The vocabulary, explained.

A card with a foil treatment applied to the artwork. The standard holo is usually the base version of a rare card in modern sets.

The opposite arrangement: the card body is foiled and the artwork window is not. A separate collectable from the non-holo version, with its own price, and frequently confused with it.

A printing where the artwork extends across the entire card, with text overlaid rather than boxed. Typically a higher rarity than the standard version.

Entirely different artwork from the standard card, usually at high rarity. Because it carries its own card number it is a different card, not a variant — which is why prices diverge so sharply.

A card numbered beyond the printed set total, so a set of 200 might contain cards numbered 201 and upward. Deliberately scarce and usually priced accordingly.

An alternative treatment of an existing card — a different foil pattern, a stamp, or a border change — sharing the artwork but distinguished by a small visual marker.

A card distributed outside normal booster packs, through events, tie-ins or product bundles. Scarcity varies enormously, from mass-distributed to genuinely rare.

Cards from the initial print run of a set, marked as such. Where the marking exists, first edition copies usually command a significant premium over later printings.

The fraction on the card, such as 58/165. The most reliable way to identify exactly which printing you are holding, and the thing to check before trusting a price.

A small mark or short code identifying which release a card belongs to. Essential when the same character appears across many sets at different values.

A card with a production fault — miscut, missing foil, wrong text. Some errors are collectable and valuable; most are simply damaged goods, and the difference is whether other collectors recognise the error as a known variety.

Unopened boosters, boxes and bundles. Priced and traded separately from singles, and often followed by collectors who never intend to open it.

Abbreviations on the European ladder: Near Mint, Excellent, Good, Light Played, Played and Poor, with Mint above them. Covered in detail in the condition guide.

How evenly the printed image sits inside the borders. Rarely affects a marketplace label, and one of the biggest factors in what grade a card receives.

Pale wear at corners and edges where the card's white core shows through the printed surface. Far more visible on dark-bordered cards than light ones.

A faint line in the card's surface from the printing process rather than from handling. Visible in reflected light and counted against surface quality by graders.

A card sealed in a tamper-evident case by a grading company, carrying a numeric grade and an authentication verdict.

Separate scores for centring, corners, edges and surface, shown alongside an overall grade by some companies. More information for buyers, which helps a strong card and exposes a borderline one.

The label attached to the top numeric grade. The threshold is strict, and the price gap between it and one grade down is often the largest on the whole scale.

A grading company's published count of how many copies of a card it has graded at each grade. Useful for judging genuine scarcity at a given condition.

Submitting an already-graded card to a different company for regrading, usually to chase a better-recognised slab or a higher number.

A general term for what comparable copies are currently trading at. Not an appraisal of your specific card, and not an offer.

A smoothed average across recent activity, used as a headline figure. More reliable than the cheapest listing, which is one seller in one condition shipping from somewhere possibly inconvenient.

Comparable completed sales for the same card, printing and condition. The closest thing to evidence in card pricing, and the reason completed sales matter more than active listings.

The gap between two prices for the same card — most often between a raw copy and the same card in a slab, which is the number the grading decision rests on.

How easily a card sells at close to its market price. Two cards can show the same figure while one sells daily and the other has not moved in a month, and only one of those prices is actionable.

How often a card has actually changed hands over a recent window, as distinct from how many copies are listed. Listings show supply; sales show demand.

Low-value cards traded by volume rather than individually, because postage on a single common exceeds what anyone will pay for it.

The chance that a card's scarcity is undone by being reprinted in a future set. A structural risk on modern cards that essentially does not apply to vintage.

A sharp short-term price rise, usually driven by tournament results, media attention or a supply shock. Spikes frequently retrace, which is why history matters more than today's number.

The average value of the contents of a sealed product, weighted by the odds of pulling each card. Generally below the product's retail price, which is how the business works.