Pokémon’s 2026 World Championships begin tomorrow, and trainers from all over are descending on San Francisco ready to find out who is the very best.
We’re obviously excited for the TCG tournament. In preparation, let’s take a look at the five decks favoured to come top of the tables.
Dragapult
The favored deck ever since rotation took everything else at its level out of the running, Dragapult is absolutely guaranteed to be the most popular deck at Worlds and it isn’t even close. While I’m hoping we see different decks come out on top, you should be prepared for the distinct possibility of a Dragapult mirror match in the final. A combination of one of the best attacks in the game’s history, plus a fantastic draw engine on Drakloak makes this the obvious pick for the championships.
There are three main Dragapult variants to choose from. Pure Dragapult, which only uses the dragon type as the attacker, with extra support cards like Dundunsparce, and Munkidoris to deal a little bit of extra damage to the bench.
Then there’s Dragapult/Dusknoir, which uses the ghost’s self-sacrificing ability combined with Phantom Dive to one-shot tanky Pokémon or snipe low-HP exes on the bench.
Finally there’s Dragapult/Blaziken, which provides a great alternative attacker in the kicking chicken, which can melt grass or metal decks and provide shelter from Lily’s Clefairy. This build could be particularly promising this time around if Mega Excadrill proves popular.
N’s Zoroark
While Dragapult will probably make up 40-50% of the Worlds meta, N’s Zoroark provides a tempting alternative for pro players who want to do something different. Utilizing other N’s Pokémon’s attacks, you can dish out a nasty 250 damage using N’s Zekrom or borrow Darmanitan’s fists to punch the bench for 90 and KO a Drakloak.
The deck also gets to use some fun Darkness-type tech cards like Yveltal to retreat-lock, or Pecharunt paired with Binding Mochi for free switching and extra damage. There’s also a recent streak of using Drapion to set up debilitating conditions, but this seems less tried and tested.
Slowking
Slowking is coming to Worlds with a lot of hype behind it. This is another Pokémon that borrows other card’s attacks, but rather than having them on the bench, Slowking takes its attack from the top card on your deck.
While this requires a good amount of set-up and can sometimes go to pieces if the gameplan doesn’t come together, there are enough tools to make this a surprisingly consistent deck.
You’re not limited to N’s Pokémon like Zoroark is, which means you can borrow some truly outrageous attacks, spreading damage around, striking the active spot for 300 or the bench for 200+. You’re a single prize deck, so when you’re knocking out Mega Evolutions with a single swing, the prize card disparity is absurd.
Festival Lead
Another solid single prize deck is Festival Lead. It uses the Festival Lead ability to allow Pokémon to attack twice, turning Dipplin into a stone cold killer and Seaking into a card drawing machine. Thwackey is also very handy as a repeatable tutor.
The game changer that has catapulted this deck up the leaderboard is Gladion’s Final Battle – a supporter that lets your Festival Lead Pokémon attack for an extra 180 damage!
Currently, this deck is considered pretty great against everything except Dragapult ex, whose Phantom Dive attacks play havoc with your low-HP benchwarmers. Having an unfavorable matchup against the strongest deck is, obviously, a big problem!
Mega Excadrill
The new kid on the block, Mega Excadrill only came out with Pitch Black. This is an interesting one, as players will still be tweaking their lists to figure out the perfect mix of cards. The basic strategy is simple though: Metang attaches loads of Metal energy to Mega Excadrill, and you hit for mahoosive damage.
The plan is to heal or buff your mole to keep it in the fight as long as possible and make good on your energy investment. If things look dicey though, you’ve got Metagross available as a backup, single-prize attacker.
Source: Wargamer
