Drawpie Explainers

Pokémon McDonald's Happy Meal 2026: What's Inside and How to Get It

By Kimi · October 30, 2026 · 7 min read
Pokémon McDonald's Happy Meal 2026: What's Inside and How to Get It
Photo by Anne Laure P on Unsplash
Key takeaways
  • McDonald’s and The Pokémon Company announced the Pokémon Happy Meal on Thursday, Oct. 29, 2026. It starts Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026, at participating US restaurants, for a limited time while supplies last.
  • Each Happy Meal comes in one of three box designs (Pikachu, Umbreon or Torchic) and contains one of 15 toys, each a mini Happy Meal box designed after a Pokémon, plus two random Pokémon Trading Card Game cards.
  • The card collection has 15 cards, seven of them foil, and a QR code on the box opens a game where players look for all 15 toys in a virtual classroom and playground.
  • ⚠️ The card list is disputed: Pokémon’s own Oct. 29 post showed a checklist that TheGamer says was quickly taken down, and PokeGuardian says two different 15-card sets have surfaced. Two of the 15 toys are also reported differently.
  • ⚠️ Price, end date, purchase limits, app bonuses and whether toys or cards are sold separately have not been announced. A Dec. 14 end date comes only from leaks.
  • Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, France and Spain also get the promotion in November 2026; the UK and Ireland wait until February 2027. In Quebec, kids get a sticker and a four-card booster pack instead of the toy.

The Pokémon McDonald’s Happy Meal starts Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026, at participating McDonald’s restaurants across the US, for a limited time while supplies last. Each Pokémon Happy Meal comes in one of three boxes (Pikachu, Umbreon or Torchic) and holds one of 15 mini Happy Meal box toys plus two random Pokémon Trading Card Game cards. The price, the end date and the final card list have not been officially confirmed.

McDonald’s and The Pokémon Company announced the promotion on Thursday, Oct. 29, as part of Pokémon’s 30th anniversary. Everything below was checked at 1:30 p.m. ET (17:30 UTC) on Friday, Oct. 30, 2026, and anything that comes only from leaks is labeled as reported.

What is the 2026 Pokémon McDonald’s Happy Meal?

It is McDonald’s US Happy Meal promotion for Pokémon’s 30th anniversary, announced by both companies on Oct. 29, 2026. McDonald’s summed it up on X as three boxes, 15 toys and two cards with every collectible, “coming 11.10.26”, and The Pokémon Company published the details in a news post the same day.

The big change is the toy. Mashable says this rollout is the first time since 2018 that customers get a genuine 3D collectible toy with playable cards. Early leaks in September described a different setup, and the official announcement replaced them.

What’s inside a Pokémon Happy Meal?

Each Happy Meal comes with one box design, one mini-box toy and two Pokémon TCG cards, plus a QR code for a digital game. According to Pokémon’s announcement and launch coverage:

  • The box: the meal is served in one of three Happy Meal box designs, themed after Pikachu, Umbreon or Torchic.
  • The toy: one of 15 toys, each a miniature Happy Meal box designed after a Pokémon. Essential Japan reports that the back opens into a small frame for displaying a card. McDonald’s executive Guillaume Huin posted on X that the mini boxes can also be clipped on as charms.
  • The cards: two random Pokémon Trading Card Game cards. The collection has 15 cards in total, and seven of them are foil.
  • The game: a QR code on the box opens a digital game where players look for all 15 toys hidden around a virtual classroom and playground.

Neither company has announced any change to the food itself. McDonald’s has not said whether a particular toy or card can be chosen; Pokémon’s post describes the cards as ones you “might find”.

Which Pokémon are the 15 mini-box toys?

Thirteen of the 15 toys match in every report we checked, but the last two are reported differently. Pokémon’s own post names only Pikachu, Rowlet and Sprigatito as examples and says there are 15 toys.

The 13 names that Essential Japan, Mashable and a leaked restaurant photo (described by Sole Retriever) agree on:

  • Pikachu, Bulbasaur, Charmander and Squirtle
  • Weedle, Eevee, Munchlax and Minccino
  • Piplup, Espurr, Rowlet, Sobble and Sprigatito

For the last two, Essential Japan and the leaked restaurant photo list Torchic and Umbreon, while Mashable lists Chikorita and Espeon. Until restaurants start handing them out on Nov. 10, treat both pairs as unconfirmed.

Which Pokémon cards are in the Happy Meal?

The card list is disputed, so no list here should be treated as the confirmed contents. What is official is the shape of the set: 15 cards, seven of them foil, with two random cards in each meal.

The confusion started with Pokémon’s own announcement. Its Oct. 29 post showed a 15-card checklist, and TheGamer and PokeGuardian report that those cards carry an M27 stamp, which points to next year’s set. TheGamer says the post was quickly taken down. TheGamer, citing the leak account PokeTCGAlerts, reports a different 15-card list that it expects in US Happy Meals this year, mostly reprints of existing cards. PokeGuardian says two different 15-card sets have surfaced and that it is unknown how they will be distributed.

  • On both reported lists: Pikachu, Eevee and Snorlax.
  • From McDonald’s side: Dexerto reports that a photo posted by Guillaume Huin shows Jirachi, Pikachu and Absol among the cards.

If Pokémon re-posts a corrected checklist, that will settle it. Until then, the only safe answer is the set size and the foil count.

How do you get a Pokémon Happy Meal in the US?

Order a Happy Meal at a participating McDonald’s in the US from Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026, while supplies last. That is the whole of the official instruction. A few practical points follow from the wording:

  • Check that your restaurant is taking part. The announcement says “participating McDonald’s”, so not every location is guaranteed to have it. Asking your local restaurant is the most reliable check.
  • Expect stock to vary. “While supplies last” means a restaurant can run out of toys, cards or particular box designs before the promotion ends.
  • Don’t count on choosing. Nothing official says you can pick a specific toy, box or card.

McDonald’s other November launches, including new holiday drinks, are in our McDonald’s holiday menu guide .

What hasn’t McDonald’s announced yet?

McDonald’s has not announced a price, an end date, purchase limits or any app bonus for the 2026 Pokémon Happy Meal. As of 1:30 p.m. ET (17:30 UTC) on Oct. 30, 2026, these are open questions:

  • Price: none was announced. Happy Meal prices vary by restaurant, so check your local menu.
  • End date: officially only “for a limited time while supplies last”. A Dec. 14 end date has been reported, originally from leaks credited to PokeBeach and repeated by Sole Retriever, but McDonald’s has not confirmed it.
  • Buying toys or cards separately: not addressed in anything official.
  • Purchase limits: none announced.
  • App or delivery extras: none announced for 2026. The 2025 promotion had an app-order bonus for Pokémon TCG Pocket, but that was last year’s offer.
  • Start time: no time of day was given for Nov. 10.

When does it reach Canada, Australia, the UK and other countries?

The official schedule gives only a month for each country: November 2026 for the first wave, February 2027 for the UK and Ireland. Only the US has an official day so far.

  • November 2026: the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, France and Spain. TheGamer reports Nov. 3 for Canada and Nov. 5 for Australia; neither date has been officially announced.
  • Quebec exception: kids in Quebec get no mini-box toy; they receive a Pokémon sticker and a booster pack of four Pokémon TCG cards instead.
  • December 2026: 43 markets, including Germany, Hong Kong, Singapore and South Africa.
  • January 2027: 23 markets, including Brazil, Mexico, Italy, the Philippines and Thailand.
  • February 2027: the UK and Ireland.

Has McDonald’s done Pokémon Happy Meals in the US before?

Yes, several times, most recently in early 2025. For the 25th anniversary in 2021, Happy Meals came with packs of Pokémon cards in Pikachu boxes (Fox Business). A 2022 run with cards, spinners, coins and books was set to last until Sept. 26, 2022 (My Nintendo News). The 2025 promotion started Jan. 21 and was scheduled to run through late February or while supplies lasted, with a four-card booster pack, a poster, a sticker sheet and four box designs (Boston Globe).

Demand can be intense: Scripps News reports that a similar promotion in Japan last year sold out within hours. For the rest of the anniversary, including cards and events, see our Pokémon 30th anniversary guide .

Sources

How we verified this

The announcement and the US start date rest on McDonald’s own X post and on The Pokémon Company’s news post as quoted by outlets. We read the @McDonalds post (posted 14:04 UTC on Oct. 29, 2026) through X’s public embed lookup; it reads “3 boxes. 15 toys. 2 cards with every collectible. Pokémon Happy Meal coming 11.10.26”, which in US date style is Nov. 10, 2026. Pokémon.com and McDonald’s own pages (corporate, US, Canada and Australia) returned a bot wall or HTTP 403 to every tool we used, so we could not read the official pages directly. We read Pokémon’s wording as quoted verbatim by GoNintendo (Oct. 29) and PokeGuardian (Oct. 29): three boxes themed after Pikachu, Umbreon or Torchic, 15 mini-box toys, two TCG cards per meal, 15 cards in total including seven foil cards, the Quebec exception, the month-by-month country schedule, and “limited time while supplies last at participating McDonald’s”. Mashable, Essential Japan and Dexerto report the Nov. 10 US start at participating restaurants (nationwide, per Mashable and Dexerto), and Scripps News reports the same date.

The toy list is only partly settled. Essential Japan, Mashable and a leaked restaurant photo described by Sole Retriever agree on 13 names. Essential Japan and Sole Retriever list Torchic and Umbreon as the other two; Mashable lists Chikorita and Espeon (we re-read Mashable’s list on Oct. 30). Pokémon’s post names only Pikachu, Rowlet and Sprigatito. We print the 13 agreed names and flag both versions of the last two. The card-frame detail comes from Essential Japan. The charm detail comes from an X post by Guillaume Huin (15:32 UTC Oct. 29), which we read through the same embed lookup and which Dexerto also reports. Huin’s account carries a McDonald’s business-affiliation badge, and the Boston Globe and Fox Business (January 2025) identified him as McDonald’s senior marketing director; we call him a McDonald’s executive because we have no current title for him.

The card list is contested, so no list is printed as the contents. TheGamer and PokeGuardian report that the checklist in Pokémon’s Oct. 29 post carried M27 set numbering; TheGamer says the post was quickly taken down, and its own wording is hedged (“appears to have revealed”). PokeGuardian does not report a takedown; it says two different sets of 15 cards have been revealed and that it is unknown how they will be distributed. TheGamer, citing PokeTCGAlerts, reports a different 15-card list for this year’s US meals. Pikachu, Eevee and Snorlax appear on both reported lists, which is the only reason they are named. The Jirachi, Pikachu and Absol photo is Dexerto’s description of Huin’s post. “Seven foil cards out of 15” is set composition only; nothing here should be read as odds.

Everything we call unannounced is a negative finding. None of the official wording we could read, and none of the reports we checked, gives a price, an end date, purchase limits, an app or delivery bonus, a change to the food, or separate sale of toys or cards. The Dec. 14 end date appears in Sole Retriever (Oct. 27) and earlier leak coverage credited to PokeBeach; it is presented as reported only. Canada Nov. 3 and Australia Nov. 5 come from TheGamer (Oct. 29) only; officially both countries are listed as November 2026, and Dexerto says no dates outside the US have been announced. The count of 43 December markets and 23 January markets is our own count of the list as GoNintendo reproduces it.

History comes from contemporaneous reports, stated as plans where that is all they give. The 2025 details are from the Boston Globe (Jan. 22, 2025), which said the meals would be available through February or while supplies last, and Fox Business; the 2021 25th-anniversary cards are from Fox Business; the 2022 run is from My Nintendo News (Aug. 16, 2022), which said it would last until Sept. 26. Mashable’s “first time since 2018” line is attributed to Mashable. The Japan sellout line is attributed to Scripps News (Oct. 30, 2026). No card values or resale prices are used anywhere.

Checked between 17:25 and 17:40 UTC (1:25 to 1:40 p.m. EDT) on Friday, Oct. 30, 2026. A Google News search over the previous day found no change to the official details. The article contains no betting odds, no prediction-market data and no price forecasts.