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Modern Archetypes

59 archetypes ranked by meta share

Metagame concentration

How few decks Modern is, month by month, against every ban on record. Each point is the chance that two decks drawn at random from that month's field are the same archetype (the Herfindahl–Hirschman index), shown as the number of decks a field that concentrated is equivalent to. How this is calculated

21.1
effective decks · Oct 2026
0.0475
HHI
−6.8
vs Sep 2026
11.3–27.9
range over 22 months

Lower means more concentrated. Months pooling fewer than 200 classified decks, or fewer than two events, are left blank rather than plotted — below that the reading moves more with how much data the month held than with the format. Decks the classifier could not name are excluded; each point's tooltip reports what share of the field that left.

Tier history — top archetypes

The 8 biggest archetypes by meta share, on one axis. Each line is the score its tier is computed from, so a ban or a set release shows up as the whole field rearranging.

The Y axis is the score each archetype's tier is computed from: for measured points a 60/40 blend of MTGGoldfish meta share and TopDeck top-8 appearances, for reconstructed ones the meta share our classifier derives from standings. Dashed horizontal lines mark the tier thresholds.

The shaded span left of the dashed vertical line is reconstructed from historical standings (issue #214), not measured at the time; those segments are drawn dashed, and they break rather than join at the changeover because no single reading bridges the two. The two eras are scored against different denominators — a reconstructed share is a slice of our classifier's archetypes, a measured one a slice of MTGGoldfish's curated list — so compare shapes across the line, not values. D tier is reconstructed-only — the live writer floors at C — so a line can step D→C at the changeover without its score moving.

Sort within tiers:

Deck costs estimate an average list at each card's cheapest printing across all printings, promos and reprints included.

A

A-Tier

Competitive tier archetypes (5-10% meta share) (5 archetypes)

A

Mono-Green Basking Broodscale Combo

14.5%of meta
~$670
A

Rakdos Midrange

13.5%of meta
~$468
A

Affinity

7.4%of meta
~$1,189
A

Amulet Titan

5.5%of meta
~$932
A

Boros Energy

2.3%of meta
~$865
B

B-Tier

Viable archetypes (2-5% meta share) (11 archetypes)

B

Esper Blink

5.4%of meta
~$726
B

Ruby Storm

3.4%of meta
~$501
B

Living End

3.1%of meta
~$522
B

Domain Zoo

2.7%of meta
~$600
B

Devoted Combo

2.6%of meta
~$908
B

Eldrazi Tron

2.6%of meta
~$432
B

Goryo's Vengeance

2.2%of meta
~$868
B

Tron

2.2%of meta
~$439
B

Neobrand

1.8%of meta
~$575
B

Belcher

1.0%of meta
~$379
B

Eldrazi Ramp

0.6%of meta
~$667
C

C-Tier

Low-meta archetypes (1-2% meta share) (43 archetypes)

C

Esper Midrange

2.5%of meta
~$794
C

Jeskai Prowess

2.2%of meta
~$355
C

Boros Burn

1.6%of meta
~$222
C

Mono-Black Midrange

1.4%of meta
~$721
C

Esper Reanimator

1.2%of meta
~$828
C

Rakdos Aggro

1.1%of meta
~$391
C

Grixis Reanimator

1.0%of meta
~$376
C

Death's Shadow

0.7%of meta
~$488
C

Boros Ponza

0.7%of meta
~$274
C

Izzet Murktide

0.7%of meta
~$561
C

Jeskai Energy

0.6%of meta
~$739
C

Hammer Time

0.6%of meta
~$1,445
C

Titan Shift

0.6%of meta
~$721
C

Azorius Blink

0.6%of meta
~$724
C

Indomitable Creativity

0.6%of meta
~$532
C

Eldrazi

0.6%of meta
~$644
C

Izzet Prowess

0.6%of meta
~$350
C

Dimir Murktide

0.4%of meta
~$701
C

Generic Ragavan

0.4%of meta
~$340
C

Grixis Control

0.4%of meta
~$623
C

Temur Prowess

0.4%of meta
~$347
C

Yawgmoth

0.4%of meta
~$834
C

Izzet Steel-Cutter

0.4%of meta
~$1,694
C

The Rock

0.4%of meta
~$660
C

Merfolk

0.3%of meta
~$508
C

Jeskai Blink

0.3%of meta
~$966
C

Mono-Green Eldrazi

0.3%of meta
~$769
C

Bant Midrange

0.3%of meta
~$669
C

Through the Breach

0.3%of meta
~$557
C

4c HollowOne

0.3%of meta
~$340
C

Bant Blink

0.3%of meta
~$637
C

Gruul Basking Broodscale Combo

0.2%of meta
~$682
C

Rakdos HollowOne

0.2%of meta
~$533
C

Sultai Midrange

0.2%of meta
~$555
C

4c Midrange

0.2%of meta
~$831
C

Mill

0.2%of meta
~$332
C

Song of Creation

0.2%of meta
~$1,732
C

Grixis Midrange

0.2%of meta
~$744
C

Azorius Control

0.1%of meta
~$564
C

Dimir Midrange

0.1%of meta
~$723
C

Jeskai Ascendancy Combo

0.1%of meta
~$1,698
C

Dimir Reanimator

0.1%of meta
~$472
C

5c Midrange

0.1%of meta
~$774