{ "url": "https://www.moonstonehq.com/articles/mcdonalds-pokemon-cards-value", "slug": "mcdonalds-pokemon-cards-value", "title": "What Are McDonald's Pokemon Cards Worth?", "summary": "Thirteen McDonald's sets, 190 cards, $4,862.21 of ask. Two of the thirteen hold 72.1% of it, and just ten of the 190 carry a recorded PSA 10 sale.", "section": "Quant research", "published": "2026-09-23", "readMinutes": 9, "publisher": "moonstone", "findings": [ { "value": "$4,862.21", "measures": "every McDonald's card we price, summed", "basis": "181 priced cards across thirteen sets" }, { "value": "$7.98", "measures": "median McDonald's card ask", "basis": "against a mean of $26.86" }, { "value": "72.1%", "measures": "of the value in two of the thirteen sets", "basis": "the Japanese Pokémon-e set and 2016" }, { "value": "10 of 190", "measures": "cards with a PSA 10 sold median", "basis": "six of those clear ten recorded sales" } ], "tables": [ { "title": "Every McDonald's set we hold, by summed ask on September 23, 2026. Registry lines are labelled lines held, not a slab count", "columns": [ "Set", "Cards", "Priced", "Summed ask", "Median card", "Dearest card", "Its share of the set", "Registry lines held" ], "rows": [ { "Set": "McDonald's Pokémon-e Minimum Pack (Japanese)", "Cards": "24", "Priced": "21", "Summed ask": "$2,166.42", "Median card": "$51.00", "Dearest card": "[Pikachu 010/018](/card/jat-613937) $399.99", "Its share of the set": "18.5%", "Registry lines held": "11,609 on 7 cards" }, { "Set": "[2016](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202016)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$1,339.44", "Median card": "$130.00", "Dearest card": "[Scraggy](/card/2016xy-7) $199.99", "Its share of the set": "14.9%", "Registry lines held": "77 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2018](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202018)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$327.45", "Median card": "$22.58", "Dearest card": "[Psyduck](/card/2018sm-2) $88.76", "Its share of the set": "27.1%", "Registry lines held": "555 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2015](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202015)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$238.16", "Median card": "$13.60", "Dearest card": "[Torchic](/card/2015xy-3) $53.34", "Its share of the set": "22.4%", "Registry lines held": "221 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2014](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202014)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$200.52", "Median card": "$15.67", "Dearest card": "[Pikachu](/card/2014xy-5) $42.26", "Its share of the set": "21.1%", "Registry lines held": "220 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2019](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202019)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$185.63", "Median card": "$14.96", "Dearest card": "[Pikachu](/card/2019sm-6) $36.82", "Its share of the set": "19.8%", "Registry lines held": "573 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2012](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202012)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$134.62", "Median card": "$12.99", "Dearest card": "[Scraggy](/card/2012bw-10) $20.41", "Its share of the set": "15.2%", "Registry lines held": "170 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2017](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202017)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$99.34", "Median card": "$5.69", "Dearest card": "[Pikachu](/card/2017sm-5) $29.79", "Its share of the set": "30.0%", "Registry lines held": "262 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2011](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202011)", "Cards": "12", "Priced": "12", "Summed ask": "$98.43", "Median card": "$7.23", "Dearest card": "[Oshawott](/card/2011bw-4) $17.86", "Its share of the set": "18.1%", "Registry lines held": "251 on 12 cards" }, { "Set": "[2021](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202021)", "Cards": "25", "Priced": "25", "Summed ask": "$40.34", "Median card": "$0.50", "Dearest card": "[Pikachu](/card/2021swsh-25) $25.27", "Its share of the set": "62.6%", "Registry lines held": "21,016 on 25 cards" }, { "Set": "[2024](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202024)", "Cards": "15", "Priced": "14", "Summed ask": "$19.97", "Median card": "$0.60", "Dearest card": "[Dragonite](/card/2024sv-12) $6.15", "Its share of the set": "30.8%", "Registry lines held": "8,781 on 14 cards" }, { "Set": "[2022](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202022)", "Cards": "15", "Priced": "14", "Summed ask": "$7.82", "Median card": "$0.38", "Dearest card": "[Growlithe](/card/2022swsh-4) $1.55", "Its share of the set": "19.8%", "Registry lines held": "580 on 14 cards" }, { "Set": "[2023](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202023)", "Cards": "15", "Priced": "11", "Summed ask": "$4.07", "Median card": "$0.29", "Dearest card": "[Kirlia](/card/2023sv-15) $0.67", "Its share of the set": "16.5%", "Registry lines held": "196 on 11 cards" }, { "Set": "All thirteen", "Cards": "190", "Priced": "181", "Summed ask": "$4,862.21", "Median card": "$7.98", "Dearest card": "[Pikachu 010/018](/card/jat-613937) $399.99", "Its share of the set": "8.2% of all thirteen", "Registry lines held": "not summable, lines are shared" } ] }, { "title": "Grading by set. Gem rates are medians over the cards whose registry row passes the trustworthiness check", "columns": [ "Set", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate", "Median gem rate", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median", "On ten or more sales" ], "rows": [ { "Set": "McDonald's Pokémon-e Minimum Pack (Japanese)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "7", "Median gem rate": "57.1%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "7", "On ten or more sales": "3" }, { "Set": "[2021](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202021)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "25", "Median gem rate": "37.3%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "1", "On ten or more sales": "1" }, { "Set": "[2024](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202024)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "9", "Median gem rate": "16.7%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "2", "On ten or more sales": "2" }, { "Set": "[2023](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202023)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "10", "Median gem rate": "15.4%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2011](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202011)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "10", "Median gem rate": "11.4%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2019](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202019)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "10", "Median gem rate": "10.0%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2012](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202012)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "7", "Median gem rate": "9.1%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2022](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202022)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "14", "Median gem rate": "8.7%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2017](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202017)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "6", "Median gem rate": "8.3%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2018](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202018)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "6", "Median gem rate": "3.4%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2014](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202014)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "6", "Median gem rate": "0.0%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2015](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202015)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "5", "Median gem rate": "0.0%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" }, { "Set": "[2016](/research/set-screen/mcdonald%27s%20collection%202016)", "Cards with a trustworthy gem rate": "7", "Median gem rate": "0.0%", "Cards with a PSA 10 sold median": "0", "On ten or more sales": "0" } ] }, { "title": "All 181 priced McDonald's cards by ask band. The bands are exhaustive and sum to $4,862.21", "columns": [ "Ask band", "Cards", "Share of cards", "Summed ask", "Share of value" ], "rows": [ { "Ask band": "Under $1", "Cards": "52", "Share of cards": "28.7%", "Summed ask": "$22.63", "Share of value": "0.5%" }, { "Ask band": "$1 to $4.99", "Cards": "18", "Share of cards": "9.9%", "Summed ask": "$52.46", "Share of value": "1.1%" }, { "Ask band": "$5 to $19.99", "Cards": "64", "Share of cards": "35.4%", "Summed ask": "$703.27", "Share of value": "14.5%" }, { "Ask band": "$20 to $99.99", "Cards": "32", "Share of cards": "17.7%", "Summed ask": "$1,313.43", "Share of value": "27.0%" }, { "Ask band": "$100 or more", "Cards": "15", "Share of cards": "8.3%", "Summed ask": "$2,770.42", "Share of value": "57.0%" } ] } ], "charts": [], "sections": [ "A small population, said plainly", "Grading depth and price run opposite ways", "The distribution", "What this cannot show", "What would overturn this" ], "method": [ "Population. Every catalog row whose folded set name contains `mcdonald`, over the 62,343-product catalog after deduplicating on `tcg_id`. Folding normalises to NFKD, strips combining marks and maps curly apostrophes to straight, which matters here because the set names carry a typographic apostrophe. That returns thirteen sets and 190 rows: twelve English McDonald's Collection sets and the Japanese McDonald's Pokémon-e Minimum Pack. The residual check, every catalog row whose CARD name mentions McDonald's, returns nothing, so no card sits outside a McDonald's set. No 2013 or 2020 set exists in the catalog and neither spelling resolves on our set pages; that is recorded as absent from our catalog and no claim is made about what was printed. Prices. `price_history` on day 20719, 2026-09-23; these are ASKS, the daily dump's market figure for the canonical printing rather than the dearest one, not sales. 181 of the 190 carry one and the nine without are excluded from every sum, median and share rather than counted as zero. The band table is exhaustive over the 181 and sums to $4,862.21. Graded. `graded_snapshots`, latest day per card key and grade, across the catalog-id and TCGplayer-id keyspaces, fresher row wins. These are SOLD medians. Stale-row rule, applied across this whole batch: after the fresher-keyspace read, any median dated before day 20695 (2026-08-30, the start of the current daily tape) is dropped, because the graded feed rotates roughly a seventh of the catalog a day and an older row is a reading from a different week. It removed zero rows across all 190 McDonald's cards. Collision test, run on every graded row used in this study: several products can share one PSA registry line, so a sold count at a grade is compared against the registry count at that grade whenever the registry row passes the trustworthiness check, and a row recording more than two sales per graded copy is withheld. One sale per copy is not a ceiling, because a slab can be sold more than once, so this is a declared threshold and not an impossibility; the stricter one-sale-per-copy bar is counted beside it below. No McDonald's row is withheld by it; four of the six gated PSA 10 rows sit on registry rows the trustworthiness check rejects and cannot be tested at all, which is stated rather than silently treated as a pass. Sensitivity: the stricter one-sale-per-copy bar withholds nothing here either, so no figure in this study differs between the two thresholds. The `on ten or more sales` column applies a minimum sample of ten; the column beside it is ungated so the reader can see the difference. Registry. `population_snapshots`, latest day per key. Reported as `registry lines held` with the card count beside it and never summed across the population, because several products can share one PSA line and a pooled total would double count. Gem rates pass `gemRateIsTrustworthy()`, which rejects a recorded zero tens on a line of 100 or more or on a line that also records nines or PSA 10 sales; the number of cards that passed is printed in the table rather than implied. Release dates. `report:spread:setsmeta` records them under the PROVIDER's set names, not ours: McDonald's Promos 2011, 2012, 2014 through 2019 and 2022 through 2024, plus McDonald's 25th Anniversary Promos, which is the 2021 set. Twelve of the thirteen carry a date, from 2011-06-17 to 2025-01-21, and the Japanese Pokémon-e set does not. A lookup on our own catalog spelling returns nothing and must not be read as an absent date. No dated, launch or since-release claim appears in this study regardless, because the daily tape is 25 days long. Links. Every McDonald's set screen linked here was fetched on 2026-09-23 and its title read back. Twelve of the thirteen also have a `/set/` page, at the provider's spelling rather than ours: `/set/mcdonald's promos 2016` renders the 2016 set and `/set/mcdonald's 25th anniversary promos` renders the 2021 one. Those pages quote a `sethist2` total on a different date from this study's tape (the 2016 page reads $1,208 against our $1,339.44), which is why the set screens are linked here instead. Every catalog spelling, `/set/mcdonald's collection 2016` included, returns a 404, and so does every spelling of a 2013 or 2020 set. Median convention: upper-middle on even samples." ], "terms": "Figures are moonstone's own recorded measurements, dated as published. Quote them with the population stated beside them. The article at `url` is the human form of this file." }