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  • What Is Standard?
  • What Is Expanded?
  • What Is Legacy?
  • What Is Theme?
  • What Are Unofficial Formats?

In TCGs like the Pokemon: Trading Card Game, formats are different sets of rules that can change how you play. Each format has its own card pools and metagames to learn, and can allow you to explore new ways of playing with new decks or even find ways to rejuvenate your old and abandoned favourites.

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The Pokemon TCG has four officially recognised and supported formats, although only one is supported digitally through Pokemon TCG Live. These are Standard, Expanded, Legacy, and Theme. Here is everything you need to know about each of them, as well as a few fun fan-made formats you could also try out.

Updated August 11, 2023 by Joe Parlock: The Pokemon TCG has changed a lot. With the launch of Pokemon TCG Live, two of these formats have been unceremoniously dumped, while Standard has almost fully rotated into the Scarlet & Violet era. There are still lots of great ways to play the Pokemon TCG, though.

What Is Standard?

Standard is Pokemon's main format. It's the format that sees the most play, and almost all organised tournaments are built around it. This is arguably the "purest" Pokemon TCG experience you can have, as all the normal rules are in effect with no change or deviation: 60-card decks with no more than four of any non-basic energy card, with six prize cards offered up by each player.

Of the four official formats, Standard is the only one that rotates. Expansions will only remain legal in Standard for at most a couple of years, before rotating out and being replaced. In a Standard deck, you can only use cards from the most recent releases – once an expansion has rotated out of Standard, any deck with their cards still in will no longer be legal.

You can identify what rotation an expansion is in by the regulation mark found in the bottom left corner of the card.

Pokemon doesn't rotate its Standard format with the release of a specific expansion each year. Instead, rotation normally happens on a specific date, announced by The Pokemon Company ahead of time.

As of August 11, 2023, only cards with E, F, and G regulation marks are legal. These are:

Sword & Shield Era

Scarlet & Violet Era

Shining Fates

Scarlet & Violet Base Set

Battle Styles

Paldea Evolved

Chilling Reign

Obsidian Flames

Evolving Skies

SVA Black Star Promos with a G regulation mark or later.

Celebrations

Fusion Strike

Brilliant Stars

Astral Radiance

Pokemon Go

Lost Origin

Silver Tempest

Crown Zenith

SWSH Black Star Promos with an E regulation mark or later

Expansions become Standard-legal two weeks after they are released. It is important to remember that, if a card has been reprinted in one of the expansions listed above, older versions of it are also legal. For example, Great Ball was printed in Evolving Skies, making any other copy of it – such as from EX FireRed & LeafGreen – also Standard-legal.

What Is Expanded?

Expanded is the primary non-rotating format for official organised play. Unlike the unofficial Unlimited format, which allows cards from any point in Pokemon's history (as an eternal format), Expanded still tries to curate the experience by having a limited card pool.

Expanded uses cards from any Black & White Base Set onwards, including black-star promo cards released during that time... As well as the Standard-legal sets listed above, it also includes:

Expanded Format Expansions

Black & White Era

Black & White Base Set

Emerging Powers

Noble Victories

Next Destinies

Dark Explorers

Dragons Exalted

Dragon Vault

Boundaries Crossed

Plasma Storm

Plasma Freeze

Plasma Blast

Legendary Treasures

Black Star Promo cards numbered BW01 and up.

X & Y Era

Kalos Starter Set

XY Base Set

Flashfire

McDonald's Collection 2014

Furious Fists

Phantom Forces

Primal Clash

Double Crisis

Roaring Skies

Ancient Origins

BREAKthrough

McDonald's Collection 2015

BREAKpoint

Generations

Fates Collide

Steam Siege

McDonald's Collection 2016

Evolutions

Black Star Promo Cards numbered XY01 and up

Sun & Moon Era

Sun & Moon Base Set

Guardians Rising

Burning Shadows

McDonald's Collection 2017

Shining Legends

Crimson Invasion

Ultra Prism

Forbidden Light

Celestial Storm

Dragon Majesty

Lost Thunder

Team Up

Detective Pikachu

Unbroken Bonds

Unified Minds

Hidden Fates

McDonald's Collection 2019

Cosmic Eclipse

Black Star Promos numbered SM01 and up

Sword & Shield Era

Sword & Shield Base Set

Rebel Classh

Darkness Ablaze

Champion's Path

Vivid Voltage

McDonald's Collection 2021

Shining Fates

Battle Styles

Chilling Reign

Evolving Skies

Celebrations

Fusion Strike

Brilliant Stars

Astral Radiance

Pokemon GO

McDonald's Collection 2022

Trick Or Trade 2022

Lost Origin

Silver Tempest

Crown Zenith

Scarlet & Violet Era

Scarlet & Violet Base Set

Paldea Evolved

McDonald's Collection 2023

Obsidian Flames

Because it doesn't rotate, Expanded needs to make greater use of card bans to maintain the health of the format. In terms of play experience, Expanded is seen as a more complex format that is a lot more aggressive, prioritising disruptive and fast plays more than anything else.

Although Expanded has never rotated since its introduction in 2016, that doesn't mean it never will. When Standard rotates each year, The Pokemon Company simply says the Expanded format "will remain unchanged", leaving open the potential for a rotation in the future.

What Is Legacy?

Legacy is a format that, while acknowledged by The Pokemon Company, isn't considered a format for organised play. Instead, Legacy is popular on the previous digital version of the game, Pokemon TCG Online. It is not supported in paper or on the current digital client, TCG Live.

Unlike Expanded, which grows with each new expansion released, Legacy only used a specific set of expansions that will never be added to or expanded. The list of Legacy expansions is:

Legacy Formats

HeartGold & SoulSilver

Unleashed

Undaunted

Triumphant

Call of Legends

Black & White Base Set

Emerging Powers

Noble Victories

Next Destinies

Dark Explorers

Dragons Exalted

Boundaries Crossed

Plasma Storm

Plasma Freeze

Plasma Blast

Legendary Treasures

Any Black Star Promo Cards from the HeartGold & SoulSilver and Black & White eras.

An important thing to note is that some parts of the Pokemon TCG community use 'Unlimited' and 'Legacy' interchangeably. However, this isn't accurate. Unlimited is an unofficial format that allows any card from the entirety of the Pokemon TCG's history, right the way back to Base Set through to today, while Legacy is a currently digital-only format using cards from 2012 at the very earliest.

While Legacy was a popular format because of the inclusion of powerful and nostalgic cards from the HeartGold & SoulSilver era, its time is seemingly over. The Pokemon Company has confirmed that there are no plans to bring it over to the upcoming Online replacement, Pokemon TCG Live, marking the probable end of the format.

What Is Theme?

Theme was by far the easiest format to get into as a newcomer to the Pokemon TCG. A digital-only format found in Pokemon TCG Online, it only allows players to use preconstructed decks.

As the list of preconstructed decks is far too long to list individually, simply: if the deck is a fresh-from-the-box pre-con from HeartGold & SoulSilver onwards, and was able to be redeemed on TCG Online, it was allowed.

Much like Legacy, there technically isn't any organised tabletop support for Theme, however that doesn't prevent your own local playgroup from adopting it. As Theme only uses preconstructed decks it is cheaper, quicker and easier to get into than Standard, Expanded or Legacy.

Unfortunately, Theme also died as a format when TCG Live arrived, and there are no announced plans to bring it at a later date.

What Are Unofficial Formats?

The Pokemon TCG has a massive community that have made dozens of their own formats. Among the most popular are Pauper, which only uses common and uncommon-rarity cards, formats that limit cards to only specific generations (Unova, Kalos and Alola being the big three), and Theme Pool that uses any card printed in a preconstructed theme deck.

One of the most radically different formats from the normal TCG is U150. Inspired by Magic: The Gathering's Commander, it is a 100-card singleton (meaning only one of each non-basic energy card is allowed) format and uses an expansive card pool that takes most cards from every set ever printed.

The main catch with U150 is that no Basic Pokemon can have HP higher than 150, forcing you to play creatively with smaller Pokemon, rather than relying on the usual heavy hitters.

The problem with fan-made formats is a matter of support. Finding playgroups for whatever random format you discover might be difficult, and you can almost guarantee they will never have the large-scale play that Standard and Expanded do. That doesn't make them bad or not worth your time, just more difficult to invest in.

NEXT: We Are Still In Pokemon Card Hell