Pokémon TCG Rarity Guide: SIR, IR, HR, UR and Every Chip Explained

The Quick Glance

Every chip you see on Mintlytics maps to a real, in-print Pokémon TCG rarity. The same chip color across a card detail, a market grid, and a set browser ALWAYS means the same thing — the colors are wired to a canonical taxonomy, not chosen ad-hoc.

The tiers most modern collectors trade around:

• SIR — Special Illustration Rare. Full-art alternate of a Pokémon-ex or Trainer. Top of the modern chase pyramid.
• IR — Illustration Rare. Special artwork showing the Pokémon in a scene. More abundant than SIR, still a real chase.
• HR — Hyper Rare. Gold or textured foil, sits at the very end of the set numbering. The "secret-rare" slot for modern sets.
• UR — Ultra Rare. Full-art Pokémon-ex or Trainer. Visually striking, entry-level modern chase.
• RR — Double Rare. The Pokémon-ex tier — the workhorse modern rare with two-prize knockouts and big-energy attacks.

If you only ever learn five chips, learn those. The other 25+ live below.

How Rarities Are Organized

Pokémon TCG has been printed under five major eras, each with its own rarity vocabulary. The modern Scarlet & Violet era (the ex mechanic) introduced the SIR / IR / HR / UR / RR system that anchors most chase discussions today. But the older eras — Sword & Shield (V / VMAX / VSTAR), Sun & Moon (GX), Black & White (EX), Diamond & Pearl (LV.X), and the original WotC era (Rare Holo, Gold Star) — all still trade actively because the chase cards from those eras are some of the most valuable in the hobby.

Mintlytics normalizes every era's strings into one canonical taxonomy. The chip color reflects collector category, not the era — so you can compare a "Holo Rare" Charizard from Base Set against a "Special Illustration Rare" Charizard from 151 even though the source labels are completely different.

Modern Flagship Tiers (Scarlet & Violet)

These are the rarities most active collectors are chasing today. Pulled from the ex era — Scarlet & Violet base, Paldea Evolved, Obsidian Flames, 151, Paradox Rift, Paldean Fates, Temporal Forces, Twilight Masquerade, Shrouded Fable, Stellar Crown, Surging Sparks, Prismatic Evolutions, Journey Together, Destined Rivals, and the Mega Evolution subseries.

SIR — Special Illustration Rare

Full-art alternate of a Pokémon-ex or Trainer. The Pokémon is the focal point of an original illustration — the trainer or Pokémon dominates the entire frame with no card-template visible behind them. This is the visual format collectors most prize. SIRs typically sit at 4–10x the price of the same card's regular ex print in PSA 10.

IR — Illustration Rare

Scene-driven artwork showing the Pokémon in a real environment — interacting with its trainer, in habitat, mid-battle. More abundant than SIR by roughly 3–5x in a typical print run, so prices sit below SIR but well above standard rares. The IR chase is the "art collector's chase" — buyers care about the illustration itself, not just the chip.

HR — Hyper Rare

The end-of-set secret-rare slot — typically gold-textured or rainbow-textured foil. Number-printed ABOVE the set's printed total (e.g. card 194/191). Limited print, so HRs trade as scarcity plays even when the underlying art isn't the most desirable in the set.

UR — Ultra Rare

Full-art Pokémon-ex or Trainer. The character is drawn into a card-shaped illustration but the standard card border + template is still visible — distinguishes it from a SIR, where the template is replaced by full artwork. ~2x scarcer than RR, ~3x cheaper than SIR for the same Pokémon.

RR — Double Rare

The mainline ex Pokémon — two-prize knockouts, high HP, the "competitive workhorse." Comes in every booster pack roughly 1-in-5. The most common ex tier, and the basis for the SIR / IR / UR / HR alternate chase prints.

ACE — ACE SPEC Rare

Powerful Trainer cards limited to a single copy per deck. Returned to the modern game in late 2023 after a decade-long absence. Strong gameplay value drives competitive demand even when the visual chase value is modest.

Mega Evolution Era (Late 2025 Subseries)

The Mega Evolution mini-era launched late 2025 with the Mega Evolution set. It overlays new Mega-mechanic tiers on top of the existing ex chase ladder.

MAR — Mega Attack Rare

The Mega-ex tier — Mega Evolutions of Pokémon-ex with new attacks. Functions like RR in the chase ladder but the mechanic is new, so early printings are still settling into market norms.

MHR — Mega Hyper Rare

Gold-textured secret-rare slot for the Mega era. Mirrors HR for the modern ex era — end-of-set scarcity play.

Era-Tagged Holos

The "Rare Holo X" family — each era's flagship Pokémon mechanic. Older but still actively traded.

• VSTAR — Sword & Shield era; once-per-game VSTAR power; late-era 2022 prints.
• VMAX — Evolution of a V Pokémon; bigger art, larger HP, two-prize knockouts. Includes the iconic Evolving Skies Moonbreon (Umbreon VMAX Alt Art).
• V — Single-prize-knockout high-HP basic Pokémon; precursor mechanic to ex.
• GX — Sun & Moon era; once-per-game GX attack mechanic. Includes the Hidden Fates "Shiny GX" subset.
• EX — Black & White era; one of the first "big attack" modern mechanics. Distinct from "ex" (lowercase) used in S&V.
• LV.X — Diamond & Pearl level-up mechanic; the original "evolved form of an evolved form" premium chase.

Secret, Rainbow, Shiny

The "appear above the set's printed total" or "color-swapped variant" chase tiers. These are where the highest valuations sit — Moonbreon (Rainbow Rare Umbreon VMAX) is the canonical example.

• Secret Rare — Card number is above the set's printed total. Bonus chase pulls outside the official set count.
• Rainbow Rare — Rainbow holofoil treatment; the Moonbreon tier from Evolving Skies.
• Shiny Rare — Color-swapped variant Pokémon; mostly Sword & Shield era (Shining Fates, Brilliant Stars).
• Shiny Ultra Rare — Shiny + full-art combo; among the rarest pulls in Sword & Shield.
• Radiant Rare — Shiny Pokémon with textured holofoil; a Sword & Shield specialty subset.
• Amazing Rare — Watercolor/rainbow burst artwork from late Sword & Shield. Short-lived but iconic.

Vintage Chases

Pre-modern but still active. The market trades these heavily — many of the highest-value cards in PSA 10 sit here.

• Holo Rare — The vintage holofoil rare. Charizard Base Set lives here. Most-traded vintage chip.
• Gold Star ★ — EX-series shiny Pokémon. The original "boutique shiny chase" — Gold Star Espeon, Umbreon, Charizard are among the priciest vintage chases.
• Prism Star ◇ — Sun & Moon limited-to-one-per-deck format; attack-strong but capped.
• BREAK Rare — XY-era horizontally-oriented evolution cards. Mid-tier vintage chase.
• Prime Rare — HeartGold/SoulSilver Prime mechanic; late-Pokémon-USA chase tier.
• LEGEND — HGSS LEGEND cards split across top + bottom halves that combine into one full card. Unique vintage chase format.
• Shining Rare — Neo-era Shining Pokémon. The original "shiny Pokémon" format, pre-modern Shiny Rares.

Sets and Curiosities

• Trainer Gallery — Bonus alt-art Pokémon/Trainer prints from the Sword & Shield TG subset (Astral Radiance through Crown Zenith).
• Classic Collection — Pokémon Center reprint of vintage cards (Base Set art) with modern foil treatment. The 2023 "Pokemon 25" subset.
• Promo — Cards never released in a retail set. Event distributions, collection-box exclusives, Pokémon Center promos, theme-deck promos.

Base Tiers

These exist for completeness but rarely drive market value at their face rarity.

• Common, Uncommon, Rare — Bulk-tier prints. Mintlytics hides Common/Uncommon chips on minimal contexts because they're noise.

How Mintlytics Uses Rarity Chips

Every surface that shows a chip — card detail, market grids, sealed catalogs, deal cards, the eBay Sniper feed, the ticker, the briefs — reads from the same canonical taxonomy. The chip color you see on the dashboard is the same one you see on /cards/[id], which is the same one in the briefs grid.

Practical implications:

• Filter consistency. Filtering by "Special Illustration Rare" on the market page and filtering by SIR on the prices page surfaces the same cards.
• Search consistency. The site search normalizes rarity input — searching "SIR" finds the same cards as searching "Special Illustration Rare."
• Price-history honesty. The Sniper compares like-for-like — a PSA 10 SIR sold comp never gets compared against a PSA 10 Ultra Rare sold comp, even if they're the same Pokémon.

When Chips Aren't Enough

The hardest market reality: an "alt art" isn't its own rarity. An alt-art Charizard ex 199/197 is tagged "Special Illustration Rare" upstream — same chip as the rest of the SIRs in the set. The collector market prices it differently because the art is more sought-after.

Mintlytics is honest about this: until we ship reliable set-aware alt-art detection (next major release), we render the canonical rarity chip and the alt-art is a chase pattern you have to recognize from the card itself. We don't guess.

The Bottom Line

The chip system is a glance shortcut — it tells you which collector category a card sits in, and roughly where it falls in the chase ladder. The price comes from the specific card, the specific grade, and the specific sold-comp data Mintlytics surfaces inside the card detail page.

Use the legend popover (the ? icon next to any rarity filter) when you need a quick refresher. Click through to a card's detail page when you need the full picture — current market, sold-comp history, PSA population, and Mintlytics' own confidence read.