There are 27 English Gold Star Pokémon cards, released from November 2004 to 2007: 25 in the booster packs of nine EX sets, from EX Team Rocket Returns to EX Power Keepers, plus Espeon ★ and Umbreon ★ in POP Series 5 promo packs. Each pictures a shiny Pokémon (Mudkip ★ only in part), marked by a star after its name. As of October 5, 2026, the median raw price in real completed sales runs from under $1,000 to $7,976 (Rayquaza ★), and the record is $2.7 million, paid for a PSA 10 Torchic ★ in an auction that closed on September 10, 2026.
Two more cards carry the star, a 2021 Umbreon ★ reprint and the 2021 Greninja ★ promo, and the World Championships decks of 2006 to 2008 reprinted four with a different back. Japan printed 31 Gold Star cards, reprints included, the first in July 2004. The main price table gives medians of real completed sales of each English card, with their number of sales, beside the number of copies PSA has graded 10.
Every English Gold Star card
Our scans of all 27, set by set, in release order. Each card links to its own page, with its prices.
Each set's full list, with prices: Team Rocket Returns, Deoxys, Unseen Forces, Delta Species, Legend Maker, Holon Phantoms, Crystal Guardians, Dragon Frontiers, Power Keepers and POP Series 5.
Gold Star prices by grade
Medians of real completed sales of the English print, in US dollars, as of October 5, 2026. The number of sales is in parentheses; est. marks one or two. PSA 10s: copies PSA had graded 10 by September 1, 2026 (October 5 for Latias ★). A dash: no sale on file, or none we could verify (explained below the table).
| Card | Set | Raw | PSA 9 | PSA 10 | PSA 10s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mudkip ★ 107/109 | Team Rocket Returns | $3,954 (5) | $14,386 (3) | - | 42 |
| Torchic ★ 108/109 | Team Rocket Returns | $5,521 (8) | $15,830 (7) | - | 19 |
| Treecko ★ 109/109 | Team Rocket Returns | $2,800 (9) | $9,762 (3) | - | 52 |
| Latias ★ 105/107 | Deoxys | - | $14,336 (4) | - | 22 |
| Latios ★ 106/107 | Deoxys | $2,687 (5) | $9,106 est. (1) | - | 28 |
| Rayquaza ★ 107/107 | Deoxys | $7,976 (7) | - | $46,967 est. (1) | 47 |
| Entei ★ 113/115 | Unseen Forces | $808 (9) | $4,274 (6) | $9,106 (5) | 300 |
| Raikou ★ 114/115 | Unseen Forces | $977 (6) | $4,321 (7) | $14,660 (7) | 387 |
| Suicune ★ 115/115 | Unseen Forces | $1,147 (10) | $2,989 (13) | $16,819 est. (2) | 269 |
| Groudon ★ 111/113 | Delta Species | $1,963 (6) | $6,506 (5) | - | 74 |
| Kyogre ★ 112/113 | Delta Species | $1,801 (5) | $5,559 (5) | - | 73 |
| Metagross ★ 113/113 | Delta Species | $2,025 (4) | $7,834 (5) | $43,232 est. (1) | 66 |
| Regice ★ 90/92 | Legend Maker | $712 (3) | $3,445 est. (2) | - | 59 |
| Regirock ★ 91/92 | Legend Maker | $1,172 (6) | $3,760 (6) | $16,936 est. (1) | 93 |
| Registeel ★ 92/92 | Legend Maker | $826 (6) | $2,157 (5) | $21,536 est. (1) | 75 |
| Gyarados ★ δ 102/110 | Holon Phantoms | $2,639 (5) | $25,906 (3) | - | 37 |
| Mewtwo ★ 103/110 | Holon Phantoms | $2,414 (5) | $14,710 (4) | $82,687 est. (1) | 127 |
| Pikachu ★ 104/110 | Holon Phantoms | $3,149 (7) | $16,441 (5) | $171,307 est. (1) | 120 |
| Alakazam ★ 99/100 | Crystal Guardians | $1,066 (8) | $5,863 (3) | - | 82 |
| Celebi ★ 100/100 | Crystal Guardians | $1,730 (5) | $4,467 (5) | - | 102 |
| Charizard ★ δ 100/101 | Dragon Frontiers | $7,118 (6) | $30,756 est. (2) | - | 98 |
| Mew ★ δ 101/101 | Dragon Frontiers | $2,080 (14) | $16,615 (5) | - | 73 |
| Flareon ★ 100/108 | Power Keepers | $1,428 (8) | $3,908 (9) | - | 95 |
| Jolteon ★ 101/108 | Power Keepers | $1,289 (7) | $4,357 (5) | $34,953 est. (2) | 92 |
| Vaporeon ★ 102/108 | Power Keepers | $877 (5) | $5,913 (5) | $34,053 (3) | 110 |
| Espeon ★ 16/17 | POP Series 5 | $6,151 (7) | $15,027 (3) | - | 58 |
| Umbreon ★ 17/17 | POP Series 5 | - | $39,094 est. (1) | - | 53 |
The most valuable raw copies are Rayquaza ★ ($7,976), Charizard ★ δ ($7,118) and Espeon ★ ($6,151); the cheapest are Regice ★ ($712), Entei ★ ($808) and Registeel ★ ($826), and 13 of the 25 priced cards sell for under $2,000 raw. On the 24 cards priced both ways, a PSA 9 sells for a median 3.6 times the raw price, from 2.4 times (Espeon ★) to 9.8 times (Gyarados ★ δ). Raw sales mix every condition, so that ratio overstates what grading adds to a near-mint copy.
PSA 10s are the scarce part. By September 1, 2026, PSA had graded about 63,000 copies of the 27 cards and given a 10 to about 2,650 of them, roughly 4%. Torchic ★ has the fewest: 19 tens out of 1,457 graded (1.3%), ahead of Latias ★ (22) and Latios ★ (28). The three Unseen Forces cards hold the most, Raikou ★ 387, Entei ★ 300 and Suicune ★ 269, more than twice any other of the 27, and theirs are the cheapest PSA 10s in the table.
PSA 10 prices are thin: only 11 of the 27 cards show one in the table, and eight of those rest on one or two sales, several from the first half of 2026, before the summer's record auctions. Rayquaza ★'s rests on a single sale in February; in July, another PSA 10 sold for $682,500.
A 10 from another grader is another price. On the three Unseen Forces cards, the only Gold Stars with at least two sales in each grade, a CGC Gem Mint 10 sells for a fifth to a third of a PSA 10: $2,523 (8 sales) against $9,106 for Entei ★, $3,610 (5) against $16,819 for Suicune ★ and $4,877 est. (2) against $14,660 for Raikou ★.
Four blanks are deliberate. The raw medians on file for Latias ★ and Umbreon ★ rest on sales priced at a few percent of the card, most likely reprints or fakes; the genuine raw copies we could verify sold for $1,000 to $6,000 (Latias ★, eight sales from June to September 2026) and for $4,435 and $5,950 (Umbreon ★, June and February 2026). The PSA 9 median of Rayquaza ★ and the PSA 10 median of Flareon ★ each mix real sales with a listing priced far below them: one PSA 9 Rayquaza ★ sold for $114,995 on July 19, 2026, and two PSA 10 Flareon ★ sold at auction for $28,988 and $36,622 in May and July 2026.
The biggest auctions of 2026
The top public auction result of 2026 for each English Gold Star and grade, from $200,000 up, as of October 5, 2026, buyer's premium included where reported. Each is one exceptional copy, not a market price.
| Card | Grade | Price | Sold |
|---|---|---|---|
| Torchic ★ 108/109 | PSA 10 | $2.7 million | September 10, 2026 |
| Rayquaza ★ 107/107 | CGC Pristine 10 | $1,020,000 | August 28, 2026 |
| Mudkip ★ 107/109 | PSA 10 | $1,020,000 | September 21, 2026 |
| Rayquaza ★ 107/107 | PSA 10 | $682,500 | July 9, 2026 |
| Charizard ★ δ 100/101 | PSA 10 | $475,000 | September 2026 |
| Latias ★ 105/107 | PSA 10 | $375,000 | July 23, 2026 |
| Mewtwo ★ 103/110 | PSA 10 | $262,500 | September 2026 |
| Umbreon ★ 17/17 | PSA 10 | $216,000 | August 10, 2026 |
| Espeon ★ 16/17 | PSA 10 | $204,000 | September 7, 2026 |
The jump is recent. A PSA 10 Torchic ★ had sold at auction for $35,000 in December 2024 and a PSA 10 Mudkip ★ for $20,400 the same month, and a PSA 10 Charizard ★ δ went from $65,600 in December 2025 to $475,000 in September 2026. The CGC Pristine 10 Rayquaza ★, the only copy of the card with that grade, was reported as the first English Pokémon card sold for more than $1 million; two weeks later the Torchic ★ sale was reported as the highest price ever paid for an English-language Pokémon card.
What makes a card a Gold Star
Gold Star cards are not gold all over. Officially each is a Pokémon ☆, read "Pokémon Star", and all 27 follow the same design:
- A gold star after the name, and a smaller gold-foil star after the number, which is the card's rarity symbol.
- Shiny colors: the Pokémon appears in its rare alternate coloring, such as a black Rayquaza, a black Charizard or a blue Mew. Mudkip ★ is the odd one: its body keeps the ordinary blue, and only its fin and belly take the shiny colors.
- Art that breaks the frame: part of the Pokémon reaches out of the picture window. Every one was drawn by Masakazu Fukuda.
- One per deck: each is a Basic Pokémon and prints the rule "You can't have more than 1 Pokémon ☆ in your deck."
Three are also δ Delta Species cards, typed after their shiny color: Gyarados ★ δ is a Fire Pokémon, Charizard ★ δ a Darkness one and Mew ★ δ a Water one. Every main EX set from Team Rocket Returns to Power Keepers has Gold Stars except EX Emerald (2005), three per set or two in Crystal Guardians and Dragon Frontiers. Espeon ★ and Umbreon ★ came from no expansion: they were in POP Series 5, the promo packs of the Pokémon Organized Play program, from March 2007.
How rare were they in packs? The odds were never published, and collectors' estimates vary; the one most often repeated is about one Gold Star per two booster boxes, an estimate rather than a count. The star after the name has nothing to do with the gold stars that mark modern rarities, which our rarity guide shows, and our guide to gold Pokémon cards sorts Gold Stars from the gold Hyper Rares and the gold-bordered reprints.
Later Gold Stars, reprints and World Championships copies
Six more English cards carry the star. The reprints sell for far less than the originals, as of October 5, 2026:
| Card | What it is | Raw price |
|---|---|---|
| Umbreon ★ 17/17 | Reprint in the Celebrations Classic Collection, October 8, 2021, with the 25th anniversary logo on the art | $90.45 (8) |
| Greninja ★ SWSH144 | New promo in the EX layout, from the Celebrations Elite Trainer Boxes, October 8, 2021 | $22.25 (5) |
| Latias ★ 105/107 | 2006 World Championships deck B-L-S (Hiroki Yano) | $183 (5) |
| Jolteon ★ 101/108 | 2007 World Championships deck Legendary Ascent (Tom Roos) | $147 est. (1) |
| Mew ★ δ 101/101 | 2008 World Championships deck Empotech (Dylan Lefavour) | $783 est. (1) |
| Jolteon ★ 101/108 | 2008 World Championships deck Psychic Lock (Jason Klaczynski) | $147 (3) |
The Greninja ★ is the only new Gold Star since 2007: an official Pokémon ☆ card in the old EX layout, with the one-per-deck rule, printed "This card cannot be used at official tournaments" and marked with the PROMO star instead of a gold rarity star. PSA rarely gives it a 10, 3,064 times out of 57,486 (5.3%), and those copies sell for $1,920 est. (2 sales). The Umbreon ★ reprint gets a 10 more often than not, 19,617 of 35,924 graded (55%), and sells for $384 (12 sales) in PSA 10.
These four World Championships decks were sold a few months after each event, as copies of decks that won an age division there. Their cards have a silver border, the player's signature and a World Championships back, and none is tournament legal, so never pay an original's price for one.
Japanese Gold Star cards
Japan printed Gold Stars first: Latias ★, Latios ★ and Rayquaza ★ came out in Clash of the Blue Sky on July 1, 2004, four months before the English Team Rocket Returns. The Japanese cards have the same art but differ in three ways:
- They are numbered inside the set, among the cards of their type: Treecko ★ is 011/084 in Japan and 109/109 in English.
- Seven began outside booster packs. The five Eeveelutions were prizes of the Pokémon Players Club from January 2005, earned with 10,000 points (Vaporeon ★) up to 70,000 (Umbreon ★), and Pikachu ★ and Mewtwo ★ came in a Japan-only gift box in November 2005. The World Champions Pack of July 2007 reprinted Vaporeon ★, Jolteon ★ and Flareon ★, and a 25th anniversary promo pack reprinted Umbreon ★ in October 2021.
- Booster-set cards come in two prints, a 1st Edition and an unlimited one, which our catalog prices separately.
| Japanese release | Date | Gold Stars and numbers |
|---|---|---|
| Clash of the Blue Sky | July 1, 2004 | Latias 065, Latios 066, Rayquaza 067 (of 082) |
| Rocket Gang Strikes Back | October 15, 2004 | Treecko 011, Torchic 020, Mudkip 033 (of 084) |
| Players Club prizes (PLAY promos) | From January 2005 | Vaporeon 022, Jolteon 023, Flareon 024, Espeon 025, Umbreon 026 |
| Golden Sky, Silvery Ocean | April 8, 2005 | Entei 019, Suicune 032, Raikou 039 (of 106) |
| Mirage Forest | June 30, 2005 | Regice 033, Regirock 059, Registeel 076 (of 086) |
| Holon Research Tower | October 28, 2005 | Kyogre 028, Groudon 056, Metagross 075 (of 086) |
| Gift Box Mew • Lucario | November 16, 2005 | Pikachu 001, Mewtwo 002 (of 002) |
| Holon Phantom | January 27, 2006 | Gyarados δ 008 (of 052) |
| Miracle Crystal | March 10, 2006 | Celebi 004, Alakazam 033 (of 075) |
| Offense and Defense of the Furthest Ends | June 29, 2006 | Mew δ 015, Charizard δ 052 (of 068) |
| World Champions Pack | July 5, 2007 | Flareon 011, Vaporeon 015, Jolteon 027 (of 108), reprints |
| Promo Card Pack 25th Anniversary Edition | October 22, 2021 | Umbreon 012 (of 025), reprint |
The 70,000-point Umbreon ★ has sold for $180,000 twice, in PSA 10 on February 23, 2024 and in BGS 9.5 on November 17, 2025, and a BGS 10 Rayquaza ★ from Clash of the Blue Sky sold for $305,906 at auction on August 13, 2026. Our guide to Japanese Pokémon cards explains how the Japanese sets and rarities work.
Vaporeon Gold Star#22/PLAY
Jolteon Gold Star#23/PLAY
Flareon Gold Star#24/PLAY
Espeon Gold Star#25/PLAY
Umbreon Gold Star#26/PLAY
Fakes and reprints: what to check
Every check compares your card with a genuine copy of the same card, and no single one settles it. Three come first:
- Rule out the official reprints. A 25th anniversary logo on the art of an Umbreon ★, a Pikachu head in English or a gold 25th badge in Japanese, means a 2021 reprint; a silver border, a signature and a World Championships back mean a deck copy. Both are genuine and worth a small part of an original.
- Let the price set the odds. As of October 5, 2026, the cheapest Gold Star in the table has a median raw price of $712, so a "Gold Star" far below the table is a reason to look closer. From April to July 2026, a run of identical listings titled Latias Gold Star EX Deoxys sold for $66 to $90 each, while copies of the real card went for $1,000 and up.
- Compare the print. Check the two stars, the art, the rule text, the number and the holofoil against a genuine copy (our scan is on every card page), then follow the full method in our guide to spotting fake Pokémon cards.
For a card worth thousands of dollars, buy it graded or have it graded, and check the slab itself: start with the certification number, which anyone can look up on the grader's site (what a slab certifies).
FAQ
How many Gold Star Pokémon cards are there?
27 in English, released from 2004 to 2007 in nine EX sets and POP Series 5. Counting everything with the star, add the 2021 Greninja ★ promo, the 2021 Umbreon ★ reprint and four World Championships deck copies; Japan has 31, its reprints included.
What is the most expensive Gold Star Pokémon card?
A PSA 10 Torchic ★ (EX Team Rocket Returns 108/109), sold for $2.7 million in an auction that closed on September 10, 2026. Ungraded, Rayquaza ★ is the most expensive, at $7,976 (7 sales) as of October 5, 2026.
Why are Gold Star Pokémon cards so expensive?
They were hard to pull, about one per two booster boxes by collectors' estimates, and few copies reach top grade: PSA had given a 10 to roughly 4% of those it graded by September 1, 2026. In 2026, PSA 10 copies of eight different Gold Stars sold for more than $200,000 at auction, up to $2.7 million for Torchic ★.
What is the rarest Gold Star Pokémon card?
In PSA 10, Torchic ★: PSA had graded only 19 as a 10, out of 1,457 copies, by September 1, 2026, the fewest of the 27. Print runs were never published; the Japanese Players Club prizes were earned with points, up to 70,000 for Umbreon ★.
How much is a Gold Star Charizard worth?
Charizard ★ δ (EX Dragon Frontiers 100/101) sells for $7,118 raw (6 sales) and $30,756 est. (2 sales) in PSA 9 as of October 5, 2026. PSA 10s are rare, 98 of 5,181 graded, and one sold for $475,000 at auction in September 2026.
How much is a Gold Star Rayquaza worth?
Rayquaza ★ (EX Deoxys 107/107) is the most expensive Gold Star raw, at $7,976 (7 sales) as of October 5, 2026. In 2026 a PSA 10 sold for $682,500 (July) and the only CGC Pristine 10 for $1,020,000 (August 28).
How much is a Gold Star Umbreon worth?
The POP Series 5 original, 17/17, sold for $4,435 and $5,950 raw in the two 2026 sales we could verify, for $39,094 est. (1 sale, August 2026) in PSA 9, and for $216,000 in PSA 10 at an auction on August 10, 2026. The 2021 Celebrations reprint, with the 25th anniversary logo, sells for $90.45 raw (8 sales), and the Japanese 70,000-point prize has sold for $180,000 twice.
Are Gold Star Pokémon cards coming back?
Not as of October 5, 2026: the last new one is the 2021 Greninja ★. On August 30, 2026, The Pokémon Company teased ex★ as a new series logo, and the reveal showed Raikou, Entei and Suicune; it had not said how the star works or tied it to the old Gold Stars.
Is a Gold Star worth grading?
Often, if the card is clean: on the 24 cards priced both ways, a PSA 9 sells for a median 3.6 times the raw price, and on the ten cards priced in both grades a PSA 10 sells for two to ten times a PSA 9. Raw prices mix every condition, so check the corners, edges and surface before you send one.
What does the gold star on a Pokémon card mean?
On a card from 2004 to 2007, a star after the Pokémon's name marks a Gold Star, a shiny Pokémon limited to one per deck. On modern cards, gold stars after the number are rarity symbols: one for an Illustration Rare, two for a Special Illustration Rare, three for a gold Hyper Rare, a hollow one for a Shiny Rare, and a four-pointed one outlined in black for a Mega Hyper Rare.
