Still confused on how standard will rotate?

Here at WizardDen we get alot of questions. I'm still amazed at the amount of people who play table-top magic at home who do a google search for "magic stores" and call use to ask rules questions, luckily for us we have no problem answering them.

However the most common question we've received since August has been how standard rotation works. There seems to be alot of confusion about how standard rotation works in general, but added confusion because a new system has been announced.

Good thing for all of us Wizard's of the Coast made some pretty graphics to save us from our lack of quality google searches.


First this shows how standard use to rotate:

Each block is represented by 3 color coordinated blocks with one core set a year. Traditionally a new block would be released in the fall rotating out the block from 2 years ago, and last years core set.

Starting with the Spring of 2016:

Starting with spring of 2016 blocks will only have two sets and rotate each other out more regularly. Whats absent from this? A core set. Magic 2016 (release July 2015) will be the last core set. Each block will have a rotation time of 18 months in standard before it rotates.

So what does rotation look like for the next few sets?

Hopefully this makes the questions easier. Again, must thank Wizard's of the Coast for creating these nice graphics.