Hi friends! The cleanup step is a weird but interesting part of Magic. In an effort to demystify one of magics most confusing topics, I am deciding to write this quick reference guide to hopefully answer some, if not all, of your questions regarding this step. The first thing I want to do, is pull the direct rule from the CR which will be below. The CR is very dense so dont worry if you can’t parse the information right now, as I will be walking through each part of this citation.
514 Cleanup Step
514.1. First, if the active player’s hand contains more cards than their maximum hand size (normally seven), they discard enough cards to reduce their hand size to that number. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack.
514.2. Second, the following actions happen simultaneously: all damage marked on permanents (including phased-out permanents) is removed and all “until end of turn” and “this turn” effects end. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack.
514.3. Normally, no player receives priority during the cleanup step, so no spells can be cast and no abilities can be activated. However, this rule is subject to the following exception:
514.3a At this point, the game checks to see if any state-based actions would be performed and/or any triggered abilities are waiting to be put onto the stack (including those that trigger “at the beginning of the next cleanup step”). If so, those state-based actions are performed, then those triggered abilities are put on the stack, then the active player gets priority. Players may cast spells and activate abilities. Once the stack is empty and all players pass in succession, another cleanup step begins.
Now that we have the full set of rules that pertain to the cleanup step, lets begin by going through each part:
514.1. First, if the active player’s hand contains more cards than their maximum hand size (normally seven), they discard enough cards to reduce their hand size to that number. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack. This part is rather self explanatory; the first thing to occur in every players cleanup step, is they discard down to their maximum hand size. Typically this is 7, but in some cases, as with the card Thought Vessel a player may not have a max hand size or it may be changed via some other effect.
514.2. Second, the following actions happen simultaneously: all damage marked on permanents (including phased-out permanents) is removed and all “until end of turn” and “this turn” effects end. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack. This is where most players seem to have trouble. ALL of these things happen at the same time, and at this point there is no priority to be passed. Notably this is how players can skirt silence effects since they fall off before any type of trigger goes on the stack.
514.3. Normally, no player receives priority during the cleanup step, so no spells can be cast and no abilities can be activated. However, this rule is subject to the following exception: 514.3a At this point, the game checks to see if any state-based actions would be performed and/or any triggered abilities are waiting to be put onto the stack (including those that trigger “at the beginning of the next cleanup step”). If so, those state-based actions are performed, then those triggered abilities are put on the stack, then the active player gets priority. Players may cast spells and activate abilities. Once the stack is empty and all players pass in succession, another cleanup step begins. This is the part where all the triggers will go on the stack in APNAP order if any triggers occurred during the previous processes of the cleanup step. This creates normal round of priority until all players pass in succession. This also works if any state based actions would happen during this part of cleanup as well.