Retract
Instant
Return all artifacts you control to their owner's hand.
- CMC
- 1
- Mana cost
- Color identity
- U
- Rarity
- rare
- Set
- Darksteel
- Price
- $5.97
- EDHREC rank
- #12597
Retract bounces every artifact you control back to hand for a single blue mana — in the right deck, that's a full storm reset, a hand refill, and a win condition stapled to one card. Any artifact-heavy Commander shell that cares about cast triggers, particularly Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain, treats this as a mandatory include.
Best Commanders
Commanders with the highest synergy
Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain
Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain draws a card for every historic spell cast, so bouncing and recasting a board full of artifacts with Retract can generate five, ten, or fifteen cards in a single turn — it's one of the primary storm engines in the deck.
Fblthp, Lost on the Range
Fblthp, Lost on the Range builds around Auras and equipment on a single creature, and Retract serves as a reset valve that reloads your hand and lets you recast the entire package to rebuild value or dig for a win condition.
Format Analysis
Where it lives, where it can’t
| Format | Verdict |
|---|---|
| commander | legal |
| legacy | legal |
| modern | legal |
| pioneer | not legal |
| standard | not legal |
| vintage | legal |
| pauper | not legal |
| oathbreaker | legal |
Commander is where Retract earns its reputation — artifact storm decks use it as a one-mana draw engine and loop enabler that can end games on the spot. In Legacy, it sees niche play in Affinity and storm-adjacent shells where bouncing a wide artifact board generates immediate advantage, though it's never been a format staple. Modern has the same theoretical application but the speed of the format and the availability of stronger options keep it on the fringe. Vintage permits it but the format's raw power level means Retract competes with considerably more broken tools, so it rarely shows up outside of dedicated artifact combo lists. Pioneer, Standard, and Pauper don't have access to it, which is frankly irrelevant — this card's identity is Commander combo piece, full stop.
Key Combos
Combo lines featuring this card
Budget Alternatives
Cheaper options that do most of the same work
Rebuild does almost the same thing — bounce all artifacts to hand for three mana — and it costs a fraction of a dollar, making it the obvious budget stand-in when you don't need the one-mana ceiling that Retract provides. The trade-off is real though: in storm lines where you're chaining spells on the same turn, the two extra mana can be the difference between going off and fizzling, so treat Rebuild as a placeholder rather than a permanent substitute.
Price Context
Current price
$5.97 mid tier
At $5.97, Retract sits in the mid tier — meaningful enough to feel in a budget build, but entirely reasonable for a card that serves as a combo linchpin in a specific archetype. Its price is stable; it's a narrow card with a dedicated audience, so don't expect dramatic movement in either direction.
Explore
Sources
Updated . Data from Scryfall, EDHREC, and Commander Spellbook.