Remove Curse is a 3rd-level abjuration spell for Clerics, Paladins, Warlocks, and Wizards. You touch one creature or object, and every curse affecting it ends. If the object is a cursed magic item, the item stays cursed, but its owner's attunement breaks so they can take it off or throw it away. It takes an action, needs no material component, and is instantaneous.
Remove Curse is the party's answer to effects that don't wear off. Mummy rot, lycanthropy, a rakshasa's touch, a cursed axe you won't part with: each of these calls itself a curse in its rules text, and each one ends when this spell touches the victim.
There is no save and no ability check. It ends all curses on the target, not just one, which is its main edge over Greater Restoration, and it needs no material component.
The limit is the word "curse." The spell doesn't touch diseases, poison, ordinary charm, or most hit point maximum loss. Read the effect first and check whether it is described as a curse.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Level | 3 |
| School | Abjuration |
| Casting Time | 1 action |
| Range | Touch |
| Components | V, S |
| Material | None |
| Duration | Instantaneous |
| Concentration | No |
| Ritual | No |
| Save/Attack | None |
| Classes | Cleric, Paladin, Warlock, Wizard |
| Metric | Assessment |
|---|---|
| Slot Efficiency | High when you need it. One cast ends every curse on the target. |
| Action Economy | One action, usually out of combat. |
| Opportunity Cost | A 3rd-level slot that could have been a combat spell. No material cost, no concentration. |
When NOT worth the slot: Short curses that will end in a minute anyway, like a Bestow Curse cast with a 3rd-level slot (concentration, up to 1 minute).
Remove Curse has no higher-level effect. Use a 3rd-level slot.
Why it works: A creature cursed with mummy rot can't regain hit points. Healing spells cast before the curse ends do nothing.
This avoids the mistake of: Burning a Cure Wounds slot on an ally who can't benefit from it.
Why it works: The spell ends all curses affecting the creature. A character with mummy rot and a Bestow Curse needs one Remove Curse, but two Greater Restorations.
This avoids the mistake of: Paying 100 gp of diamond dust for Greater Restoration when a free 3rd-level spell does more.
Why it works: Armor of Vulnerability's curse is revealed by Identify or by attuning, and Identify is cheaper. Most cursed items hide better: the 2024 rules say most ways of identifying an item, including Identify, fail to reveal a curse.
This avoids the mistake of: Attuning first and spending a 3rd-level slot to undo it.
Why it works: Characters below 5th level can't cast a 3rd-level spell, so a low-level mummy or werewolf adventure needs a plan for afterward.
This avoids the mistake of: Leaving a tomb with a curse eating someone's maximum hit points and no way to stop it.
Why it's bad: Diseases aren't curses. An otyugh's or death dog's disease is a job for Lesser Restoration.
Do this instead: If the effect says "curse," use this spell. If it says "disease" or "poisoned," use Lesser Restoration.
Why it's bad: For a cursed magic item, the curse remains. The spell breaks the owner's attunement so they can remove or discard it.
Do this instead: Cast it, then get the item off the character before anyone attunes to it again.
Why it's bad: Mummy rot's 2014 text says the curse lasts until removed, but it doesn't say whether the maximum it already took comes back. That is a DM ruling, not rules text.
Do this instead: Ask your DM. If the loss stays, Greater Restoration can end one effect reducing a hit point maximum.
| Remove Curse | Greater Restoration | |
|---|---|---|
| Level | 3rd | 5th |
| Material | None | Diamond dust worth 100 gp, consumed |
| Curses ended | All on one creature or object | One curse per casting |
| Cursed item attunement | Breaks it | Ends it (counts as a curse) |
| Other uses | None | Charm, petrification, ability score or hit point maximum reduction, or exhaustion |
Greater Restoration is the wider tool. Remove Curse is cheaper and clears everything at once when the problem is purely curses.
The spell itself is unchanged: a level 3 abjuration for Clerics, Paladins, Warlocks, and Wizards, an Action, touch range, V and S components, instantaneous. It still ends all curses on one creature or object and breaks attunement to a cursed magic item without ending the item's curse.
The rules around it changed. The 2024 rules glossary adds a "Curses" entry: the effect that confers a curse defines what it does, and Remove Curse and Greater Restoration can remove curses. The 2024 DM rules cover cursed creatures (the DM might decide a mummy can be destroyed permanently only by casting Remove Curse on its corpse), narrative curses (the spell might only suppress them), and environmental curses like Demonic Possession, which any magic that removes a curse also ends.
The 2024 SRD also includes Hex, whose text says "You place a curse on a creature." By that wording, Remove Curse ends a Hex on its target. Many 2024 monsters curse more often: the mummy curses on every hit with no save, the werewolf's curse turns the victim into a werewolf at 0 hit points, and the rakshasa curses with three touches a turn. The 2024 deva, planetar, and solar can cast Remove Curse with their Divine Aid bonus action.
It ends every curse affecting one creature or object you touch. A cursed magic item keeps its curse, but its owner's attunement ends so they can remove or discard it.
Yes, in both editions. The 2014 mummy's stat block names Remove Curse directly, and the 2024 Rotting Fist is a curse. In 2024 the lost maximum returns on the next long rest once the curse is gone; in 2014 that is a DM ruling.
Yes. The werewolf's bite is a curse in both editions, and the spell ends all curses on the target.
No. The item keeps its curse, and anyone who attunes to it later is cursed again. The spell only breaks the current owner's attunement.
No. Diseases aren't curses. Use Lesser Restoration in 2014. In 2024, the otyugh's and death dog's diseases are written as the Poisoned condition, which Lesser Restoration also ends.
Remove Curse is 3rd level, needs no material, and ends all curses on the target. Greater Restoration is 5th level, consumes 100 gp of diamond dust, and ends one curse per casting, but it can instead end charm, petrification, ability score or hit point maximum reduction, or a level of exhaustion.
Yes. The 2014 Bestow Curse text says Remove Curse ends it, even the 9th-level version that lasts until dispelled. The 2024 DM rules on curses say the same.
Clerics, Paladins, Warlocks, and Wizards, in both the 2014 and 2024 SRD. Clerics, Warlocks, and Wizards can cast 3rd-level spells from 5th level. Paladins get them at 9th level.
Citations: SRD 5.1 (2014 rules), SRD 5.2.1 (2024 rules)
Includes material from the System Reference Document 5.1 and 5.2.1 by Wizards of the Coast LLC, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
This page includes material from the System Reference Document 5.1 and 5.2.1 by Wizards of the Coast LLC, available under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Loreify is not affiliated with Wizards of the Coast.
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