Price Trends: Pokémon Cards Climbing in Price - 01/28/2025
By Peter Day •
We want you to have the best information available when you price cards on the TCGplayer Marketplace. So to help you get the most from your inventory, we’ve put together a downloadable CSV report of Pokémon cards that have dramatically increased in Market Price in the past 30 days.
(Note: This report only considers Near Mint copies of cards with at least five sales between December 28 and January 26, 2025.)
Here are ten highlights from that report. First, we have the five cards that gained the most value in the past 30 days after starting with a Market Price of $20 or less.
Top 5 Price Increases—PKMN Cards $20 or Less
#5 Mew ex - 053
- Set: Scarlet & Violet Promo Cards
- Increase: +$17.86
- Current Market Price: $36.58
This Mew card has been targeted by buyouts almost every month for the past year, and on January 23, the biggest buyout of them all finally pushed this card over the $30 barrier. That day, the average number of copies per buyer rose to 11.3 (up from 1.6 the day before), and Mew’s price has been climbing ever since.
This Mew is available exclusively in the 151 Ultra-Premium Collection—and as the turmoil around the release of Blooming Waters shows, 151 is as popular as ever but sealed products are harder and harder to find. That scarcity has caught up with all the cards from the set, including the promos. Snorlax from the 151 Elite Trainer Box rose to over $6 this month (up from less than $1 in September), and the Pokémon Center-stamped Snorlax is on the verge of passing $100.
- Set: Twilight Masquerade
- Increase: +$18.09
- Current Market Price: $28.78
Chansey started creeping up in price in the wake of Black Friday, and a remarkably small buyout on January 20 was enough to send it spiking over $25. Twilight Masquerade has been able to hold its value as a set with its tough pull rates, but in the months since its release, changing opinions on its cards have shifted where that value is held. The four Special Illustration Rare Ogerpons have all dropped in fans’ estimation, as the Gen IX Pokémon simply isn’t popular enough to sustain high prices across so many cards, and the Gen I Pokémon Chansey has managed to absorb some of that value, becoming more expensive than any of Ogerpon’s versions.
- Set: Scarlet & Violet Promo Cards
- Increase: +$18.63
- Current Market Price: $28.79
Available exclusively in the Shrouded Fable Kingdra ex Special Illustration Collection product, this Kingdra ex card was purchased in huge quantities on Black Friday. Those purchases seem to have had a delayed effect on Kingdra, because it didn’t spike until January 19, during a relatively quiet week of sales.
Shrouded Fable was among the least popular Pokémon set of 2024, but that unpopularity may have ironically boosted the value of Kingdra ex and other promos by causing fewer copies to enter circulation.
#2 Sylveon-EX
- Set: Generations: Radiant Collection
- Increase: +$18.64
- Current Market Price: $36.77
Sylveon-EX is just one example of the surge in price that hit every Eeveelution card in the wake of Prismatic Evolutions. Eevee is in (it’s the Year of Eevee, after all), so nearly every card featuring the cute fox or its evolutions has been on an upswing over the past few weeks.
- Set: Scarlet & Violet Promo Cards
- Increase: +$20.20
- Current Market Price: $39.94
Just like Kingdra ex, Greninja ex comes from a Shrouded Fable Special Illustration Collection product, and ironically owes much of its current value to how that set’s unpopularity led to fewer fans opening boxes.
Next, these are the five cards that gained the most value in the past 30 days after starting with a Market Price over $20.
Top 5 Price Increases—PKMN Cards Over $20
#5 Mew VMAX (Alternate Art Secret)
- Set: Fusion Strike
- Increase: +$90.98
- Current Market Price: $198.96
After months falling behind the other alternate-art cards from Fusion Strike like Gengar VMAX and Espeon VMAX, Mew VMAX has finally started to catch up. Its ascent doesn’t look quite as organic as the rise of those other two did—especially given the buyout on January 11, when the average number of copies per buyer rose to 11.0—but the recent market gains by Bubble Mew and Fusion Strikes’ abysmal pull rates have helped Mew VMAX hold its new price, at least for now.
#4 Gengar & Mimikyu-GX (Alternate Full Art)
- Set: Team Up
- Increase: +$111.50
- Current Market Price: $586.94
Back for a second month in the #4 spot, Alternate Art Greninja & Mimikyu-GX has managed to break the $500 barrier and keep climbing. Its ascent looks entirely organic, with low daily sales but steadily rising prices as collectors accept higher and higher costs to own a Near Mint version of a card printed before the COVID-era collector boom. The reasons why are pretty simple: everyone loves Gengar, and this is the first alternate-art Gengar card ever printed (if you don’t count Phantom Forces).
#3 Giratina V (Alternate Full Art)
- Set: Lost Origin
- Increase: +$155.09
- Current Market Price: $654.46
A Smoliv-sized buyout on January 19th helped push the fourth most valuable Pokémon card of the Sword & Shield Series up another $150 dollars.
We’re in the middle of an enormous Pokémon card hype phase that’s been percolating since May and finally bloomed with the back-to-back releases of Surging Sparks and Prismatic Evolutions. The biggest chase cards from 2020-2023 reached their position by riding the last big collector wave, and they’re doing it again today.
#2 Gengar VMAX (Alternate Art Secret)
- Set: Fusion Strike
- Increase: +$247.39
- Current Market Price: $756.36
As above. The winners from the Sword & Shield Series keep on winning.
#1 Umbreon VMAX (Alternate Art Secret)
- Set: Evolving Skies
- Increase: +$298.78
- Current Market Price: $1,671.43
Moonbreon’s gonna Moonbreon. The original modern Umbreon chase card might have been slightly jealous of the new “Sunbreon” card from Prismatic Evolutions briefly out-pricing it at $1,600, so it did the only sensible thing and added a few hundred dollars to its price tag.
By selling these cards online, you can reach a broad audience of customers who are willing to pay what these cards are truly worth. Download the January 2025 Price Trends Report to review every Pokémon card that went up in value this month. Then list those cards on TCGplayer so your inventory can do more for your business.
Download the Pokémon Price Trends Report
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