Best Pokemon TCG Pocket decks and tier list (Nov 2024)

The best Pokemon TCG Pocket decks and tier list are all presented below, and not only that, we've explained how to build those decks and play them for yourself. Whether you're looking to make the most powerful decks in the meta, or a budget friendly option, we've got all the main players and their pros and cons.

Right now the Pokemon TCG Pocket meta has stabilised somewhat after a tumultuous first couple of weeks, with two clear winners in the S-tier - Pikachu and Mewtwo ex, representing electric and psychic types respectively. Still, they're not so strong as to be untouchable, and decks like Starmie and Charizard are nonetheless giving a strong showing, ranking highly when played correctly. Of course, we'll be updating this page regularly, to ensure you have all the most up to date information on the meta and ranked play as it evolves (pun intended).

Best decks in Pokemon TCG Pocket and full tier list

Right now the tier list for the best decks in the Pokemon TCG Meta is as follows:

• S-tier
  • Mewtwo ex (Psychic): This deck focuses on Mewtwo ex up front and having Gardevoir on the bench, using the latter to rapidly power up the former to do massive damage.
  • Pikachu ex (Electric): A high-speed deck designed to do rapid damage before the opponent can set up their own play.
• A-tier
  • Starmie ex (Water): A diverse deck that combines speed and power through a mix of rare cards, using Misty to (sometimes) provide energy to the team.
  • Charizard ex (Fire): A heavy-hitting deck that uses Moltres ex to fuel a benched Charizard ex with its Inferno Dance, before swapping them around to do some major damage.
• B-tier
  • Venusaur ex (Grass): A deck that uses healing powers to sustain itself, but struggles in the early game.
  • Marowak ex (Fighting): A cheap, quick fighting deck that risks a lot on coin flips.
• C-tier
  • Poison/Koga (Dark): Arbok and Weezing control and poison the opponent while Koga allows you to return Weezing to your hand. Lacks raw power, though a good budget deck with a strong early game.

We'll go into these decks further on, and there's plenty of the Pokemon TCG Pocket best cards that aren't necessarily represented in the decks above, but keep in mind that the meta and the best decks in Pocket aren't so unstoppable that you'll always be guaranteed a 100% win rate. Type disadvantage, a bad opening hand, clever plays by your opponent - all these things can bring even the most powerful deck down, and metas being what they are, we'll likely see some counter-decks for these two popping up soon, especially as more cards are added (the previous Pokemon TCG Pocket Lapras ex event and promo card of the same name are pretty powerful if used right).

Now, admittedly these decks all tend to include some of the rarest cards in Pokemon TCG Pocket, and that's something to keep in mind - you won't be able to build these straight off the bat unless you're willing to sync a lot of money into gold, or just are very lucky in your pack draws.

Best Mewtwo ex deck

The Mewtwo ex deck is one of the best decks in the meta right now, and is composed of the following:

• Mewtwo ex x2
• Ralts x2
• Kirlia x2
• Gardevoir x2
• Potion x2
• X Speed x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Red Card x1
• Professor's Research x2
• Sabrina x1
• Giovanni x2

We've got a dedicated guide to looking at all version of the Pokemon TCG Pocket Mewtwo ex deck, but this is the most powerful one. It focuses on getting Mewtwo ex onto the battlefield early, then using Gardevoir's "Psy Shadow" Ability to give it free energy every turn. Set it up right, and you can use Mewtwo's Psydrive attack to do 150 damage every turn, at no cost to yourself.

Until that point though, you're in riskier terrain. Setting up two evolutions on Ralts to get Gardevoir in play is where you'll be struggling, and if you don't get the Poke Ball/Professor's Research cards to quickly search through your deck, you can be left flailing with no solution. Until then, use Sabrina, Potions and X Speed to buy yourself time until you can set up your cards right.

• Pros
  • Massive, continuous damage when set up
  • Gardevoir and Mewtwo have decent HP
  • Mewtwo can start doing damage in the early game
• Cons
  • Takes time to set up properly
  • Poor draws can leave you in trouble with no solution
  • If you lose Mewtwo, it's all over

Pikachu ex deck

The Pikachu ex deck has pushed its way to being one of the best decks in play right now, owing to a strong early game. You can make it from the following cards:

• Pikachu ex x2
• Zapdos ex x2
• Voltorb x2
• Electrode x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Potion x2
• Red Card x1
• X Speed x2
• Sabrina x2
• Giovanni x1
• Professor's Research x2

This is a massively aggressive "glass cannon" deck, based around getting powerful Pokemon on the field and doing high damage ASAP. Pikachu ex and Zapdos ex cards both can do major damage in their first few turns on the field, and it means you can secure a victory as early as turn six, if you're lucky.

However, if you haven't won by that point and give your opponent time to set up, things will get harder. Both are comparatively low health for "ex" cards, and obviously if one gets taken out, you lose two points instead of one. Not only that, but there's some luck involved here: Pikachu deals damage that scales to the number of Pokemon you have benched, and Zapdos' big attack is based on a series of coin flips, so you might end up doing nothing.

If you want more info on building and playing this, as well as some alternative builds, here's our full guide to the perfect Pokemon TCG Pocket Pikachu ex deck.

• Pros
  • Fast set-up and high damage, great early game
  • Not complex or dependent on evolution
  • Good against water decks, late-game decks, and the legendary birds, all of which are common
• Cons
  • Best attacks are somewhat circumstantial and not always relaiable
  • Low health pools
  • Expensive, high budget deck

Starmie ex deck

Just below the top two decks, the Starmie ex deck is about getting powerful water Pokemon on the field and doing damage ASAP. Here's the most widely-used and effective version:

• Staryu x2
• Starmie ex x2
• Articuno ex x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Potion x2
• Red Card x2
• Misty x2
• Giovanni x2
• Sabrina x2
• Professor's Research x2

Starmie ex might not seem like much when compared to the other "ex" cards, dealing less damage, but there's two major advantages to it - it's cheap to use, and can retreat for free, which is why you don't see the more common X Speed in the deck list above. You can have a powerful card on the field and dealing 90 damage as early as round 4, and few decks can keep up.

Meanwhile, Articuno ex is a good backup to that Starmie, with its own cheap attack (Ice Wing doing 40 for two energy) and a more powerful Blizzard that can actually damage benched Pokemon. You can even cast Blizzard on turn 1 if you get lucky with the supremely random Misty card, which has you flip a coin until you eventually get tails - and then provides 1 energy for every heads you got.

• Pros
  • Low/no retreat costs
  • Powerful early game
  • Misty might be devastating
• Cons
  • Lacks really powerful attacks
  • Starmie is evolution dependant
  • Misty might be useless

Charizard ex deck

The Charizard ex deck is a fire-type deck that has Moltres power up the star of the show, which stays on the bench until it's ready to tear through opponents. To build your own Charizard ex deck, you'll need:

• Charmander x2
• Charmeleon x2
• Charizard ex x2
• Moltres ex x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Potion x2
• X Speed x2
• Red Card x2
• Professor's Research x2
• Sabrina x2

Charizard ex has the most powerful attack in the game right now, its Crimson Storm capable of doing 200 damage to the enemy's active Pokemon. Unfortunately, it discards two energy cards in being used, so the goal here is to keep Charizard benched while Moltres is active and fuels it up with repeated uses of Inferno Dance. Once Charizard has at least 5 energy, you can swap their places and tear through the opponent's team.

The downside is similar to Mewtwo's: the lengthy setup. You need to find Charmander in the deck and then evolve it twice, something that can take a lot of time if you're unlucky in your card draws. Use Sabrina, your Potions and Red Cards to buy yourself time until you're ready to retaliate - and if your opponent brings in Starmie ex, you might as well give up there and then.

• Pros
  • Unrivalled attack power
  • Inferno Dance is a swift energy-creation method
  • Charmander/Charmeleon are both powerful in their own right
• Cons
  • Shaky early game
  • Somewhat chance-dependent (Inferno Dance and drawing the right cards)
  • Crimson Storm discards precious energy cards in being used

Venusaur ex deck

Venusaur ex and grass decks are the only options in Pokemon TCG Pocket for healing and recovery on a major level. If that appeals to you, here's the build:

• Bulbasaur x2
• Ivysaur x2
• Venusaur ex x2
• Petilil x2
• Lilligant x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Potion x1
• X Speed x2
• Erika x2
• Professor's Research x2
• Sabrina x1

You can shuffle around the exact numbers of items to taste, but ultimately the goal here is to get Lilligant active on the field so it can then provide energy to the Bulbasaur on the bench. You play defensively, healing and controlling, all the while evolving Bulbasaur to the Venusaur ex. Once you're done, swap them around and bring in the big grass frog. 

Venusaur ex's Giant Bloom does 100 damage while healing it for 30 every turn - not to mention the fact that it's pretty tanky at 190 HP. Unless your opponent is running a Charizard deck as shown above, it should be impossible to one-shot your team mascot. If you want some alternate variants for the deck, try bringing in Exeggutor ex early on, or having Caterpie to more quickly draw Pokemon cards. 

• Pros
  • Venusaur is a sturdy tank
  • Erika is a powerful healing card
  • Lilligant is a good energy provider
• Cons
  • Lacks major firepower
  • Dependent on good draws
  • Fire decks are common right now

Marowak ex deck

A good budget and beginner deck for Pokemon TCG Pocket, this fighting-type Marowak ex deck is simple in concept and execution.

• Cubone x2
• Marowak ex x2
• Diglett x2
• Dugtrio x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Potion x2
• X Speed x2
• Sabrina x2
• Giovanni x2
• Professor's Research x2

There's been a few variants of this deck floating around, using regular Marowaks, Kabutops, Primeape and Hitmonlee (among others), but this is our preferred build. Both Dugtrio and Marowak ex have strong early game performances, but are also pretty reliant on chance, with a lot of coin flips. Marowak ex does 80 damage for each head in two coin flips (meaning somewhere between 0 and 160), while Dugtrio has a 50% chance to become invulnerable to all damage and effects for a turn, every turn. I've won games on the strength of that latter ability alone. Not to mention that with so many people running Pikachu ex and electric type decks, this serves as a good counter.

It's not perfect though. Marowak ex's reliance on chance means that you can get ruined by some bad coin flips, and the deck lacks heavy, dependable firepower. The key here is to do heavy damage in the early game, and hope your opponent can't recover.

• Pros
  • Strong early game
  • Good counter against the common electric decks
  • When coin flips go your way, you're unstoppable!
• Cons
  • Weak late game
  • Lacks massive damage options
  • When coin flips don't go your way, you're in trouble...

Koga deck

This dark-type poison deck budget friendly, yet demands a veteran's experience, all about control and careful manipulation of the battlefield, poisoning the opponent and whittling them down instead of utilizing single-hit super-attacks. Here's the most commonly used deck build in the meta right now:

• Koffing x2
• Weezing x2
• Ekans x2
• Arbok x2
• Poke Ball x2
• Potion x2
• X Speed x2
• Koga x2
• Sabrina x2
• Professor's Research x2

This one is a little tricky to learn and get the hang of, but there's a lot of potential, especially to counter the common Mewtwo psychic deck that's dominating the meta. You bring out Koffing and Weezing for a strong, cheap early game tank that poisons the enemy, then use Koga to pull them back to your hand for free when you're ready (healing them in the process). With the enemy poisoned, you bring in Arbok, forcing them to stay on the battlefield as the active Pokemon, as Arbok's "Corner" attack disables the ability to retreat.

It's very based on control, and if the opponent does manage to bring their wounded Pokemon back to the bench, you use Sabrina to get them back out. It's a deck that's good at disrupting strategies, though it lacks heavy damage and usually falters in the late game.

• Pros
  • Budget friendly, no ex cards requires
  • Powerful early game
  • Counters the psychic Mewtwo meta
• Cons
  • No heavy firepower
  • Struggles against tanky cards
  • Weak late game

Of course, if you're focused more on form over function, find out how the Pokemon TCG Pocket flair system works and how to add cosmetics to your cards here!

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission