Pokemon Pitch Black UK: Where to Buy

Pokemon Pitch Black hit UK shelves on Friday 17 July 2026, and the run-up was messy. When Pokemon Center UK opened preorders on 10 June, launch-day traffic crashed the site. Four Mega Evolution sets had already sold through in this country, and Pitch Black went the same way. This guide maps every UK route to Pitch Black, what the sell-out picture looks like, and which sealed format to pick if you can only secure one.

The UK Release at a Glance

Pitch Black is the fifth main set of the Mega Evolution era, adapted from Japan's Abyss Eye expansion, and carries the set code ME05. The set runs an 84-card main sheet plus 36 secret rares, 120 cards in all: six Mega Evolution Pokemon ex, four Pokemon ex, eleven Illustration Rares, eighteen Ultra Rares, six Special Illustration Rares and a single gold Mega Hyper Rare. Mega Darkrai ex is the mascot and the runaway chase, with Mega Zeraora ex, Mega Chandelure ex and Mega Excadrill ex in support.

Prerelease events ran at local game stores from 4 to 12 July, where Build & Battle Boxes went on sale ahead of street date. Pokemon TCG Live added the set digitally on 16 July, and sealed retail product arrived on the 17th. For card-level detail, the full set breakdown lives in our Pitch Black set guide. This page is about actually getting the product.

Where to Buy Pokemon Pitch Black in the UK

Is there an official Pokemon shop in the UK? Yes, but it is online only: Pokemon Center UK is The Pokemon Company's own store, and it is the sole source of the Pokemon Center exclusive Elite Trainer Box, which carries eleven packs instead of the retail nine plus a Pokemon Center-stamped Zarude promo. That version never reaches the high street.

On the high street, Smyths, Argos and GAME all carry Mega Evolution era product. Smyths and Argos were the most dependable on launch day, with Argos click-and-collect the fastest way to a box on 17 July where a local store showed stock, while GAME's allocation varied branch to branch. Amazon UK ran invite-request queues on Elite Trainer Boxes rather than open listings, a lottery rather than a plan. Those are still the routes to watch for restocks and for the next set.

Specialist card shops are the other route: Total Cards, Chaos Cards, Magic Madhouse, Collectors Edge and Wayland Games all ran Pitch Black preorder windows from June, and specialists are where what remains of UK sealed stock tends to surface now.

Evol Vault's Pitch Black allocation covered the Pokemon Center exclusive ETB, the 36-pack booster box and the six-pack bundle, all factory sealed and sourced directly from Pokemon Center UK. It has since sold through, as every Mega Evolution era allocation has, so drop alerts are the route to a restock.

Has Pitch Black Sold Out?

At source, yes. Pokemon Center UK's preorder window buckled under traffic on day one and its allocation went the way every previous Mega Evolution set's did. High-street stock survived a little longer, rarely past the first weekend. As of October 2026, what is left sits with specialists and the secondary market, and the Pokemon Center exclusive ETB is the hardest of the three formats to find.

Our own allocation was deliberately small and has sold through; any restock depends on what Pokemon Center releases after launch. If you land here late, sign up for drop alerts and you will hear about the next window before it opens to everyone else.

Pitch Black ETB: Pokemon Center vs Standard Retail

There are two Pitch Black Elite Trainer Boxes, and most searches for the ETB are really asking which one. They are not the same box.

The Pokemon Center ETB carries two Zarude promos, one stamped; the standard retail ETB has the unstamped card only.

	Pokemon Center ETB	Standard ETB
Booster packs	11	9
Zarude promo cards	2, one with the Pokemon Center stamp	1
Card sleeves	65	65
Energy cards	40	40
Dice	6 damage-counter dice, 1 coin-flip die	6 damage-counter dice, 1 coin-flip die
Coin	1 plastic coin	1 plastic coin
Player's guide (booklet)	Yes	Yes
Collector's box	With 6 dividers	With 6 dividers
Pokemon TCG Live code card	Yes	Yes
Chance of at least one Special Illustration Rare	About 9 to 13%	About 7 to 11%
Where to buy	Pokemon Center UK only, then the secondary market	High street and specialists

Each booster pack holds 10 cards plus a basic Energy and a code card.

The stamped Zarude is the part that cannot be bought any other way, and it is the reason the Pokemon Center version holds a premium over the retail box on the secondary market. Both carry the same player's guide booklet, so if the booklet is what you are after, either ETB gets you one and the booster box and bundle do not. To see what eleven packs actually buys you in odds terms against nine, our pull rate calculator runs the per-card numbers for Pitch Black.

ETB, Booster Box or Bundle: Which to Get

The Pokemon Center ETB, the 36-pack booster box and the six-pack booster bundle.

The Pokemon Center exclusive Elite Trainer Box is the collector's format. Eleven Pitch Black packs, 65 Mega Darkrai sleeves, and two Zarude foil promos, one stamped with the Pokemon Center logo, a print that exists only in this box. If Pitch Black is going on a shelf rather than into a binder, this is the version that holds attention.

The booster box is 36 packs, 360 set cards, and the format set builders default to. Nothing else matches a sealed display for pack volume or pull consistency, and with Pitch Black's compact card pool the box takes you most of the way to a main-set completion in one purchase.

Six packs make the booster bundle the lightest entry point. Same packs, same odds, no accessories. If you want Pitch Black in hand without committing three figures, the bundle is the honest answer, and our bundle vs booster box comparison covers when stepping up is worth it.

What You're Chasing

Mega Darkrai ex carries the set with two premium prints: a Special Illustration Rare illustrated by Akira Egawa (#116) and the set's gold Mega Hyper Rare (#120). Only six Special Illustration Rares exist in the whole expansion, so the chase is unusually concentrated for a modern set. Beyond Darkrai, the secondary tier leans on the Morpeko ex, Gwynn and Gladion's Final Battle Special Illustration Rares rather than the supporting Megas. If you are weighing Pitch Black against the sets landing later this year, 30th Celebration arrived on 16 September 2026 and Delta Reign lands on 6 November, and our UK preorder guide shows what is open right now.