While Magic cards can represent costs and colors using printed symbols, the Comprehensive Rules and Scryfall’s API use a text representation of these values.
Color Vectors
Whenever the API presents set of Magic colors, the column will be a vector that uses the uppercase, single-character abbreviations for those colors. For example, <"W", "U"> represents something that is both white and blue. Colorless sources are denoted with an empty vector NULL.
Common places were you might see this kind of vector are scry_cards()’s colors and color_identity. When a color column is NULL or NA, it implies that that information is not pertinent for the current object. It does not imply that the object is colorless.
Color vectors are not guaranteed to be in a particular order.
A list of color representations is provided below:
| Abbr. | Color | Basic Land | Mana Symbol |
|---|---|---|---|
W |
White | Plains |  |
U |
Blue | Island |  |
B |
Black | Swamp |  |
R |
Red | Mountain |  |
G |
Green | Forest |  |
Mana Costs and Other Symbology
Whenever the API presents mana costs and other card symbols, it does so using the official plaintext notation for that symbol set forth in the Comprehensive Rules. For example, “
, 
” is written as {2/W}, {T}.
An exhaustive list of all symbology is provided below. You can also retrieve this information programmatically using the scry_symbols() function.
Note that some symbols use UTF-8 characters outside the ASCII range.
| Symbol | Printed | Description |
|---|---|---|
{T} |
|
Tap this permanent |
{Q} |
 |
Untap this permanent |
{E} |
 |
An energy counter |
{PW} |
 |
Planeswalker |
{CHAOS} |
 |
Chaos |
{A} |
 |
An acorn counter |
{X} |
 |
X generic mana |
{Y} |
 |
Y generic mana |
{Z} |
 |
Z generic mana |
{0} |
 |
Zero mana |
{½} |
 |
One-half generic mana |
{1} |
 |
One generic mana |
{2} |
 |
Two generic mana |
{3} |
 |
Three generic mana |
{4} |
 |
Four generic mana |
{5} |
 |
Five generic mana |
{6} |
 |
Six generic mana |
{7} |
 |
Seven generic mana |
{8} |
 |
Eight generic mana |
{9} |
 |
Nine generic mana |
{10} |
 |
Ten generic mana |
{11} |
 |
Eleven generic mana |
{12} |
 |
Twelve generic mana |
{13} |
 |
Thirteen generic mana |
{14} |
 |
Fourteen generic mana |
{15} |
 |
Fifteen generic mana |
{16} |
 |
Sixteen generic mana |
{17} |
 |
Seventeen generic mana |
{18} |
 |
Eighteen generic mana |
{19} |
 |
Nineteen generic mana |
{20} |
 |
Twenty generic mana |
{100} |
 |
One hundred generic mana |
{1000000} |
 |
One million generic mana |
{∞} |
 |
Infinite generic mana |
{W/U} |
 |
One white or blue mana |
{W/B} |
 |
One white or black mana |
{B/R} |
 |
One black or red mana |
{B/G} |
 |
One black or green mana |
{U/B} |
 |
One blue or black mana |
{U/R} |
 |
One blue or red mana |
{R/G} |
 |
One red or green mana |
{R/W} |
 |
One red or white mana |
{G/W} |
 |
One green or white mana |
{G/U} |
 |
One green or blue mana |
{2/W} |
|
Two generic mana or one white mana |
{2/U} |
 |
Two generic mana or one blue mana |
{2/B} |
 |
Two generic mana or one black mana |
{2/R} |
 |
Two generic mana or one red mana |
{2/G} |
 |
Two generic mana or one green mana |
{P} |
 |
One colored mana or two life |
{W/P} |
 |
One white mana or two life |
{U/P} |
 |
One blue mana or two life |
{B/P} |
 |
One black mana or two life |
{R/P} |
 |
One red mana or two life |
{G/P} |
 |
One green mana or two life |
{HW} |
 |
One-half white mana |
{HR} |
 |
One-half red mana |
{W} |
|
One white mana |
{U} |
|
One blue mana |
{B} |
|
One black mana |
{R} |
|
One red mana |
{G} |
|
One green mana |
{C} |
 |
One colorless mana |
{S} |
 |
One snow mana |