Coinbase Teases Pokémon Card Packs Backed by Physical Collectibles

Coinbase teased a mobile trading-card feature on Sept. 28 that would let users open packs backed by physical cards and choose whether to keep their pulls in a vault or have them shipped.

“Rip packs on your phone. Every pull backed by a real, physical card. Vault it or ship it,” the company wrote. It described the timing only as “Soon on Coinbase,” without giving a launch date.

Coinbase also signaled that Pokémon cards are part of the offering. When a user described it as “pokemon packs on the chain,” the company replied, “you get it.” The teaser did not identify a blockchain or explain how ownership of the cards would be recorded.

The company linked the preview to its broader ambitions, telling another user, “well, we are the Everything Exchange.” Coinbase has described that strategy as bringing the assets users want to trade into a single platform.

The physical-card model already exists in crypto. As The Defiant reported in September 2025, Collector Crypt tokenizes physical Pokémon cards and offers a digital vending machine as an alternative to opening physical packs.

Collector Crypt’s withdrawal documentation describes the connection between token and collectible: users pay for shipping and burn the card’s NFT to receive the physical card.