What Is a Pokemon Secret Rare?

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A pokemon secret rare is one of those formats that looks straightforward and isn't. The literal definition is simple. A secret rare card is any card whose number exceeds the official set total. If the back of a recent box lists 165 cards in a set, anything numbered 166 or higher in that set is a secret rare. The category started in 2007 with Diamond and Pearl, ran as a distinct rarity tier for fifteen years, and has been slowly absorbed into more specific labels (Hyper Rare, Rainbow Rare, Special Illustration Rare) across the modern Sun and Moon, Sword and Shield, and Scarlet and Violet eras.

How did pokemon secret rares start?

The first English-language Pokemon secret rares were the four foil energy cards in Diamond and Pearl base set, numbered 131 through 134 in a set whose official total was 130. They were chase cards, but they were also a structural change. Before 2007 the Wizards of the Coast and early Nintendo era of Pokemon TCG had used printed promos and rare holos as the chase tier, with no convention for over-set numbering on the card itself.

The Japanese print of Pokemon TCG had used the over-set numbering idea earlier, but the format only standardized internationally with the Diamond and Pearl era. Once it landed, it kept evolving. Every subsequent block (Platinum, HeartGold and SoulSilver, Black and White, XY, Sun and Moon, Sword and Shield, Scarlet and Violet) added new secret-rare-style chase pulls, and the Pokemon Company kept renaming the specific finishes (foil, full art, ultra rare, gold, rainbow, hyper, illustration, special illustration) without dropping the over-set numbering rule.

How does a secret rare differ from a Hyper Rare?

Hyper Rare is the modern name for the gold or rainbow foil version of a base-set card, almost always numbered above the set total. The Hyper Rare label was introduced in the Sun and Moon era to describe a specific finish style, not a numbering convention. So a Hyper Rare is technically still a secret rare by the over-set numbering rule, but the Pokemon Company uses Hyper Rare in retail-facing language to describe the visual style.

The practical implication: if you pulled a Charizard VMAX Rainbow Rare from Sword and Shield Champion's Path, that card is both a Hyper Rare (by finish) and a secret rare (by numbering). The two labels are nearly redundant in modern packaging, but the older Diamond-and-Pearl-through-Black-and-White secret rares often used holo or full-art finishes that do not match the Hyper Rare rainbow-gold style.

How does a secret rare differ from a Special Illustration Rare?

Special Illustration Rare (SIR) is the Scarlet and Violet era label for full-art trainer cards and character-style cards numbered above the set total. SIR cards replaced the Character Rare and Character Super Rare slots from the Sun and Moon and Sword and Shield eras, with a more consistent illustration-forward art convention. The shorter Illustration Rare (IR) sits one tier below SIR and is also typically numbered above the set total, though in some sets IRs fall inside the base numbering.

In current Scarlet and Violet sets the term "secret rare" is mostly used historically, while the active retail labels are Hyper Rare (for gold or specific finish chase cards) and SIR or IR (for illustration-art chase cards). Both still satisfy the over-set numbering convention. The Pokemon Company's own product flyers use SIR and IR almost exclusively now, with secret rare appearing more often in collector forums and grading slabs than in publisher copy. For a deeper read on the SIR vs IR distinction specifically, see the IR vs SIR answer page.

Era timeline at a glance

How are pokemon secret rares priced in 2026?

The pricing pattern on Pokemon secret rares follows the same rules as the rest of the modern Pokemon market. Subject matters more than format. A Charizard secret rare in any era trades at multiples of a non-Charizard secret rare from the same set. Era matters too. Vintage Wizards-era cards do not have secret rares (the format did not exist yet), so the oldest secret rares date to 2007 Diamond and Pearl, which is the start of the format's price-history depth.

Within an era, the specific finish matters a lot. Gold Hyper Rare cards in Sun and Moon and Sword and Shield run differently from Rainbow Rare VMAX cards from the same era, even when both are numbered above the set total. Special Illustration Rare cards in Scarlet and Violet tend to run higher than equivalent Illustration Rare cards because the alt art chase is more visually distinctive and the print structure is tighter on SIRs.

Grading premium math on Pokemon secret rares follows the standard modern Pokemon pattern. PSA 10 commands a meaningful multiple over raw on flagship subjects. The raw-to-PSA-10 conversion rate runs 25 to 45 percent on modern Pokemon depending on stock quality, which is roughly in line with modern Chrome basketball. Cards from the early Sun and Moon era have shown the worst surface-grading patterns because of the foil texture of that era's stock, so PSA 10 rates on a 2017 Burning Shadows Charizard GX rainbow rare run measurably lower than a 2023 Scarlet and Violet base SIR Charizard. For the broader read on the modern Pokemon alt-art chase, see the Hyper Rare guide and the SIR guide.

What collectors actually call them in 2026

In hobby usage in 2026, "secret rare" is mostly a category umbrella that older collectors use to mean any over-set numbered chase pull. Younger collectors who started in the Scarlet and Violet era often skip the term entirely and use SIR, IR, or Hyper Rare directly. On eBay search, the term "secret rare" still pulls a meaningful chunk of listings, especially for Sun and Moon and Sword and Shield era cards where Rainbow Rare and Character Rare were the dominant slots.

The Pokemon Company's own copy has shifted. Current Scarlet and Violet product flyers use Hyper Rare for the gold style, SIR for the full art illustration chase, and IR for the smaller-illustration chase, and reserve the unmodified term "secret rare" for historical descriptions. So when you see "secret rare" on a 2026 product, you are usually reading collector copy or a reseller listing, not a Pokemon Company description.

What this answer does not cover

This is a definitional read, not a pricing report. We are not naming current dollar comps on any specific secret rare. If you want current pricing on a specific card, the per-card pages at /cards/ will have a comp band. The closest market-context companion to this answer is the Eeveelution effect report, which covers how the modern alt-art and Special Illustration Rare structure has reshaped pricing on non-Charizard Pokemon characters.