Print MTG Proxies That Actually Feel Like Cards

Orders ship within 2-3 days of being placed, and that's production time, not just processing time — your card is actually being printed in that window. Once it leaves our facility in Des Moines, Iowa, standard USA shipping takes the usual few days depending on where you're located, but there's no extra shipping fee added since shipping is free nationwide. Compare that to ordering physical singles from an online marketplace, where you might wait a week or two for a seller to ship, plus more time for it to arrive, and you still might get a card that's not in the condition you expected. With Snapshot, you control exactly what the card looks like from the upload stage, so there are no surprises about condition or centering. If you're prepping for a playtest session or a casual game night coming up soon, ordering a few days ahead gives you comfortable buffer time. We'd recommend not waiting until the morning of if you can help it, just to give shipping room to work.

It'll feel close, though it's worth setting expectations correctly since Snapshot's process is built around trading card printing rather than replicating Magic's exact card construction. What you get is professional card stock with real weight and a clean snap, a big step up from home-printed paper or cardstock from a craft store. It sleeves well alongside your real cards and holds up to regular shuffling without the corners softening or peeling after a few games. Where it won't be identical is the exact texture finish that Magic's official printer uses, since that's a proprietary process specific to Wizards of the Coast's manufacturing partners. For playtesting, casual games, and personal proxy projects, most players find the difference negligible once the card is sleeved. If your priority is something durable enough to survive repeated shuffling and handling rather than a perfect factory match, this covers that need well. Plenty of players tell us they can't tell the difference once it's in a sleeve next to their real cards.

Absolutely, and this is actually one of the more popular reasons people use Snapshot beyond straightforward proxy printing. If you've got a redesigned card frame, a favorite piece of fan art, or even a personal photo you want turned into a card-style collectible, you can upload that directly into the builder just like you would card art for a proxy. The templates are flexible enough to handle different layouts, so you're not locked into one exact frame style. Since everything prints on the same professional card stock with the same magnetic case included, a custom altered card comes out with the same durability and feel as a straightforward proxy. A lot of players do this for gifts, inside jokes with their playgroup, or just to have a keepsake version of their favorite card with personalized art. Just make sure your image is high enough resolution before uploading, since a blurry or low-quality source photo will print blurry no matter how good the card stock is.

Higher resolution always prints cleaner, so aim for the largest, sharpest version of the card art you can find before uploading. A low-resolution image pulled from a quick web search will look pixelated or soft once it's blown up to fill the card template, even though the printing process itself is high quality. If you're scanning a physical card, scan at a high DPI setting rather than snapping a quick phone photo under bad lighting, since shadows and glare will show up in the final print. For custom art or altered designs, source the original file if you can rather than a screenshot of it, because screenshots compress detail and introduce artifacts. The builder will generally let you know if an image looks too small for the template size you've chosen, which is a good signal to find a better source. When in doubt, test with one single card before ordering a full pack, so you can check the print quality in hand before committing to a bigger order.

You can order anywhere from a single card up to a full pack, with pack pricing scaling up to $49.99 depending on how many cards you include. This makes it practical whether you need one replacement card for a damaged staple in your deck or a full 60-card proxy deck for a serious playtesting session before a big purchase. There's no minimum order requirement, so testing the waters with one or two cards first is completely reasonable if you want to see the print quality before committing to a larger batch. For bigger projects, like proxying an entire Commander deck or building out a full cube for a playgroup, ordering in a pack keeps the per-card cost more reasonable than ordering singles one at a time. Since shipping is free regardless of order size, there's no cost benefit to bundling everything into one giant order versus placing a couple of smaller ones if your card list changes as you playtest.

Yes, every order includes a free magnetic case for the first card, which is a nice bonus most home-printing methods can't match. The magnetic case snaps shut and holds the card securely, which is great if you want to display a particularly good custom print or protect a proxy you're especially attached to. For everyday play, you'll still want standard card sleeves to mix your proxies in with your real collection at the table, and the card stock we use is sized to fit standard sleeves without issue. The magnetic case is more of a display and protection option for cards you're not actively shuffling into a deck every session. If you're ordering a full playset of proxies for a Commander deck, you likely won't need a magnetic case for every single one, but it's a nice touch for the one card in the order you care most about.

No, every card in an order goes through the same printing process on the same professional card stock, regardless of whether you're ordering one card or a full pack. The per-card price naturally goes down as you order more, since pack pricing tops out at $49.99 for a larger quantity compared to $17.99 for a single card, but that's a cost efficiency, not a quality difference. Some players like to order a single test card first to check color accuracy and card feel before committing to a larger proxy deck order, which is a smart way to avoid surprises. Once you're happy with how that first card turns out, scaling up to a full pack for the rest of your deck list follows the exact same production process. There's no tiered quality system where bulk orders get a lesser treatment — it's the same equipment and same card stock throughout.

Yes, you're not limited to printing the same card art over and over in a single pack order. If you're building a proxy deck with 20 different cards, you can upload 20 different images and assign each one to its own card within the same order. This is especially useful for Commander or cube projects where you need a wide variety of proxy cards rather than multiples of the same one. The builder lets you review each card individually before finalizing the order, so you can double check that the right art is matched to the right card before it goes to print. Just budget a bit more time for uploading and organizing if you're doing a large mixed order, since you'll want to keep track of which image corresponds to which card in your list, especially for a long Commander deck with dozens of unique cards.