Release data
30th Celebration has the best Special Illustration Rare odds we track: about 1 in 20 packs
A verified study of more than 3,000 packs puts any SIR at about 1 in 20 packs, roughly 4 times as often as the 2026 main sets, where SIRs sit near 1 in 80.
Special Illustration Rares turn up about once every 20 packs in 30th Celebration, the best odds for the rarity in any set we track. That’s roughly 4 times as often as in this year’s main sets.
The figure comes from a TCGplayer study of more than 3,000 opened packs, which we’ve checked against the published article. It reports a rate of 4.88% per pack, with a 95% margin that puts the true rate between about 1 in 18 and 1 in 24 packs.
Four times the 2026 main sets#
The three main sets released in 2026 all sit near 1 in 80 packs for any SIR: Pitch Black at about 1 in 80, Perfect Order at about 1 in 81, and Chaos Rising at about 1 in 83. Before 30th Celebration, the best SIR odds we’d measured were the early Scarlet & Violet sets and 151, all near 1 in 32.
The gap holds for a single card too. 30th Celebration has 10 Special Illustration Rares, so one specific SIR comes out about once every 205 packs. In the 2026 main sets, with 6 SIRs each, one specific SIR takes about 480 to 500 packs.
In practice: open an Elite Trainer Box’s 9 packs of 30th Celebration and there’s about a 36% chance of at least one SIR. The same 9 packs of a 2026 main set give about a 10% to 11% chance.
Smaller packs, same price#
30th Celebration packs are built differently. Each holds five cards plus a foil Energy, half a main-set pack, and one of the five is always from the 30-card Pikachu subset. Packs aren’t sold loose at retail; in a booster bundle they work out to $4.49 each, the same list price per pack as a main set.
So the comparison is fair per pack and per dollar: at the same list price, a 30th Celebration pack is about 4 times as likely to hold a Special Illustration Rare, even though it holds half the cards.
How sure we are#
One verified study carries the headline rate. Four community counts we haven’t verified yet, from 100 to about 4,000 packs each, land between about 1 in 15 and 1 in 21, close to the same figure. We’ll fold them in once each one is checked against its source.
Every rate for the set, with sample sizes and ranges, is on the 30th Celebration page. For how SIR odds tightened in main sets since 2023, see Special Illustration Rares got about 2.7× rarer after 2023, and for the odds of chasing one card, How many packs for one specific SIR?.