Pokémon Surging Sparks Most Expensive Cards

2024 ended with a blast for the Pokémon Trading Card Game with the release of Surging Sparks in November, an expansion filled with beautiful artwork and game-relevant cards. Pokémon Surging Sparks was not only the latest set released in the Pokémon TCG: Scarlet & Violet but it is also a very interesting set filled with Electric and Dragon-type Pokémon, Stellar Tera Pokémon ex cards, and ACE SPEC cards to bring terawatts of energy to your collection.

Surging Sparks: main set characteristics and collectible value

Surging Sparks is in fact, one of the largest set ever released in the TCG, featuring more than 250 cards including 18 Pokemon Ex cards, 21 Full Art cards and 8 ACE SPEC cards. On top of this, Surging Sparks includes 23 Illustration Rare cards, 11 Special Illustration Rare and 6 Hyper Rare Gold cards that contribute to the collectible value of this set. However, the size of the set and the number of Rare cards in it, make also more difficult to pull the most interesting cards from the Surging Spark boosters and to complete the set. For collectors, Surging Sparks is indeed loaded with a lot of chase cards, with the Special Illustration Rare version of Pikachu ex being the most sought after card of the set for sure. Pikachu ex is also actually a very good card in competitive play and this explains why the value of this card has been quit high since its first release in Japan.

As it usually happens, however, the value of the cards from Pokémon Surging Sparks have now began to stabilize considering we are fast approaching the release of the long-await first set of 2025, “Prismatic Evolutions”. The collectible value of the set is still quite good but we can now see clearly which cards are still holding their ground on the secondary market and have the potential to offer a long term value to collectors. With this in mind, we thought of summarizing the five Surging Sparks cards that still have the highest value and that you may want to consider for your collection. Spoiler alert: Pikachu ex is obviously among the 5 Most Expensive Cards as expected....

The five Most expensive cards in the set

The list of the five most expensive cards in Surging Sparks can only start from Pikachu ex. This card ticked all the right boxes to be a super-sought after card considering it features a very iconic Pokemon, it has a stunning art (more below) and, most important, it can be actually played efficiently in the current metagame. As such, both collectors and players have been after this card since the release explaining why its value has been incredibly high since the first release of the set.

Pikachu ex can actually be pulled as a Gold Hyper Rare and as an Illustration Rare. Both variants are among the five most expensive cards from this set, although the Illustration Rare (SSP 238) is the most valuable one fetching almost four times the value of the Gold Hyper Rare card SSP 247. This discrepancy in value seems quite weird as Gold Hyper Rare cards have a higher rarity than Special Illustration Rare cards. However, the large amount of Illustration Rare in Surging Sparks and the very different artwork used on SSP 238 with respect of 247 are both contributing factors in the making SSP 238 the most expensive Pokemon card of 2024 and the best card to collect from this set.

In terms of gameplay, Pikachu ex is an impressive powerhouse able to deal 300 damage with its Topaz Bolt attack. This attack requires however three specific energy types in order to be used (grass, metal and electric) and it comes at the cost of discarding all energy attached to the Pokemon. There are a few ways of course to keep Pikachu charged and ready, including the ability of the new Magneton card “Overvolt Discharge” that can move three energy cards from the discard pile onto any Electric-type Pokémon knocking this last one off. Pikachu ex seems designed to combo with Magneton due to its ability “Resolute Heart”, which prevents Ash's favourite Pokemon to remain with 10 HP every time it should be knocked out with a single blow.

The second most expensive card from Surging Sparks is the Special Illustration Rare Latias ex that is still sold today for over £100 on Cardmarket. Latias ex SSP 239 features a really beautiful artwork that matches the one on Latios ex (SSP 203) to create an amazing connected art depicting the two legendary siblings soaring through the skies against the sunset. Among the two, Latias ex has a higher rarity and the higher value with respect to her blue counterpart.

In addition, players really want to get their hands on Latias ex to exploit its “Skyliner Ability” that grants zero retreat cost to any Basic Pokemon in play. This card is rapidly becoming a must in decks like the Raging Bolt ex-one, where all the Pokémon are Basic or in the ones that rely on moving your Pokémon to play specific attacks or combos like those that include Iron Valiant ex or Gouging Fire ex.

In third place in order of value we then have another Illustration rare: Milotic ex. This evolution of the water Pokémon Feebas showcases both a particularly impressive artwork and a widely versatile set of abilities in game. In fact, I personally think the very whimsical rendering of Milotic in SSP 237 is among the best artwork for this Pokemon and one of the cards I love the most in the entire set. It also perfectly matches the artwork on the Feebas card in the same set making these two cards a beauty to display together (if you pull them both of course). Milotic is also a pretty cool card to play with its 160 damage attack and the ability to avoid any damage from abilities and attack from Tera Pokémons. Not a meta defying card of course, but a really option to consider in Water-based decks.

Not surprisingly, the last of the five more expensive card of the set is another Special Illustration rare, Hydreigon ex. In this case, Akira Egawa did an amazing work showing off Hydreigon ex in a very chaotic rainbow of colours that matches the Terastallized form of this Pokemon. This three-headed Dragon Pokemon is also a deadly opponent with a 330 HP and two different attacks. The first one, “Crashing Headbutt”, does 200 damage and discards the top three cards of the opponent’s deck while the second one “Obsidian”, does 130 damage plus another 130 damage to two of your opponent’s benched Pokémon. This last attack quite matches the idea of the three heads taking a bite at your opponent. Although powering up this Pokemon may take three different energy types, we should remember we can pair it up with another Hydreigon from Paldea Evolved and use its Tri Howl ability to look at the top three cards of the deck to attach any energy to your Pokemons.

Other notable cards in Surging Sparks

As mentioned previously, Surging Sparks features a large number of Special Illustration rare cards and all these cards have good collectible value. Excluding the first most expensive cards mentioned in the previous section, there are at least 6 more cards with value ranging from £40 to £20 on the secondary market. Among these we can count a few very nice Pokemon Latios (mentioned previously), Alolan Exeggutor ex and Durant ex and two trainer cards, Lisia's Appeal and Jasmine's Gaze. The two trainer cards have actually being solidly among the most expensive cards from this set since the pre-release. Lisia's Appeal's value in particular skyrocketed in US after release to then settle to a more reasonable value a few weeks after.

Some Final thoughts

Overall, I think it should be pretty clear why Surging Sparks is considered a very collectible set. The size of the collection and the amount of Illustration Rare together with the gorgeous art work on these cards are some of the main factors that contribute in making this set one of the most sought after by collectors. For those that may still need to chase the cards from the set, we would like to strongly recommend to consider the value per pack of different products to help maximizing your chances of obtaining the best value out of your set. Although it seems obvious that booster packs are not usually the most cost-effective way to pull chase cards compared to booster boxes, or even 3-pack blisters, the various sale offers we saw recently for the end of the year may have contributed in creating some very good opportunities to boost your collection. If (or when) you have a well established collection, purchasing single cards will then be a more cost-effective approach in particular if you consider the current offers on Magic Madhouse and their standard free shipping for any order over £30.  

One aspect we usually don't mention is also the need to source the proper accessories to store your cards. For those that may have just started getting into Pokemon TCG, we are talking of clear sleeves for your collection, coloured sleeves for your playing deck, top-loaders, boxes and card binder for your collection and bulk cards. All these accessories are critical for both collectors and players to ensure your valuable cards are protected and safe from damage and wear. We usually don't remind to always keep an eye out for all the accessories you need but we thought about mentioning this topic as the New Year sales may also offer some good opportunities to stock-up on accessories.