it.
The Best MTG Accessories You Can 3D Print
Here we will go over the best MTG accessories you can 3D print yourself. The best part? Every single one of these MTG accessories are 100% free. I will provide download links to each one from either ThingiVerse or Printables (two of the most popular user submitted 3D model sites). Some of these 3D prints are even my own creations! The first of the 3D printed MTG accessories is the Modular Life Counter.
1. Modular Life Counter
One of the best MTG accessories you can 3D print is this Modular Life Counter. The 2-wheeled version shown in the photos has 5 parts. The two black outside pieces, the two number wheels and one pin everything attaches to. It is all friction fitted together as well, so need for any additional supplies to put one together yourself.
If you’d like, you can even go a step further and paint it. The way I painted mine was to get some black and white paint and then use toothpicks to fill in the numbers and the arrows. It took about an hour to do, but I think the results speak for themselves.
2. Mass MTG Tokens with Counters
Another one of the best 3D printed MTG accessories is what I call Mass MTG Tokens. These are tokens you print that have dual counters with a custom label. These two counters go from 00-99 and can represent whatever you’d like. The way I use mine is the for the bottom counter to represent the total number of that specific token I control and the top counter representing how many are tapped, attacking, summoning sick, etc.
The provided link above will give you everything you need to build you own, including a full tools and supplies list, along with a complete step-by-step assembly guide. Not including print time or time for glue to dry, making your own should only take about 30-45 minutes.
3. Dry Erase MTG Tokens with Counters
In a similar vein, I created a dry erase/whiteboard version of the Mass MTG Tokens. They function the exact same, but instead of having a printed label, you will have a whiteboard label so you can fill out what ever token you’d like.
The steps to build one of these is a little bit different so be sure to follow the instructions if you plan to make your own. The biggest difference is how the label is created, as you’ll need special materials so dry erase markers work properly without staining the whiteboard label and can be erased properly.
4. EDH/Commander Tray
If you use the same MTG accessories as I do, such as the 12mm dice and the Modular Life Counter, this EDH/Commander tray is a perfect addition to your collection. This was one of the first 3D models I ever created as a way to learn while making some semi-useful. The tray can accommodate 5x d20 dice, 3x 12mm dice, 2x 16mm dice, 1x Modular Life Counter and 1x Commander card.
You can download the free 3D model at EDH/Commander Tray on Printables. I printed mine in all black filament and then used some white paint to go over all of the letters so the text really pops and stands out. You could also try printing it using dual colors, if your printer supports that.
5. Compact/Collapsible Dice Tower
Out of all of the cool MTG accessories you can 3D print, this might just be favorite because of how unique it is. This is a Collapsible Dice Tower that is compact and self-contained. The spiral steps collapse down into a long row of steps and fits inside the box. The box itself acts as a fenced in area for the dice to tumble without flying across the room.
The Metal D&D Dice Set I mentioned earlier is kept in here as well. Like I said before, these dice are heavy and have semi-sharp corners and they will definitely damage cards. So I use this dice tower to roll these types of dice. Plus, seeing the dice tower transform is kind of a conversation starter too!
6. Card Uncurler
The last of the 3D printed MTG accessories is the Card Uncurler. Everyone knows modern aged foils come straight out of the pack all curled up. This nifty gadget was designed to combat that. Just throw a foil in the Card Uncurler and let it sit for a few hours. Take it out and, worst case scenario, it will not be curled as bad. Best case scenario, it will be completely flat!
One thing to be careful of, make sure you print at a decent resolution to make the insides of the Card Uncurler as smooth as possible. Also, do not just put your cards in it without, at minimum, a sleeve. It might even make sense to ‘pad out’ the inside with some card stock. This will prevent any damage to your cards due to uneven surfaces on the insides of the Card Uncurler.
Wrap Up
I really hope this has given you a few ideas to build your own collection of functioning and cool MTG accessories. It is very possible I may have missed some key MTG accessories. If I have, please let me know in the comments. I will gladly provide an updated version reflecting those missed MTG accessories! Also, feel free to sound off and let me know what all you use and why. Like I said at the beginning, I am always curious about what others are using. Often times I will use other folk’s ideas as inspiration for my own collection of MTG accessories. Thank you for reading and have a wonderful day!
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