Price$4.57 – $255.96
Buy on TCGplayerAnimate Dead
Enchantment — Aura
LegalRank #224
Enchant creature card in a graveyard
When this Aura enters, if it's on the battlefield, it loses "enchant creature card in a graveyard" and gains "enchant creature put onto the battlefield with this Aura." Return enchanted creature card to the battlefield under your control and attach this Aura to it. When this Aura leaves the battlefield, that creature's controller sacrifices it.
Enchanted creature gets -1/-0.
KeywordsEnchant
Why is this card good?
Animate Dead is one of the best two-mana reanimation spells in the format, and a staple of any black reanimator strategy.
For just , you're cheating a huge threat out of any graveyard — yours or an opponent's. That last part matters: it's spot removal-as-recursion, letting you steal whatever a rival just discarded or had killed. Pair it with discard outlets like Entomb, Faithless Looting, or self-mill, and you're dropping Archon of Cruelty or a value-laden body on turn two or three.
It also shines in aristocrats and combo decks — it's a key piece of the Animate Dead + Worldgorger Dragon infinite loop, and it reanimates creatures with strong ETB or sacrifice synergies repeatedly with blink/recursion.
The -1/-0 is trivial; you're playing this for the body, not the stats.
Don't play it in decks with no graveyard enablers and few impactful creatures to revive — it's a dead card if you can't reliably fill a yard. It also evaporates if your reanimated creature gets exiled or bounced.
, you're cheating a huge threat out of any graveyard — yours or an opponent's. That last part matters: it's spot removal-as-recursion, letting you steal whatever a rival just discarded or had killed. Pair it with discard outlets like Entomb, Faithless Looting, or self-mill, and you're dropping Archon of Cruelty or a value-laden body on turn two or three.
It also shines in aristocrats and combo decks — it's a key piece of the Animate Dead + Worldgorger Dragon infinite loop, and it reanimates creatures with strong ETB or sacrifice synergies repeatedly with blink/recursion.
The -1/-0 is trivial; you're playing this for the body, not the stats.
Don't play it in decks with no graveyard enablers and few impactful creatures to revive — it's a dead card if you can't reliably fill a yard. It also evaporates if your reanimated creature gets exiled or bounced.Related cards
Necromancy
Nearly identical reanimation aura, can flash in at instant speed.
Dance of the Dead
Same reanimation aura effect for two mana, taps reanimated creature.
Reanimate
One-mana sorcery reanimation, premier upgrade.
Exhume
Cheap symmetrical reanimation sorcery.
Victimize
Reanimates two creatures by sacrificing one.
Persist
Two-mana sorcery reanimation with downside.
Unburial Rites
Reanimation with flashback for graveyard synergy.
Stitch Together
Cheap reanimation enabled by threshold.
Printings (20)
Show all 20 printingsShow fewer
Played by these commanders
Killian, Decisive Mentor100% of 1
Mirko, Obsessive Theorist100% of 1
Combos (8)
- Abdel Adrian, Gorion's Ward + Animate Dead
→ Infinite blinking, Infinite creature tokens, Infinite death triggers
- Animate Dead + Worldgorger Dragon
→ Infinite colored mana, Infinite colorless mana, Infinite ETB
- Leonin Relic-Warder + Animate Dead
→ Infinite death triggers, Infinite ETB, Infinite LTB
- Sun Titan + Karmic Guide + Animate Dead + Altar of Dementia
→ Infinite death triggers, Infinite ETB, Infinite LTB
- Sun Titan + Karmic Guide + Animate Dead + Ashnod's Altar
→ Infinite colorless mana, Infinite death triggers, Infinite ETB
- K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth + Buried Alive + Animate Dead + Chainer, Dementia Master + Viscera Seer + Gray Merchant of Asphodel
→ Infinite death triggers, Infinite ETB, Infinite lifegain
Rulings (5)
- 2016-06-08
If Animate Dead isn't on the battlefield as its triggered ability resolves, none of its effects happen. The creature card won't be returned to the battlefield.
- 2016-06-08
Animate Dead is an Aura, albeit with an unusual enchant ability. You target a creature card in a graveyard when you cast it. It enters the battlefield attached to that card. Then it returns that card to the battlefield, and attaches itself to the card again (since the card is a new object on the battlefield). Animate Dead itself never moves into a graveyard during this process.
- 2016-06-08
Once the creature is returned to the battlefield, Animate Dead can't be attached to anything other than it (unless Animate Dead somehow manages to put a different creature onto the battlefield). Attempting to move Animate Dead to another creature won't work.
- 2016-06-08
Abilities such as shroud and protection function only on the battlefield unless otherwise specified. A creature card with shroud may be targeted by Animate Dead, and Animate Dead will become attached to the creature that enters the battlefield.
- 2016-06-08
If the creature put onto the battlefield has protection from black—or if the creature can't legally be enchanted by Animate Dead for another reason—Animate Dead won't be able to attach to it. It will be put into the graveyard as a state-based action, causing its delayed triggered ability to trigger. When the trigger resolves, if the creature's still on the battlefield, its controller will sacrifice it.