Gold Star Pokemon cards are Pokemon cards that generally look like your average Pokemon card but next to the name of the Pokemon at the very top of the card features a small gold star. As well as this, Gold Star Pokemon are always shiny, bursting out of the border of their card, and are typically the rarest card in the set they belong to. They make up some of the rarest and most sought-after cards in the Pokemon TCG community.

There is also a common misconception about the names Golden Rare and Gold Star and how they are interchangeable. This is not the case. Golden Rares refers to the secret rare full arts in modern sets while a Gold Star card is far from a full art at all.

While they recently made Gold Star Greninja promo for the 25th anniversary of Pokemon, Gold Star Pokemon cards have become a lot less commonplace in the Pokemon TCG, making them even more desirable. 

Below you can find a list of the most valuable Gold Star cards of all time.

What may seem like an unlikely entry on this list, the Metagross Gold Star, coming from the 2005 set Delta Species, has been turning the heads of collectors for many years due to it being vintage and being a Gold Star. Just picking one of these ungraded can run you anywhere between $300 and $400. Get your hands on one of these in a PSA 10 and you have yourself a $3500 card.

This card has only become more topical with the 20-year battle between The Pokemon Company and magician Uri Geller being put to rest for the rights to Alakazam about 2 years ago. It comes from the 2006 set Crystal Guardians. With that considered the card is worth around $420 ungraded and when put in a PSA 10 the card is worth about $3100.

This rocky icon made its Gold Star debut in the 2006 set Legend Maker which also features Gold Star versions of its ice and metal counterparts (Regice and Registeel). Getting a hold of this legendary rock star will inevitably be a pricey investment as picking it up ungraded can cost about $450 and in a PSA 10 has previously sold for $2700.

On any other list, this would be an extremely low placement for a Charizard, but when we’re dealing with Gold Star Pokemon cards, there are just some extremely rare cards that outrank Charizard every day of the week. However, that’s not to say this Charizard is easy to come by, getting one ungraded can cost upwards of $500. Featuring probably one of the most beloved shiny Pokemon in Pokemon history,  when you put this card in a PSA 10, it suddenly shoots up to around $20,000 in value.

This beautiful red Celebi made its debut in the same 2006 set as the Gold Star Alakazam, Crystal Guardians, and has since remained one of the staple Gold Star Pokemon cards among collectors. It introduced a one-of-a-kind mechanic to the game, allowing it to avoid critical damage by getting shuffled into the player’s deck. This mechanic along with the awesome artwork makes this card worth around $500 ungraded. In a PSA 10 however, you can pick one of these up for $3500.

What is now pretty much the face of not just the Pokemon TCG but Pokemon as a whole, the Pikachu Gold Star card was going to pop up at some point and it just so happens that it comes in at number 5 on our list. Coming from 2006 set Holon Phantoms, It’s currently worth about $500 ungraded but this is likely only going to go up in the coming years because of the collectibility of this card. In a PSA 10, it knocks its ungraded price out of the park, however, coming in at about $7000.

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What likely isn’t a surprise to anyone is this OG legendary making it so high up on this list. Part of the original 151, Mewtwo was released as a Gold Star card in 2006 in the same set as the Gold Star Pikachu: Holon Phantoms. However, ungraded it dwarfs the cost of the Gold Star Pikachu, as it is worth about $600. Once in a PSA 10, it has been known to sell for $4000.

This absolute gem that comes from the same 2006 set as the Gold Star Charizard (Dragon Frontiers) is kicking off the top 3 most valuable Gold Star Pokemon cards. It likely has one of the most stunning card arts as it features a shiny, baby blue, water-type Mew bursting out of the cards’ art border with trails of water behind it. Ungraded this card has sold for roughly $620 but in a PSA 10, it can get as expensive as $7700.

Coming in at number 2, we have the second-generation water-type starter, Mudkip. This cute, shiny, little guy, coming from the 2004 set Team Rocket Returns,  looks relatively similar to a normal Mudkip despite shiny Mudkips usually being a vibrant purple. That’s because he is a normal Mudkip. It’s unknown as to why this is the case, but this makes Gold Star Mudkip one of the only non-shiny Gold Star Pokemon which may have even contributed to its current value. It has become a must-have card for big collectors and if they’re trying to pick one up ungraded, they’d have to be willing to part with nearly $900. In a PSA 10, this card is worth around $5400.

To any avid collectors, this number one entry likely comes as no surprise. Umbreon Gold Star is not only one of the rarest and most valuable Gold Star Pokemon cards, but one of the rarest and most valuable (non-tournament) Pokemon cards altogether. It comes from the 2007 promotional set POP Series 5 for the Pokemon Organized Play program. The catch with these packs however was that they only contained 2 cards each, making this Umbreon even harder to pull. Even getting one ungraded can cost upwards of $1500 and in a PSA 10, this Umbreon is worth nearly $20,000.

If Gold Star Pokemon cards are something you’re interested in and want to start collecting but you’re on a tight budget, it will be tricky to work around it. Gold Star Pokemon cards are inherently valuable, regardless of the Pokemon, simply because they are vintage and hard to pull. Having said that, there are more affordable ones than the ones listed above. For example, the Gold Star Entei from the set Unseen Forces can be picked up for around $100 and when graded in a PSA 10 can be as valuable as $1000. Aside from Entei, finding a Gold Star card that is sub $200 will be extremely difficult and you should therefore be prepared to part with a lot of money when looking for Gold Star cards.

So, we have to confess that Gold Star cards weren’t technically discontinued in 2007. In 2021, along with the release of the 25th-anniversary Celebrations Elite Trainer Box, collectors were awarded a Gold Star Greninja promo. As well as this, within the set, collectors were able to pack a reprint of the now-famous Gold Star Umbreon which featured a little Pikachu icon on the left of the card to indicate that it was a rerelease for the 25th-anniversary. Therefore, this would mean that the most recent Gold Star Pokemon cards were released in 2021.

If you’re still not sure about how to get a hold of Gold Star Pokemon cards, it’s worth clarifying that not every vintage set out there have Gold Star cards in them. In total there are 10 sets that contain the original Gold Star cards and across these sets, there are 27 unique Gold Star Pokemon. So for the collectors out there looking to pack some potential Gold Star cards, we’ve compiled a list of all the sets that feature Gold Star Pokemon and the Pokemon they feature. 

Team Rocket Returns: Mudkip, Torchic, and Treecko

EX Deoxys: Latias, Latios, and Rayquaza

Unseen Forces: Entei, Raikou, and Suicune 

Delta Species: Groudon, Kyogre and Metagross

Legend Maker: Regice, Regirock, and Registeel

Holon Phantoms: Gyarados, Mewtwo, and Pikachu 

Crystal Guardians: Alakazam and Celebi

Dragon Frontiers: Charizard and Mew 

Power Keepers: Flareon, Jolteon, and Vaporeon 

POP Series 5: Vaporeon and Espeon

The rarity of Pokemon cards varies from set to set as each card has its own unique population in the set. However, on average, Gold Star Pokemon cards have around a 1 in 88 pull rate making them some of the rarest Pokemon cards that you can get a hold of. This rule applies especially to sets like POP Series 5 which weren’t available to buy in shops but instead had to be obtained through Pokemon Organized Play events, hence the name POP series. Not only were these packs super hard to obtain but they also only contained 2 cards in them meaning that the chances of pulling the Umbreon or Espeon were extremely slim.

If you have a pretty large budget and you can afford to invest in any of the cards above then your best bet is likely putting money into the Delta Species Charizard. While this isn’t the most valuable card on the list, Charizards have a tendency to shoot up in price because Charizards are almost like the second mascot of Pokemon and collectors love them.

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