McDonald's Pokémon Cards 2026: All 15 Cards and Legality

Pokémon Happy Meals are back at McDonald's in the US, and each one has two Pokémon TCG cards in it. Pokémon.com announced the promotion on November 10, 2026, and it runs through December 14, 2026, or until your local store runs out.

The announcement shows all 15 card faces but never names them. So we went through the images one by one. Every card turned out to be a reprint of a card that already exists, and the regulation mark on each card tells you most of what you need to know about whether you can play it.

What is in the Happy Meal

Pokémon.com lists this for the US promotion:

Fifteen cards at two per meal means eight Happy Meals at the very least to complete the set, and in practice a lot more, because you don't get to pick your cards. The article says the Happy Meals reach other regions soon. Canada's version was announced separately on November 3, runs only through November 30, 2026, and shows the same 15 M26 card images. This post covers the US promotion.

The toys and the cards aren't the same list. Weedle, Munchlax, Minccino, Espurr, Rowlet, Sobble, Sprigatito, Bulbasaur, Charmander, Squirtle, Piplup, Torchic and Umbreon are toys only. Pikachu and Eevee are both a toy and a card.

All 15 cards

We took the type, HP and regulation mark from each card image. The last column is the existing card whose name, HP and attacks the McDonald's card copies, checked against the Pokémon TCG API.

That's 10 cards with a Standard-legal mark (eight H, two I) and 5 with G: Chandelure, Palafin, Lucario, Hawlucha and Tyranitar.

Quick warning on 010: it's plain Zoroark, a 120 HP Stage 1 with Mind Jack and Foul Play. It is not the N's Zoroark ex that has been showing up at Regionals.

Every card is a reprint

Each of the 15 cards has the same name, HP, attack names, attack costs, damage and effect text as the card it matches in the table. Pikachu's Random Spark is the Temporal Forces attack. Snorlax's But First, Food (attach an Energy card from your hand to this Pokémon, and if you do, heal 60 damage) and its 160-damage Heavy Impact come straight from Twilight Masquerade. Weakness and Resistance match on every card we checked. The regulation marks match too, so each card is still tied to the era its original came from.

That matters for players. If you didn't pull a Shrouded Fable Decidueye, the Happy Meal copy is the same card in game terms. Expect playable bulk, not new strategy: none of these is a Pokémon ex, and none of them adds a mechanic that wasn't already in the card pool.

Can you play them in a tournament?

This is where the regulation mark comes in. Standard legality is set by the mark printed on each card, not by the product it came in, and section 4.1.1 of the TCG Tournament Handbook (last revised September 1, 2026) makes H, I and J Standard-legal. G is Expanded only. The formats guide has the full table.

Section 4.1.3 then covers reprints. Any version of a card may be played if its name is identical to the older card and all of its printed text is functionally identical. A newer version of a card that is currently playable in Standard or Expanded "may be played immediately in that format upon its release." We go through how that rule works on a real card in the tournament rules guide.

Applied to this set:

• The 10 H and I cards match cards that are legal in Standard right now. Under the reprint rule they qualify for Standard and Expanded.
• The 5 G cards match cards that rotated out of Standard on April 10, 2026, per the 2026 rotation announcement. They qualify for Expanded, not Standard.
• All 15 are fine in Unlimited, which section 4.2 opens to any card or promo released in the US.

What we could not confirm

Two things are still open, and we're keeping them apart from the answer above.

The Handbook doesn't name this set. Its "Additional Releases" table lists "McDonald's Collection 2011–2021" as Expanded-legal and says nothing about any McDonald's set after that. Our reading for the 2026 cards rests on the general reprint rule and the printed marks, not on a line that names them.

The official promo legality page wasn't readable for us. Section 4.1.2 says promo release and tournament-legal dates are confirmed on the Pokémon TCG Promo Card Legality Status page. When we tried to load that page on November 10, Pokémon.com served a bot-check screen instead, so we couldn't see whether M26 is listed or when it would go legal. Before you register an M26 card at a Regional or League Cup, check that page, and ask your organizer if you're unsure. The head judge's ruling is the one that counts on the day.

We'll update this post if Pokémon.com adds the cards to that page or publishes the dates for other regions.

Quick Action Checklist

• US Pokémon Happy Meals run through December 14, 2026, announced November 10, while supplies last at participating McDonald's.
• Two cards per meal, 15 in the set (M26 001-015), 7 of them foil. Pokémon.com doesn't say which seven are foil.
• All 15 are reprints of existing cards, with the same name and text as the originals listed above.
• 10 carry H or I marks (Decidueye, Pikachu, Mimikyu, Absol, Zoroark, Metagross, Jirachi, Eevee, Snorlax, Wooloo) and match Standard-legal cards.
• 5 carry G (Chandelure, Palafin, Lucario, Hawlucha, Tyranitar). They're Expanded and Unlimited cards, not Standard.
• Check the official promo legality page before a sanctioned event. The Handbook doesn't list this set by name.
• Zoroark 010 is not N's Zoroark ex.