Work out what your cards are, before working out what they are worth
Identification comes first, condition second, price third. This site covers all three without an account, without a paywall and without pretending a website can appraise a card it has never seen.
Read the card
Collector number, set symbol, rarity mark and stamp — the four marks that name the exact printing you own.
Judge the condition
The five-tier marketplace scale, quoted from the standard the marketplace publishes rather than paraphrased.
Do the math
Centering against published tolerances and a break-even calculation before any card goes in an envelope.
Start here
Most people arrive with one question. What is my Pokémon card worth answers it end to end: the four drivers of price, how to check a real sold price in about five minutes, and why two price sites quote different numbers for the same card.
If the card is still unidentified, start one step earlier with how to read a Pokémon card, then decode the symbol with rarity symbols explained. Vintage cards usually need one more check — first edition, shadowless or unlimited — and anything that looks off deserves the counterfeit comparison checklist. For the top of the market, the most expensive cards covers what is verified and what is hearsay.
Before you send anything to a grader
Grading is a purchase, and most submissions lose money quietly. The grading cost comparison lists what PSA, BGS, CGC and SGC charge per card as of 21 August 2026 — including the two graders whose cheapest tiers could not be booked at all that day — and is it worth grading gives the break-even rule in one line. Run your own numbers through the ROI calculator, check the one attribute you can measure at home with the centering calculator, and see how the four scales differ in PSA vs BGS vs CGC.
Condition, quoted rather than guessed
Near Mint, Lightly Played, Moderately Played, Heavily Played, Damaged — five words that decide what a raw card sells for. The condition guide quotes each definition from the marketplace standard and adds the three integrity tests that decide when a card drops to Damaged regardless of how it looks. Keeping that condition is a separate skill: how to store cards follows what the national conservation bodies publish rather than what the hobby repeats.
Once the cards are identified, the next question is keeping track of them. The collection tracker page covers the six fields worth recording per card and why export matters more than any feature a tool advertises.
What this site will not do
It will not quote a price for your card, because card price data is licensed and republishing someone else's feed is not something a serious site does. It will not tell you a card is genuine, because authentication is a service with liability attached and a web page has neither. And it will not show scans of cards, because the artwork belongs to its rights holders. Everything it does do is on the guides page and the tools page, and the reasoning behind those three refusals is on the about page.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a free way to check what a Pokémon card is worth?
Yes. Identify the printing from the bottom edge of the card, pick your condition honestly, then look up completed sales for that exact printing and condition on any marketplace. Sold listings are free to browse and are the only prices buyers actually paid.
Does this site price my cards for me?
No. Card price data is licensed and no site can republish another company’s feed, so what you get here is the method instead: how to identify the printing, how to judge condition, and the arithmetic for grading decisions using numbers you look up yourself.
Do the tools need an account?
No account, no email, no sign-up. The centering calculator and the grading ROI calculator run entirely in your browser, and nothing you type is stored or sent anywhere. Close the tab and the numbers are gone.
What does the TCG Valuer app do that the website does not?
The site explains how to read a card; the app reads it. It uses the camera to pull the set symbol and collector number off a card, files it into a searchable collection, and keeps the notes and shortlists that a browser tab cannot hold between sessions.
TCG Valuer is an independent site and app. Not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Nintendo, The Pokémon Company, PSA, Beckett, CGC or SGC. Product names are used descriptively to identify the cards and services being discussed.