List series
The blocks that group sets — Base, EX, Sword & Shield, Scarlet & Violet — with the number of sets in each.
/v1/series1 creditfree planCache-Control: public, max-age=86400
No key yet? One call gets you one: POST /v1/accounts/free with an Idempotency-Key header and your email address returns a working key in the response. Keep the original Idempotency-Key and body for response replay for up to 24 hours, under the conditions in the quickstart. The trial is 800 credits over 30 days once the address is confirmed, no card; paid plans start at 29 € a month. See the quickstart and the pricing.
Seventeen rows, so the whole list fits in one page. id is the slug, and it is the value GET /v1/sets?series= accepts — as does the name, because whichever one you stored should work.
Query parameters
| Name | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
orderBy | string | -set_count | set_count, name or slug, with a leading - for descending. Every order ends on slug as the tiebreaker. |
order_by | string | — | Accepted snake_case spelling of orderBy; the same sort keys and cursor rules apply. |
limit | integer | 50 | Rows per page, 1 to 250. Card and sealed lists cost 1 credit per 50 rows requested, rounded up: 50 costs 1, 51 costs 2, 250 costs 5, so ask for multiples of 50. Above 250 you get LIMIT_EXCEEDED — follow links.next instead of raising it. |
cursor | string | — | Opaque keyset cursor from links.next. Never construct one; it carries the sort order it was issued for and is rejected if orderBy changes mid-run. |
Headers
| Name | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
X-Api-Key required | string | — | Your API key. Authorization: Bearer <key> is accepted as an alias. |
If-None-Match | string | — | Send back the ETag you stored. The API returns a strong ETag on every catalogue response, and a 304 is a header exchange: no body, no database row read. |
Example request
curl -s -G "https://api.pokemontcgapi.com/v1/series" \
--data-urlencode "limit=3" \
-H "X-Api-Key: $PTCG_API_KEY"Example response
200 OK · Cache-Control: public, max-age=86400
{
"data": [
{
"id": "sword-shield",
"slug": "sword-shield",
"name": "Sword & Shield",
"set_count": 22
},
{
"id": "ex",
"slug": "ex",
"name": "EX",
"set_count": 20
},
{
"id": "scarlet-violet",
"slug": "scarlet-violet",
"name": "Scarlet & Violet",
"set_count": 18
}
],
"meta": {
"limit": 3,
"count": 3,
"total_count": 17,
"has_more": true
},
"links": {
"next": "https://api.pokemontcgapi.com/v1/series?cursor=eyJrIjpbMThdLCJpZCI6InNjYXJsZXQtdmlvbGV0IiwicyI6InNldF9jb3VudDpkZXNjLHNsdWc6YXNjIn0&limit=3"
}
}Errors
Every error body carries error.code, error.message and error.request_id. Switch on the code, never on the message.
| Status | Code | When |
|---|---|---|
| 401 | MISSING_API_KEY | No X-Api-Key header and no bearer token on a route that requires one. |
| 401 | INVALID_API_KEY | The key does not match any account. |
| 400 | INVALID_PARAMETER | A query parameter has the wrong type or an unsupported value — a non-integer limit, an unknown lang, an unknown region, a sort key that is not sortable. |
| 400 | INVALID_CURSOR | The cursor is malformed, or was issued for a different orderBy than the one on this request. |
| 400 | LIMIT_EXCEEDED | limit is above 250, or a batch request carries more than 100 ids. |
| 429 | QUOTA_EXCEEDED | Trial credits, monthly credits or the daily cap are exhausted, and details says which: daily_cap with retry_after_s is the trial daily cap, which resets at midnight UTC; renews: true with resets_at is the monthly quota of a paid plan; renews: false is the trial allowance, which never comes back. details.next_step carries the plan, prices and owner action, or email verification when it unlocks the full trial. |
| 403 | PLAN_REQUIRED | The feature is outside the plan (movers require Growth; photo recognition has 5 calls after Free email confirmation, then requires Growth), or the account subscription is canceled or suspended. Centering requires Growth or higher; Developer is excluded. After email confirmation the trial includes 5 measure and 5 confirm calls independently; grade and standards use trial credits without separate call counters. Before email confirmation, the message starts with “Confirm your email…”. Follow details.next_step when present. |
| 403 | TRIAL_EXPIRED | The trial has ended: the account is on the trial and its 30 days from signup are over, and this route costs credits. details.trial_expired_at is the date, details.trial_days the length, and details.next_step the owner handoff. Zero-cost routes — /v1/me, /v1/me/usage, the key routes and /v1/billing/checkout — still answer. |
The full taxonomy, with what to do about each code, is on the errors page.