Pokémon celebrated its 30th anniversary on 27 February 2026, marking three decades since the popular games were first released in Japan. The franchise was created by Satoshi Tajiri, with help from illustrator Ken Sugimori, and has grown into one of the world’s most successful entertainment brands.
Satoshi Tajiri loved exploring forests and collecting insects as a child, and this inspired his idea for Pocket Monsters, later known as Pokémon. In 1989, he and his friends turned their magazine, Game Freak, into a video game company. After years of hard work, the first Pocket Monsters games were released on 27 February 1996 for the Game Boy in Japan. Players could connect their consoles with a cable to trade Pokémon with friends.
The games were a huge success and were later released in the United States and the United Kingdom as Pokémon Red and Blue. Over the years, many new generations of games have been launched, including Gold and Silver, Ruby and Sapphire, and most recently Scarlet and Violet. There are now more than 1,000 different Pokémon for players to discover. By March 2025, the games had sold more than 489 million copies worldwide.
Pokémon quickly expanded beyond video games. In October 1996, the first Pokémon Trading Card Game set was released, and the cards soon became extremely popular. Today, more than 30 billion cards have been printed, and rare ones can sell for very high prices.
