Pokémon 30th Celebration: what is in each product and which to buy

On 16 September 2026 30th Celebration came out, the anniversary set for thirty years of the Pokémon Trading Card Game. It is the first set released worldwide on the same day, and the first in years without a booster box. If you want a pack, you buy a product. Below is what is in each product, so you can work out the cost per pack.

Updated 12 October 2026By the GemHunt editors9 questions answered

Short answer30th Celebration came out worldwide on 16 September 2026. Every pack contains six foil cards: five cards from the set, always including one of the thirty Pikachus, plus a foil Energy card. There is no booster box, and packs are not sold on their own. The Elite Trainer Box contains nine packs, the Pokémon ex Box four, and the Poster Collection and the Tech Sticker Collection three each. Work out the cost per pack and count the promo cards separately.

What makes 30th Celebration different from other sets?

Three things. First the date: every earlier set came out in Japan months before, and by the time the English version arrived, everyone already knew which cards were in demand and what a booster box would cost. Not this time. Second the contents: every pack contains six cards, all of them foil, with one of thirty different Pikachus in every pack. Third the packaging: there is no booster box. Packs only come as part of a product.

The set has 128 numbered cards plus secret rares; the final count has not been announced yet, but cards up to 158/128 have already been shown. Inside is a Classic Collection of thirty reprinted cards from thirty years of history and a new rarity, the Futuristic Rare, with Mewtwo ex and Mew ex by illustrator YOSHIROTTEN as the first two.

What is in each product from 16 September?

Product	Packs	What else you get
Knock Out Collection	2	Eevee promo card and a coin
Tech Sticker Collection	3	Promo card (Lucario or Alolan Exeggutor) and a sticker sheet
Poster Collection	3	Poster of the whole set and three full-art promos: Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres
Pokémon ex Box	4	Sylveon ex or Greninja ex as a promo, in normal and oversized format
Elite Trainer Box	9	Full-art Nidorina, 65 sleeves, 16 foil Energy cards, dice, coin, storage box
Pokémon Center Elite Trainer Box	11	Two full-art Nidorinas (one with the Pokémon Center logo), otherwise like the regular ETB

Source: pokemon.com product announcement, September 2026. Packs are the unit for comparing; count the promo cards separately.

Which 30th Celebration products come later in the year?

2 October: the Booster Bundle with six packs and the Day & Night Mini Tins with two packs each.
30 October: the Espeon ex and Umbreon ex Battle Decks, ready-to-play decks of 60 cards.
6 November: the Ultra-Premium Collection in a Day and a Night version (29 packs plus a Classic Collection pack), the Ditto Premium Collection (8 packs) and the Figure Collection Mew and Mewtwo (5 packs).
4 December: the Binder Collection with five packs. It was first planned for 2 October and has been moved back.

If you do not need to open on day one, you have choice until December. With a launch that has no Japanese forerunner, the first week is also when prices are least predictable.

Which 30th Celebration product should you pick?

1Decide on your goal. Opening, the promo cards, a gift or keeping it sealed. Each goal points to a different product.
2Work out the cost per pack. Divide the price by the number of packs in the table. Without a booster box, that is the only fair comparison between products.
3Count the promos separately. The three birds from the Poster Collection and the oversized ex cards are not available anywhere else. If you want those, only that product gets you there.
4If you want to keep it sealed, pick a product with its own promo that is not available anywhere else. The box is then more than the sum of its packs.

Without a booster box, the Elite Trainer Box is the product with the most packs in the first wave. But nine packs of six cards are 54 cards, not 360 as in a normal booster box. So compare it with another set's ETB, not with a booster box.

What does GemHunt have?

All the first-wave products are together on the 30th Celebration set page: the Elite Trainer Box, the Pokémon Center Elite Trainer Box, the ex Boxes with Sylveon ex and Greninja ex, the Poster Collection and the Tech Sticker Collections. Everything factory sealed and shipped unopened. Stock and the limit per customer are on every product page.

Frequently asked questions

When does Pokémon 30th Celebration come out?

On 16 September 2026, worldwide on the same day. That is new: earlier sets came out in Japan months before, so there was already an import market and a sense of prices before the English version reached the shops. This set has no forerunner, so prices in the first weeks are harder to predict than usual. More products follow in waves through to December.

How many cards are in a 30th Celebration booster pack?

Six, and all of them are foil. Five cards come from the set, and one of them is always one of the thirty Pikachu cards, each with a different illustration. The sixth card is a foil basic Energy card. For comparison: a normal English pack has ten cards, of which usually only one or two are foil.

Is there a 30th Celebration booster box?

No. The packs only come inside products such as the Elite Trainer Box, the Pokémon ex Box and the Poster Collection, and they are not sold on their own. If you want a lot of packs, you count per product: the Elite Trainer Box has nine, the Pokémon Center version eleven, and the Ultra-Premium Collection, which comes out later in the year, has been announced with 29 packs plus a Classic Collection pack.

What is the Classic Collection in 30th Celebration?

A subset of thirty reprinted cards from earlier sets, with an anniversary stamp. You can pull them from the normal packs. A separate Classic Collection pack with three cards from this subset has also been announced; it only comes in the Ultra-Premium Collection. It is the first time an English set has had a pack like that.

What is a Futuristic Rare?

A new rarity introduced with this set. The first two are Mewtwo ex (157/128) and Mew ex (158/128), both illustrated by YOSHIROTTEN. How many cards this rarity will cover in the end and how often it turns up has not been officially announced.

Which 30th Celebration product is the smartest buy?

That depends on what you want. For opening, the packs count: the Elite Trainer Box brings nine. For the promo cards, you choose deliberately: the Poster Collection has three fully illustrated promos (Articuno, Zapdos and Moltres), the Pokémon ex Box a Sylveon ex or Greninja ex in normal and oversized format. As a gift, or to get to know the set, the Tech Sticker Collection or the Knock Out Collection is enough.

Are the 30th Celebration pull rates known?

Not officially. The Pokémon Company never publishes pull rates. Since the release, collector sites have been counting opened packs; TCGplayer reports roughly one Special Illustration Rare per 21 packs, one Futuristic Rare per 120 and one Classic Collection card per 10. Those are estimates from samples, not a guarantee. The only certainty: every card is foil and every pack has a Pikachu.

Can you play 30th Celebration cards in tournaments?

Yes. Since 25 September 2026 the cards from 30th Celebration are legal in the Play! Pokémon Standard format. The exception is the Classic Collection: those reprinted anniversary cards do not count in Standard. If you are buying the set to play, look at the regular cards and the Battle Decks that come out on 30 October.

Is the set called 30th Celebration or 30th Anniversary?

Officially 30th Celebration. With it Pokémon marks its 30th anniversary in 2026, which is why many people search for the set as Pokémon 30th Anniversary. They are the same products: the Elite Trainer Box, the Pokémon ex Box and the other 30th Celebration products in this guide.