Most Valuable Sol Rings – Magic: The Gathering

Summary

• The most expensive versions of Sol Ring include rare serialized editions like Judge Promos and the Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth versions.
• Some rare versions of Sol Ring, like the Elven ring from Tales of Middle-earth, can reach over $750 due to limited print numbers.
• The Kaladesh Inventions version offers a unique glow and border, while the classic Beta Sol Ring provides a timeless look without white borders.

One of the most ubiquitous Magic: The Gathering cards of all time is the all-powerful Sol Ring. This little artifact can accelerate any Commander deck to excellence early in the game.

If you really want to make a splash, you’re going to want to grab the flashiest version of the card you can. There are a few more expensive Sol Rings out there, but they are serialized versions of the card, which can be difficult to track and can vary in price. The prices here are taken from TCGplayer.com

10

Sol Ring

Unlimited – $109.56

One of the earliest printings of Sol Ring is the Unlimited version of the card coming in at just over $100. Adding two mana never looked so good, and rarely costs this much, but its just the first step on your price-checking journey.

The obvious difference from every other iteration here is the white border, which for some is a fun quirk, while others absolutely cannot stand it. No matter how you feel about the color of the border, the Unlimited version is still more than 30 years old at this point, making it a rarity to own.

9

Sol Ring – Borderless Surge Foil

Universes Beyond: Fallout – $134.90

One of the rarest cards from the Universes Beyond: Fallout set is the borderless and surge foil version of Sol Ring. Featuring Vault Boy from the Fallout series, the card has the iconic vault door acting as the ‘ring’, with light pouring out behind it, which is a nice aesthetic choice.

Only found in Collector Boosters, this card has the fancy surge foiling applied to it, which is exclusive to Universe Beyond sets. The surge foiling gives it a rippling effect over the artwork and helps keep the price for this card high.

8

Sol Ring

30th Anniversary Edition – $149.99

While not the most popular set Magic: The Gathering ever released, the 30th Anniversary Edition set saw the rerelease of tons of classic Magic cards, though none of them are tournament-legal.

This helped Wizards of the Coast get around that pesky Reserved List, but left a bit of a bad taste in many players’ mouths, especially since you can’t play with any of the cards in any tournaments. That isn’t stopping players from valueing these cards highly, as they’re a bit of a collector’s item since they’re not very popular.

7

Sol Ring – Human

The Lord Of The Rings: Tales Of Middle-earth – $281.70

The release of The Lord Of The Rings: Tales of Middle-earth was a massive endeavor, adapting the epic tale into Magic cards, and applying some Magic cards to elements of the story.

One of the more clever approaches to the set was taking the Rings of Power that Sauron helped Celebrimbor forge and made them into functional cards, the Sol Rings. While the Rings were used for evil in the books, you can use them to cast all sorts of good spells in your deck.

6

Sol Ring

Judge Promo – $297.92

Judge promos are one of the little perks that you can get for helping to oversee Magic: The Gathering tournaments. This promo comes from 2005 and was one of four given out that year.

The promo has a special DCI watermark and features artwork from the legendary Mark Tedin, a classic artist from Magic’s earliest days. If you were a Magic Judge from back in the day, you might have one of these tucked away in a deck somewhere, and if so, you’re hiding no small chunk of change in a lost deck.

5

Sol Ring – Dwarven

The Lord Of The Rings: Tales Of Middle-earth – $321.46

Returning to Arda, we have the Dwarven Rings of Power this time. While functionally all the Tales of Middle-earth Sol Rings do the same thing, the artwork depicts a different scene.

The neat thing about these Rings, and what plays into their high value, is that the number printed reflects the number of Rings made for each race. There are:

• 9,000 Human Sol Rings
• 7,000 Dwarven Sol Rings
• 3,000 Elven Sol Rings

One of the sillier choices on this card is that they needed to give the person picking up the ring a large beard, since a close up on the ring or even just the hand picking up the ring might not be unique enough to distinguish from a human’s hand.

4

Sol Ring

Alpha – $549.99

The incredibly rare Alpha set is filled to the brim with valuable cards. Practically any care you pick is worth something, given that it’s oldest set in the game, with the gaming having been released in 1993.

The Alpha Sol Ring has the same artwork as the Judge Promo version that Mark Tedin originally created for the card, a fiery ring of pure energy to show the amount of power behind this card. While later interpretations show the Sol Ring as being a physical item or or some magical object, Tedin took the name to heart, making a more ethreal version of the Sol Ring being a ring of fire.

3

Sol Ring – Elven

The Lord Of The Rings: Tales Of Middle-earth – $757.80

The last of the Tales of Middle-earth Sol Rings, the Elven ring, is the most valuable of the trio, thanks to its much lower print number.

All three versions of Sol Ring feature the same text, the Quenyan version of the Ring-verse, the inscription found on The One Ring. When spoken, the Ring-verse reads:

Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,

Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,

Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,

One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne

In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,

One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them

In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

2

Sol Ring

Kaladesh Inventions – $775.65

Part of the Masterpiece Series, the Kaladesh Inventions are a collection of some of the most powerful artifacts from Magic’s history collected together and given a makeover by some of the plane of Avishkar’s most talented artisans.

Sol Ring here is depicted as a glowing ring hovering above a golden stand. The Inventions all share a special border, with filigree metal replacing the usual artifact frame. The interpretations of the Sol Ring being crafted by artisans from other planes gives a great way to show the culture and diversity of Magic’s plane while still being a recognizable card.

1

Sol Ring

Beta – $949.99

You can’t go wrong with the classic Beta Sol Ring. You get the same vibe as the Alpha version, minus the goofy corners, while avoiding the white borders of Unlimited. The Beta set also released in 1993, just a few two months later, but demand for the card has contibuted to its high value.

While there are cheaper versions of this essential artifact out there, you can’t really do much better if you’re looking to bling out your deck to the highest degree possible than this snazzy Sol Ring.