30th Celebration ex Cards: Every Confirmed ex★ and How to Target the One You Want
By Dexhaul Team · September 4, 2026
The 30th Celebration set drops September 16, and it carries more ex cards than any Pokémon TCG anniversary set before it. Knowing which one to target changes how you spend your pre-order budget.
This set introduces Futuristic Rare (ex★) as a new rarity: ex cards illustrated by artist YOSHIROTTEN with vivid colors, 3D Energy graphics, and Poké Ball elements layered into the artwork. Every card in the set is holofoil.
The ex★ tier sits at the top of that structure. Pulling an ex in any 30th Celebration pack means you got the set's premium rarity, not a stepping stone to something rarer above it. That's a meaningful difference from standard Scarlet & Violet sets, where alt arts exist as a tier above the standard ex.
Here is every confirmed ex★ in the set and what each one means for your pre-order decision.
The Headline Pair: Mewtwo ex and Mew ex
The Pokémon Company leads the set's official description with these two.
The exact quote from the official set blurb archived on Bulbapedia: "Celebrate this magnificent milestone with the mighty presences of Mewtwo ex and Mew ex." That positioning is deliberate.
Mewtwo is the final boss of the original games and the first Pokémon TCG's most legendary rare. Mew has always sat alongside it as the mythical counterpart. This set's thematic center is the psychic legendary pair.
Collector demand for both runs high. Mewtwo in particular is the only Pokémon whose ex cards appear regularly in both the competitive and collector markets at the same time. If you collect psychic-type cards or Gen 1 legendaries, these two are the natural anchor targets.
The Kanto Starters: Charizard ex, Venusaur ex, and Blastoise ex
All three Gen 1 starters appear as ex★ cards in the international set. Their inclusion as a trio makes this the first time all three Kanto starters have appeared as top-rarity ex cards in the same set.
Charizard ex gets the most buyer attention, by a significant margin. That reflects the general collector market: Charizard commands the highest search volume and pre-sale interest of any single card in this set. If you are targeting Charizard ex★ specifically, that demand is real and won't surprise you when the set launches.
Venusaur ex and Blastoise ex occupy a different position. Both pull at the same odds as Charizard ex★ within the set. Venusaur ex was never a collector-market centerpiece the way Charizard was.
The Base Set Venusaur was actually the competitive card: Rain Dance was the dominant archetype in the game's first year. But Charizard won the cultural battle for collector attention.
That history means Venusaur ex and Blastoise ex are the two starters where collector demand is real but not frenzied. A collector focused on completing the trio rather than chasing one card gets roughly the same pull odds for less secondary-market competition.
The Allies: Umbreon ex, Salamence ex, Greninja ex, Espeon ex, and Sylveon ex
The Bulbapedia set description names Umbreon ex, Salamence ex, and Greninja ex as the confirmed "ally" ex cards alongside the headline pair. The international set also adds Espeon ex (sourced from the Japanese Premium Deck Set Espeon & Umbreon) and Sylveon ex as ex★ entries.
Umbreon and Espeon come as a thematic pair. Both are Eevee evolutions with strong collector followings, and both appear in the Battle Deck products separately, which means collectors who want the set-card ex★ version have a clear pull goal distinct from the promo cards in the Battle Deck packaging.
Salamence ex is the one that consistently surprises collectors.
Salamence has no in-game Mega Evolution (unlike Charizard, Venusaur, Greninja, or the Eevee evolutions). It appeared in this set as a thematic choice, not a nostalgia callback.
For collectors running set-completion goals, Salamence ex★ will be one of the harder cards to find on secondary markets: fewer people are specifically hunting it. That cuts both ways. It won't be the first to sell out, but dedicated Salamence collectors may find post-launch availability tighter than expected.
Greninja ex extends the pattern set by the Chaos Rising ME04 releases. Greninja has appeared in premium products twice in the past year, making this its third notable ex appearance in recent sets. The Greninja ex Box is the primary product route if you're targeting this card specifically.
How Pull Odds Actually Work Here
Every ex★ card in the set competes for the same pack slot. Pull rates are tracked by independent services like SNKRDUNK, which has been aggregating pull data from Japanese collectors since the set launched there ahead of the international release.
Targeting a specific ex★ means accepting that your pulls will be spread across the entire ex★ roster. There is no product that increases the odds of pulling one ex★ over another within booster packs.
The implication: if you want Charizard ex★ and only Charizard ex★, pulling packs until you hit it is not efficient. Waiting for secondary market listings post-launch or completing the full set alongside it are both more logical than single-target pack hunting.
Which Product to Buy, Based on Your Target
The product decision follows from your ex★ goal.
Targeting a specific single ex
The ex Tins (Sylveon ex, Greninja ex) and Battle Decks (Espeon ex, Umbreon ex, Victini ex) include promo versions of their headliner cards as guaranteed inclusions. These are separate card prints from the set's pullable ex★ cards: the promo has different artwork.
If you want the promo version, the dedicated tin or deck is the direct path. If you want the set's pullable ex★ version of the same character, you are pulling packs like everyone else.
Targeting the full ex roster
The Elite Trainer Box at $179.95 gives you eight booster packs plus accessories. It is the most common entry point for collectors who want to chase multiple ex★ cards across sessions.
The UPC (Ultra Premium Collection) at $549.95 includes fifteen packs plus premium extras. The Night variant includes a coin, card sleeves, and additional promo cards not available in standard packs. For collectors who want maximum pull volume combined with the complete product experience, the UPC is the set's top-tier purchase.
Lower budget entry
Individual booster packs at $14.95 each from Galactic Toys let you spread purchases across the pre-order window without committing to a full ETB or UPC. The pull math is the same per pack regardless of format. Three packs from a pre-order costs the same as buying loose packs post-launch at a premium, with the added certainty of stock.
The One Structural Advantage This Set Has for Collectors
There is no card tier above ex★ in the 30th Celebration set. In standard Scarlet & Violet sets, pulling an ex means you got a good pull but not necessarily the best one: Special Illustration Rares and Hyper Rares sit above standard ex cards in those sets. Every pull feels like it could have been something rarer.
The 30th Celebration removes that ladder. Every card in the set is holofoil. Every ex★ you pull is the top rarity in the set.
There is no "I got an ex but not the alt art" scenario. That structural simplicity is genuinely different from any Scarlet & Violet set released since 2023. It is the reason the set's ex cards carry a different feel to open than their standard era equivalents.
Twelve days out, preorders are live across multiple independent sellers. DexHaul finds available listings from independent shops so you can compare prices and sellers across the full 30th Celebration product range, including ETBs, UPCs, Booster Bundles, and individual packs. Start with searching DexHaul for 30th Celebration products to see what is currently in stock from verified merchants.
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