The cheapest way to buy a Magic: The Gathering deck
Quick answer
The cheapest way to buy a Magic: The Gathering deck is to price the whole list at once across stores and solve for the lowest total including shipping — not to buy each card from whichever store is cheapest for it. Buying card by card scatters your order across many sellers and stacks up shipping, which usually costs more than a consolidated order. Three moves cut the bill: consolidate cards into fewer sellers (many stores also give free shipping over a threshold, like TCGplayer Direct over $35); accept cheaper printings of the same card when the art doesn't matter; and take lightly played copies on bulk commons. ScryPrice does all three automatically — it compares TCGplayer, Card Kingdom, and ManaPool, finds the cheapest split including shipping, and gives you one-click carts. It's free.
1. Never price a deck card by card
The single biggest mistake is buying each card from whichever store is cheapest for that card. You'll pay shipping to several sellers and blow past what a consolidated order would cost. Solve for the total — item price plus shipping — not the per-card price.
2. Consolidate sellers to cut shipping
Most marketplaces charge shipping per seller — often around $1–$5 each. Buying 30 cards from two sellers beats the same 30 cards from eight. Many stores also offer free shipping over a threshold: TCGplayer Direct is free over $35, and Card Kingdom ships free over $99. Clearing one of those thresholds is often worth a slightly higher item price.
3. Be flexible on printing and condition
If you don't care which art you get, a cheaper reprint of the same card can save serious money — heavily reprinted staples sometimes cost a fraction of the newest printing. Dropping from Near Mint to Lightly Played on bulk commons barely matters for play and cuts the bill further. ScryPrice supports 5 condition grades so you set the floor.
4. Let ScryPrice do all three at once
Paste your decklist and ScryPrice compares TCGplayer, Card Kingdom, ManaPool across 170,000+ indexed cards (prices refreshed daily), then solves for the cheapest total including shipping — consolidating sellers and, optionally, swapping in cheaper printings. It hands you a one-click cart for each store in the winning split.
A quick worked example
Say a 40-card list has its cheapest copy of each card spread across seven sellers. Buying it that way might mean seven shipping charges. Consolidating the same list onto two or three stores — accepting a few cards at their second-cheapest price — commonly nets a lower delivered total, because you drop four or five shipping fees. That trade-off is exactly what the optimizer computes for your specific list.
Price your card list free →Frequently asked questions
What's the cheapest way to buy a Magic deck?
Compare stores for the whole list at once, consolidate purchases to fewer sellers to reduce shipping, and be flexible on printing and condition. ScryPrice does this automatically and for free.
Is it cheaper to buy a deck from one store or many?
Usually fewer stores is cheaper because you pay shipping fewer times, even if individual cards cost slightly more. ScryPrice weighs item price against shipping to find the true cheapest split.