The global economy and in particular the clean energy transition is highly dependent on critical raw materials (CRMs) – from transition metals to the lanthanides. The last group, from lanthanum (La) to lutetium (Lu), scandium (Sc) and yttrium (Y), known as rare earth elements (REEs), plays a fundamental role in technological advancement in many high-tech sectors. REE-based permanent magnets are one of the key building blocks in the transition to more sustainable technologies, from green energy production and energy conversion to fossil-free mobility. As a result, 38% of the total REEs demand is dedicated solely for Nd-Fe-B permanent magnets manufacturing. Furthermore, until the end of this decade (2020 – 2030), the demand for REE-based permanent magnets is expected to soar by 2 times, further emphasizing the criticality of REEs demand. Major share of this demand is related to critical REEs, that have very low recyclability (1 – 2 wt.%) and high carbon footprint (up to 100s of kg CO2-eq/kg), such as neodymium (Nd), dysprosium (Dy) and terbium (Tb). Highly efficient recycling and a low environmental impact process are critical to the long-term availability and improved sustainability of the growing Nd-Fe-B based magnets market. So far, there have been few NdFe-B recycling strategies reported in the literature exploring the reuse of end-of-life (EoL) magnet waste for permanent magnet production. The direct reuse of EoL magnets through hydrogen-based processes – so called magnet-to-magnet approach – focuses on the pulverization of such magnets and their reintroduction of the base material into the production chain. The environmental impact can be reduced up to 96% due to the simplification of the magnet production chain. However, the increasing contamination by oxygen and nitrogen through recycling steps is a limiting factor to obtain high-performance sintered magnets through multiple reuse cycles. In addition, virgin REEs are required to mitigate the deleterious effects of contaminants, a non-sustainable solution in the light of CO2 emissions and REEs criticality and limited sourcing. In this context, the Hydrogen-enabled Plasma process (HPSR) emerges as a candidate to overcome several of the mentioned limitations of existing Nd-Fe-B recycling methods. The potential of the HPSR for green metal and alloy production has been reported using a hydrogen lean thermal plasma to reduce metal-rich ores and from bauxite refining waste residue. The outcome of this process were high purity metals and alloys with negligible impurity content and demonstrated purification of the feed from volatile and intrusive elements through evaporation. The HPSR process is versatile in many aspects: the use of hydrogen as the reducing element eliminates carbon-based emissions, the high-energy plasma enables the reduction/decontamination step within minute timescale and there are practically no limitations regarding the input material. Ultimately, we shed a light on a potential and sustainable recycling route using plasma-enable technologies as an alternative recycling process of commercial grade Nd-Fe-B waste magnets, providing insight into its potential influence on selected figure of merits.