Most of a Commander deck's price sits in a handful of cards. The new Budget Alternatives tool finds cheaper cards that do the same job, so you can build the budget version of a list without guessing.
One card or a whole deck
Search a card that costs $3 or more to see up to six cheaper cards that do what it does, with their prices and a link to buy them.
Or, with Pro, choose A decklist and paste your list. The tool picks out every card that has a cheaper alternative, most expensive first, and adds up how much you could save by swapping each one for its cheapest option.
How it decides what "the same job" means
Every card is described by its function tags from Scryfall Tagger, where the community labels what each card does: ramp, repeatable treasures, tutor to hand, one-sided board wipe and thousands more. Two cards do the same job when they share those tags, and a tag that few cards have counts for more than a common one.
An alternative also has to:
- be legal in Commander,
- fit inside the original card's colour identity,
- cost at most 40% of the original, at least $2 less and no more than $10.
Prices are each card's cheapest paper printing on Scryfall, refreshed every week.
Same job, not the same card
A cheaper card is cheaper for a reason. Diabolic Tutor finds any card just like Demonic Tutor, for two more mana. Read each alternative before you swap it in, and keep the expensive card if your deck needs its speed.
The page also lists the most played expensive staples with their three best alternatives each, so you can see where a deck's money usually goes.