Card box

A card box is a container for Magic cards.

General

The first major question facing the avid Magic hobbyist is, of course, where to keep a collection of several hundred or several thousand cards, at least some of which may be worth a significant amount of money. One does not simply stuff a Black Lotus or a Mox Sapphire into the bottom of a sock drawer. The two popular solutions borrowed from sports-card collectors were binders and clear plastic storage boxes of various sizes.^[1]

Boxes are more compact and often easier to carry around as collections grow to epic proportions.The problem with plastic storage boxes is that some of them are brittle. A sports-card box is designed to store and protect cards, not transport them. If you keep a playing deck in a plastic box and toss it into a rucksack or book bag as you head out the door for a friendly game, the box is likely to be badly scuffed and cracked before long. Other options include the die-cut cardboard storage boxes that card collectors use to store vast quantities of cards-they're cheap, really useful, and available at almost any card shop.

AEG

In 1995, Alderac Entertainment Group offered a line of sturdy cardboard boxes enhanced with lush fantasy artwork by artist like Susan van Camp, William O’ Connor and Stephen Venters. There were two sizes, the Duelmaster Deck Box (100 card capacity, $2) and the Card Crypt (1,000-card capacity $3). AEG advertised a selection of several different designs, color-coded to match the five types of mana in Magic. Boxes were also available with vampiric art suitable for Jyhad decks and collections.

Like sports-card boxes, the AEG boxes were susceptible to scuffing over time. And they were not designed to handle either factory-boxed starter decks or quantities of cards in protective sleeves. Both would stretch the sides of a Card Crypt, and the former simply wouldn't fit in a Duelmaster box.

Wood Den

For those really valuable collections, another option was "The Master's Box" ($21.95), built by the Wood Den in 1995. This was a solid mahogany box with brass fittings, listed as holding over 800 cards.The boxes are described as hand-made, limited-run items.

Wizards of the Coast

Wizards of the Coast first released official card Magic boxes in 1996.

Updated storage boxes were released by Wizards of the Coast for the 1998 Holiday Season. These boxes could each hold 1,200 cards vertically, allowing the players to read the card titles more quickly. Five designs featured updated artwork from the world of Magic, blending illustrations of classic cards with newer images from Tempest, Stronghold and Exodus. A new sixth box featured artifacts like the Black Lotus, the moxes, and other favorites. The boxes were available at a suggested retail price of $3.95.^[2]

As part of the Fantasy Pro Tour prizes awarded by the Sideboard Online in 2002, winners received a Sideboard deck box. The box features card art from Hammer of Bogardan, Morphling, Cursed Scroll and Shadowmage Infiltrator. The texture of the box very subtly contains all the expansion symbols from Arabian Nights to Apocalypse.^[3]

Ultra Pro

Ultra Pro started producing themed card boxes with the Tempest set. In 1998, Ultra Pro introduced rigid deck boxes, constructed from polyurethane. These fit 75 cards (a deck and a sideboard) with sleeves. For Planechase, Ultra Pro introduced an extra large box. The front of this box was divided into two spots for sixty-card decks, and the rear compartment was sized to hold oversized cards in sleeves.^[4] Commander came with trapezium-sized boxes that contained a hundred-card deck 3 oversized cards ^[5] and the MOX CUB3™, designed for Cubing, features a unique 2-level storage design which holds 900 sleeved cards and a compartment for dice, stones and other accessories.^[6]

Wyrmwood

In June 2017, a license a for Magic themed wooden deck boxes and leather playmats was acquired by Wyrmwood, a small customer-focused company founded by three friends, whose mission is to deliver exceptional craftsmanship and high quality materials to the tabletop gaming community.^[7] The Unlimited Edition Mana Deck Box is from Cherry wood, and can hold 100 double sleeved cards. The premium Alpha Edition Mana Deck Box is is strictly limited to 100 units of each mana symbol.

Jewel cases

Several companies sell crystal clear "jewel cases"" , or "hinged trading card cases", made from high impact polystyrene. These usually hold up to 15 or 100 (un-sleeved) cards.