Ranked Brawl Launches on MTG Arena 23 June with New Banned List
Wizards of the Coast announced Ranked Brawl on 1 June 2026, with the format officially launching on MTG Arena on 23 June. A free limited-time preview event is live right now from 2–15 June, giving players a chance to try the new queue ahead of its full release.
What Is Ranked Brawl?
Brawl is a 100-card singleton format exclusive to MTG Arena, built around a commander. You choose one legendary creature, planeswalker, Vehicle, or Spacecraft as your commander, and every other card in your deck must match its colour identity. Players start with 25 life.
Ranked Brawl applies competitive matchmaking to that foundation, pairing you with opponents based on your Constructed rank and rating rather than deck power level. Unlike the casual Unranked Brawl queue, there is no free mulligan, bringing it in line with Standard and other ranked formats. Wins and losses will affect your rank and count towards end-of-season reward eligibility.
Wizards identified two distinct audiences in Brawl: players who want a creative, expressive format and players who want a high-intensity competitive game. A single queue could not serve both well, so they have now split them.
What Is Banned?
The Ranked Brawl banned list targets commanders only. After months of playtesting, Wizards found that individual cards in the 99 have far less impact on win rates than the commander does. As a result, nearly every card is legal in the 99, with balance maintained by banning commanders that exceed a reasonable win rate threshold.
Ten commanders are banned at launch:
- Ajani, Nacatl Pariah
- Nadu, Winged Wisdom
- Lutri, the Spellchaser
- Oko, Thief of Crowns
- Old Stickfingers
- Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer
- Rusko, Clockmaker
- Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student
- Wrenn and Six
- Tajic, Legion's Valor
Going forward, Wizards will issue wildcard refunds for any crafted commander banned post-launch, though no refunds are being issued for this initial list. Metagame Challenges are also planned for the format, with Qualifier Play-In Weekends a possibility if player numbers are strong enough.
Three new Core Achievements reward players for logging games: 25 games earns reward track progress, 100 games earns the "Do you pay the one?" emote, and 450 games unlocks the "Jubilant Brawler" title.
Splitting Brawl into two queues is the right call. Unranked Brawl has always been a format at war with itself, trying to accommodate janky tribal brews and tuned control lists in the same lobby. Giving competitive players their own space should make both queues meaningfully better.