What are the Pokemon card types?

The patient type. Grass attacks tend to heal the attacker or leave the other Pokemon Poisoned, so a Grass deck wins by outlasting rather than by hitting hardest.

Poison used to live here too, until EX Power Keepers in 2007. Very old Grass cards of Poison Pokemon are correct for their era.

Weakness. Of the 210 Grass Pokemon cards measured, 208 (99%) print Fire x2. The rest: Lightning x2 on 2 (1%).

Resistance. Of the 210 Grass Pokemon cards measured, 208 (99%) print no Resistance at all. The rest: Fighting -30 on 2 (1%).

The big-swing type. Fire attacks hit hard and can leave the other Pokemon Burned, but they usually cost you Energy off your own Pokemon to do it.

The only TCG type that maps to exactly one video game type and nothing else.

Weakness. Of the 146 Fire Pokemon cards measured, 141 (97%) print Water x2. The rest: Lightning x2 on 5 (3%).

Resistance. Of the 146 Fire Pokemon cards measured, 141 (97%) print no Resistance at all. The rest: Fighting -30 on 5 (3%).

The type that moves things around. Water attacks shuffle Energy and drag the other player's benched Pokemon into the fight, which is how they pick the matchup they want.

Weakness. Of the 183 Water Pokemon cards measured, 137 (75%) print Lightning x2. The rest: Metal x2 on 46 (25%).

The quarter that print Metal instead are the Ice Pokemon. Ice is a Water card here, but it keeps the fear of Steel it has in the video games, and the cards call Steel Metal. Psychic, Fighting, Darkness and Colorless all split the same way, for the same kind of reason.

Resistance. Of the 183 Water Pokemon cards measured, 175 (96%) print no Resistance at all. The rest: Fighting -30 on 8 (4%).

The refuel type. Lightning attacks pull used Energy back out of the discard pile and can leave the other Pokemon Paralyzed, so they keep swinging when other decks have run dry.

The TCG has never called it Electric. Beginners search for Electric and land on the video game chart, which is one reason this page exists.

Weakness. Of the 132 Lightning Pokemon cards measured, 120 (91%) print Fighting x2. The rest: Lightning x2 on 12 (9%).

Resistance. Of the 132 Lightning Pokemon cards measured, 120 (91%) print no Resistance at all. The rest: Fighting -30 on 12 (9%).

The trick type. Psychic cards do their work through Abilities and status, leaving the other Pokemon Asleep, Confused or Poisoned rather than just hitting it.

Fairy only since Sword & Shield, February 2020. Ghost has been here since the start. Poison sat here from Diamond & Pearl until Sword & Shield and has since moved to Darkness.

Weakness. Of the 180 Psychic Pokemon cards measured, 122 (68%) print Darkness x2. The rest: Metal x2 on 55 (31%), Lightning x2 on 3 (2%).

The Metal third are the Pokemon that are Fairy in the video games. Fairy fears Steel in the games, the cards call Steel Metal, and the weakness came along when the type was folded in.

Resistance. Of the 180 Psychic Pokemon cards measured, 125 (69%) print Fighting -30. The rest: no Resistance at all on 55 (31%).

Printing a Resistance is the majority case here, and it splits the same way as the Weakness. The Ghost and Psychic ones carry Fighting -30 and the former Fairy ones carry nothing.

The gambler. Fighting attacks do extra damage if you accept a downside, and a lot of them flip coins for combination hits, so the type swings between whiffing and hitting far above its cost.

Three video game types in one. This is the biggest single collapse in the TCG and the one most likely to confuse someone coming from the games.

Weakness. Of the 175 Fighting Pokemon cards measured, 121 (69%) print Grass x2. The rest: Psychic x2 on 54 (31%).

It splits by where the Pokemon came from. The Ground and Rock ones print Grass, the actual Fighting ones print Psychic. Both track the video games through the card game's own names, because Grass covers Bug as well as Grass and Ground and Rock fear both.

Resistance. Of the 175 Fighting Pokemon cards measured, 175 (100%) print no Resistance at all.

Not one of the 175 Fighting cards sampled printed a Resistance at all. That is a striking number, and it is exactly the sort of thing that could stop being true next set, which is why the count and the set list stay next to it.

The type that plays dirty. Darkness attacks make the other player discard cards and can leave their Pokemon Poisoned, so it wins by taking away the tools rather than by out-damaging anyone.

Poison arrived here with Sword & Shield in 2020. Before that it was Psychic, and before EX Power Keepers it was Grass. A Poison Pokemon's TCG type has changed twice, so which card is 'right' depends entirely on when it was printed.

Weakness. Of the 125 Darkness Pokemon cards measured, 59 (47%) print Grass x2. The rest: Fighting x2 on 53 (42%), Lightning x2 on 13 (10%).

This is the most split type on the page and the only one where the top answer is under half, which is why there is no honest way to round it to one answer. It splits by origin and both halves make sense. The Dark Pokemon print Grass, because Dark fears Bug in the games and Bug is a Grass card here. The Poison Pokemon print Fighting, because Poison fears Ground in the games and Ground is a Fighting card here.

Resistance. Of the 125 Darkness Pokemon cards measured, 112 (90%) print no Resistance at all. The rest: Fighting -30 on 13 (10%).

The wall. Metal Pokemon soak damage for longer than anything else in the game, and Metal is the one type where printing a Resistance is normal rather than rare.

Called Steel in the games and Metal on the cards, the same rename Electric gets as Lightning.

Weakness. Of the 90 Metal Pokemon cards measured, 83 (92%) print Fire x2. The rest: Lightning x2 on 7 (8%).

Resistance. Of the 90 Metal Pokemon cards measured, 83 (92%) print Grass -30. The rest: Fighting -30 on 7 (8%).

Metal is the only current type where essentially every card prints a Resistance.

The type that fits anywhere. Colorless Pokemon take any Energy you have, so they slot into a deck built around something else, and a Colorless symbol in an attack cost can be paid with any Energy card at all.

Two separate facts share this name and they are easy to merge. A Colorless Pokemon is a card with the star type. A Colorless symbol in an attack cost is a slot that any Energy card can fill. There is no basic Colorless Energy card, which is only confusing until you notice that the symbol means anything rather than a thing.

Weakness. Of the 169 Colorless Pokemon cards measured, 119 (70%) print Fighting x2. The rest: Lightning x2 on 50 (30%).

Splits by origin again. The Normal Pokemon print Fighting, and the Flying ones print Lightning and carry Fighting -30, which is exactly the Flying profile from the games.

Resistance. Of the 169 Colorless Pokemon cards measured, 119 (70%) print no Resistance at all. The rest: Fighting -30 on 50 (30%).

The greedy type. Dragon attacks hit like nothing else, but they usually demand two different kinds of Energy to fire, because there is no Dragon Energy card to feed them.

Dragon Pokemon were Colorless cards until Dragons Exalted gave them their own type.

Weakness. Of the 36 Dragon Pokemon cards measured, 36 (100%) print no Weakness at all.

All 36 modern Dragon cards sampled print no Weakness and no Resistance at all. The bottom-left corner is simply empty. A universal type chart cannot describe a Pokemon that has no Weakness, so one Dragonite settles the question faster than a paragraph does. Bulbapedia dates the change to Evolving Skies.

Resistance. Of the 36 Dragon Pokemon cards measured, 36 (100%) print no Resistance at all.

Retired. Fairy ran from 2013 to 2020 and specialized in blunting the other player's attacks. You will still find Fairy cards in older packs and bulk, and they are not fakes or misprints.

Pokemon that are Fairy in the video games are printed as PSYCHIC cards now.

Weakness and Resistance. Not measured, and this page publishes no figure for Fairy. None of the ten sets counted below is old enough to contain a Fairy card, and filling the gap by pattern-matching the other ten types would be a guess wearing a percentage sign. The card below prints Metal x2 and Darkness -20, and that is a statement about that one card. Note the -20: it is a pre-Sword-and-Shield card, from back when Resistance was -20 rather than -30, which is a second unforced demonstration that these values are printed rather than fixed.