Like many other Magic The Gathering players my first real competitive deck was mono-red and I have loved red cards ever since. Although red board wipes are not as absolute as board wipes in colors since as white or black, red board wipes are often my favorites to cast.

As a general rule, the best red board wipes are Anger of the Gods and Blasphemous Act. Red board wipes deal damage to creatures to remove them from play rather than using a “destroy” effect. Red board wipes are known for additional effects like dealing damage to players as well as creatures.

What are the Best Red Board Wipe Spells?

Red spells have an array of exciting board wipes, from instants that you can cast on any turn of the game to sorceries that wipe the lands off the board.

Depending on your playstyle and strategy, you can add these spells to synergize well with your deck.

1. Sulfurous Blast

Recommended Formats:	Commander

Sulfurous Blast deals 2 damage to each creature and each player. If you cast this spell during your main phase, Sulfurous Blast deals 3 damage to each creature and each player instead.

A good starter for this list is Sulfurous Blast. This board wipe spell is an excellent example of red’s fire and lightning playstyle; it’s quick and scorches every creature on the board.

Sulfurous Blast is an instant that deals 2 damage to each creature and player, or 3 damage when cast on your turn.

An instant is a type of spell you can cast at any phase of the game, on anyone’s turn.

Some sorcery spells may be more potent, but you can only play them on your turn. A spell that you can play anytime is critical during clutch situations. For example, you can cast Sulfurous Blast when your opponent’s creatures attack you while you have no blockers available.

The 2 or 3 damage dealt by Sulfurous Blast may seem small, but it’s enough damage to destroy an array of small creatures that opponents may use to swarm the board at the start of a game. Also, the spell deals direct damage to your opponent, so you get a free Shock along with your board wipe for 4 mana. Neat!

2. Starstorm

Recommended Formats:	Commander, Penny Dreadful

Starstorm deals X damage to each creature.

Starstorm is a board wipe spell that gets stronger as you put more mana into it.

With an initial 2 mana and a varied X mana you put in, the instant spell deals X damage to each creature on the battlefield. This spell is quite a flexible board wipe as you need only the X that’s the highest toughness among enemy creatures to wipe the board with.

Starstorm is an excellent instant spell to have in commander as it can wipe out a horde of creatures when you have abundant amounts of mana available at anyone’s turn.

Additionally, Starstorm is the perfect board wipe to send enemy creatures to the graveyard if you have the creature with the highest toughness on the board, as this spell gives you a chance to clear the board with your tanky creature staying on the field.

Starstorm also has a cycling ability when you don’t need the card in your situation and prefer to draw something more useful.

ALSO READ: Best MTG Red Counterspells [Helpful Guide To Red]

3. Magmaquake

Recommended Formats:	Commander

Magmaquake deals X damage to each creature without flying and each planeswalker.

Magmaquake is the board wipe you need against creatures and Planeswalkers.

Similar to Starstorm, Magmaquake is an instant that costs X + 2 mana but deals damage instead to planeswalkers and creatures without flying. Choose X accordingly, and this becomes a one-sided board wipe.

Magmaquake may not be able to damage flying creatures, but it makes up for that with the ability to damage Planeswalkers.

Players often take advantage of Magmaquake being an instant by casting this card during their opponent’s End Step before untapping for the turn.

First, let the enemy cast more creatures or bring out their prized planeswalker onto the field. Then, as they are about to end their turn, thinking they have their pieces ready, cast Magmaquake to clear the board of their precious planeswalkers and non-flying creatures.

The result gives you a promising start to your turn while your opponents are shaken off their seats.

4. Chandra’s Ignition

Recommended Formats:	Commander

Target creature you control deals damage equal to its power to each other creature and each opponent.

If you’re looking for a board wipe that assures you of an advantage, it’s Chandra’s Ignition.

For only 5 mana and a chosen creature you control, Chandra’s Ignition deals damage to each other creature in the field and each opponent. But, you might ask, why?

Well, after casting this spell, these three things will happen:

• Enemy creatures are sent to the graveyard.
• Opponent loses life points.
• You have one creature on the board, with no contesting enemy creatures.

Especially in competitive formats where life points start at 20, a powerful creature dealing direct damage to the opponent is devastating.

So when Chandra’s ignition is cast before your combat phase, it directly damages your opponent and clears the board of enemy blockers.

Then during combat, your powerful creature can deal damage to your opponent uncontested. That’s a powerful combo that can be lethal with the right creature.

5. Bonfire of the Damned

Recommended Formats:	Commander

Bonfire of the Damned deals X damage to target player or planeswalker and each creature that player or that planeswalker’s controller controls.

Bonfire of the Damned is the miracle spell that can change the game in your favor.

The spell can bypass creatures with Hexproof and protection from red. It can also deal significant face damage to the opponent along with a one-sided board wipe.

What makes this spell powerful and enjoyable is it has Miracle.

If it’s the first card you draw this turn, it costs only X + 1, a considerable discount over its original cost.

I strongly advise that when you get the opportunity to cast this card’s miracle cost, go right ahead and do it.

Most likely, you’ll deal significant direct damage to your opponent while destroying most, if not all, his/her creatures. Then during your combat phase, your creatures can deal direct damage to your opponent with hardly any blockers.

Casting this card will often shift the game in your favor by combining strategy with a bit of luck.

6. Hour of Devastation

Recommended Formats:	Commander, Penny Dreadful, Pioneer

All creatures lose indestructible until end of turn. Hour of Devastation deals 5 damage to each creature and each non-Bolas planeswalker.

When it’s time to take out indestructible creatures on the board, cast Hour of Devastation.

For 5 mana, this spell removes all indestructible from creatures until the end of turn, then deals 5 damage to creatures and non-bolas planeswalkers. There are only about 5 Bolas planeswalkers, so it shouldn’t be much of a problem.

Indestructible creatures can now be damaged and destroyed for the whole turn after casting this spell. This means direct damage from creatures and spells will directly send indestructible creatures to the graveyard.

In commander, I advise having this card in your deck just in case you need to deal with a few indestructible creatures.

The 5 damage in itself is strong enough to wipe out many creatures and planeswalkers anyway, so this card should still be helpful in most scenarios you find yourself in.

7. Blasphemous Act

Recommended Formats:	Commander, Penny Dreadful

Blasphemous Act deals 13 damage to each creature.

A personal favorite, Blasphemous act is the board wipe perfect against a crowded board.

The spell deals a whopping 13 damage to each creature in the field. Aside from indestructible creatures, there is only a handful of creatures in Magic The Gathering that can take that kind of damage and survive.

Even though it has a mana Value of 9, Blasphemous Act gets to a lower mana cost quickly as it costs 1 mana less per creature on the battlefield.

This red board wipe spell perfectly fits in situations where enemy creatures have overwhelmed the board as it becomes easier to cast when more creatures are in play.

I like to play this card when odds are stacked against me in terms of creature numbers, and Blasphemous act is at least 5 mana less – this way I know that casting the spell publishes opponents for overextending on the board.

A prime example would be against token combo decks where the opponent has just summoned an unhealthy amount of tokens for your life total.

To answer that seemingly unstoppable army I simply cast Blasphemous Act.

Wiping out an entire token army costs only 1 red mana, but wiping your opponent’s smile off their face – priceless.

8. Jokulhaups

Recommended Formats:	Commander, Penny Dreadful

Destroy all artifacts, creatures, and lands. They can’t be regenerated.

We’ve come to a rare and devastating kind of board wipe in red; land destruction, and the prime example of that category is Jokulhaups.

When you cast this spell, Jokulhaups destroys the following:

• All creatures.
• All artifacts.
• All land.
• Some of your friendships.

You basically reset everything when you cast this spell since you take away everyone’s source of mana and their armies when you clear the board with Jokulhaups.

Often players turn this into a win condition by building their decks around this scenario.

When they use Jokulhaups, often players save a land or two in hand before casting the spell. That way, they get the advantage of being ahead on lands for a few turns against unprepared opponents.

Jokulhaups is highly impactful at the late game when numerous creatures, artifacts, and especially lands are already on the board. Creatures can’t regenerate, so there aren’t many creatures in Magic that will survive the casting of this spell.

Even graveyard decks can’t do much since lands are destroyed, and no mana is available. In commander, where amassing mana sources is a race, this spell brings total devastation to everyone in play.

Caution: In my personal experience playing MTG, there’s an unwritten courtesy in friendly casual games to ask your friends beforehand if they are alright with you playing a land board wipe card.

Please ask your playgroup first, before friendships are destroyed without regeneration.

9. Obliterate

Recommended Formats:	Commander

Destroy all artifacts, creatures, and lands. They can’t be regenerated.

What could be more potent than a spell that destroys all creatures, artifacts, and lands in one go? A spell that does the same thing, and it can’t be countered.

Obliterate is an inevitable spell, that is well named.

A counter-immune version of Jokulhaups, Obliterate is unaffected by blue counterspells that prevent you from casting it.

As a result, opponents have no way of saving their permanents from being destroyed. You get a surefire way to clear the field back to square one, giving you an opening to gain control of the game.

This spell works well with a low mana curve deck making it easier to rebuild after casting the spell.

Low mana curve decks don’t need a lot of lands to thrive but become underpowered as the games go late and opponents gain more mana sources to cast more potent spells.

Obliterate reverts mana sources and board states back to zero, an ideal scenario for these decks. In formats where decks usually have a limited amount of lands, losing a few to Obliterate can easily be crippling to your opponent’s mana resources for the rest of the game.

10. Anger of the Gods

Recommended Formats:	Commander, Modern, Historic, Pioneer

Anger of the Gods deals 3 damage to each creature.

A good board wipe spell is measured by its ability to destroy creatures and its effectiveness throughout the whole game.

Anger of the Gods is a red board wipe spell effective from early game to late game. You can deal 3 damage to all creatures in the field for only 3 mana and exile them when they die from the spell’s damage.

The exile prevents regeneration, graveyard plays, and graveyard triggers that your opponents may use to keep their creatures.

This cost-effective creature board wipe spell is excellent against aggro in the early game as you can cast this spell as soon as turn 3, giving you a chance to react to a swarm of enemy creatures ready to attack. In addition, since aggro creatures tend to have three or less toughness, you can prevent early barrages from your opponent with this spell.

In the late game, due to the low cost of Anger of the Gods, you can cast another red board wipe like Sulfurous Blast before casting Anger of the Gods to ensure all the creatures on the battlefield are exiled. This gives you another chance at controlling the game and canceling out any graveyard responses from your opponent.

Anger of the God’s low mana cost and its nuking capability makes it an all-around red board wipe spell. It’s always an excellent addition to any deck as it can be played from early to late game.

The Advantages and Disadvantages of Red Board Wipes Spells 

Red board wipes refer to a type of red-colored spell that clears the board of all cards of a specific type. There are board wipes available for every color and each color has its own thematic way of going about clearing the board. 

Red board wipes, in general, deal damage to creatures to destroy them. Creatures are sent to the graveyard when their toughness becomes zero after taking damage from a spell or creature. Be careful, though, as board wipe spells also damage your creatures, so you’ll need to strategize when to use these powerful cards.

Red board wipe spells often “deal damage” to creatures to clear the board with X amount of damage, which usually depends on the X amount of mana spent. 

Players can take advantage of this mechanic by building decks and casting creatures with higher toughness to survive the red board wipes you cast.

Some red board wipes damage not just the creatures but the players as well.

Some spells deal damage to players, reducing their life points, along with hitting creatures. These board wipe spells can act as surprise lethal finishers against your opponents. These spells are highly punishing as your opponents have to not only worry about losing their creatures, but they need to keep an eye on their life total – Red sweeper can really punish players that like to spend their life total as a resource. 

Also, there are red board wipe spells that can destroy lands! These, in turn, give your deck a unique strategy in controlling and applying pressure to the board in the later stages of the game.

A disadvantage for red board wipe spells is that most red spells don’t interact with enchantments. So you have to find another way of handling enemy enchantments.

Employing creatures or artifacts that specifically take out enchantments may be your solution.

Strategies and Tactics with Red Board Wipe Spells

As you may have noticed by now, red board wipe spells have a “deal damage” approach to clearing the board of creatures, something that may seem less powerful compared to the “destroy” approach by other board wipes.

But here’s the good thing about it, you can create one-sided board wipe tactics with these spells. For example, consider adding creatures with four toughness in your deck if you have Sulfurous Blast as a board wipe. That way, you can confidently use the spell to eliminate enemy creatures while sparing yours.

Keep in mind that one of red’s strategic themes is using a fiery and quick lightning approach.

Red board wipes synergize well with that technique, making fast and powerful offensive moves in a turn. In a similar example, you can use Sulfurous Blast to destroy enemy creatures before blockers are declared, allowing your creatures to deal face damage. At the same time, the spell also deals three additional damage to your opponent. This forces opponents to play defensively as they now have significantly fewer life points.

As the adage goes, the best defense is a good offense.

Another strategy for red is to simply embrace the chaos. Meaning, that you bring about cards that can take advantage of all the damage and destruction your red board wipe spells bring.

For example, you may add an indestructible creature or two to ensure in your deck that it’s immune to your board wipe spells. You may also add some low-cost creatures in your deck if you have to destroy all lands to recover your army quickly. 

Lastly, I suggest adding an enchantment that works with damage dealt to creatures, such as Fiery Emancipation, which triples the damage caused by your sources to any player or permanent. It adds more impact against opponents every time you cast your board wipe spell.

Red board wipes can be synergistic with so many deck builds. Try to find the ones that suit well to your playstyle and learn the different ways you can win with a blaze.