Pokémon TCG Pocket Trading: Stamina, Shinedust Costs, and What's Off-Limits
Trade Stamina refills once a day, Shinedust replaced Trade Tokens, and two rarities can never be traded. Full cost table inside.
Trade Stamina: 1 Per Day
Trading exists to solve a very specific pain point: you've pulled a third or fourth copy of a card you'll never use, while a friend is missing exactly that card and holds the one you're chasing instead. Every trade costs 1 Trade Stamina, and Trade Stamina refills at a flat 1 per day — there's no way to complete more than your banked stamina allows, and no way to hold multiple concurrent trades open unless you've been sitting on unused stamina for a while. Trades also only go through between confirmed in-game friends, so it isn't an open marketplace.
- 1 Trade Stamina consumed per completed trade
- Refills at a flat 1 per day
- Both sides must already be friends in-game — there's no public trade board
- Unused stamina banks up if you skip a day, giving you room for more than one trade later
For newer players this means trading is a slow trickle, not a way to instantly complete a set — plan it as a once-in-a-while cleanup of duplicates, not a daily habit.
Shinedust Cost by Rarity
Shinedust is the currency that actually pays for a trade, and the price climbs sharply once you're past the lowest tiers. Crucially, the cost below is what each side of the trade pays for the card they're receiving — a trade isn't a single shared fee split between two people, it's two separate Shinedust payments, one per player, each priced off the rarity of the card coming their way.
| Rarity | Tradeable | Shinedust cost (per side) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 diamond (Common) | Yes | 0 (free) |
| 2 diamond (Uncommon) | Yes | 0 (free) |
| 3 diamond (Rare) | Yes | 1,200 |
| 4 diamond (Double Rare) | Yes | 5,000 |
| 1 star (Art Rare) | Yes | 4,000 |
| 2 star (Super Rare / Special Art Rare) | Yes | 25,000 |
| 1-Shiny | Yes | 10,000 |
| 2-Shiny (Shiny Super Rare) | Yes | 30,000 |
| 3 star (Immersive Rare) | No | — |
| Crown Rare | No | — |
So if you and a friend swap two 2-Shiny cards, that's 30,000 Shinedust leaving each of your balances, not 30,000 total split between you. At the top end, that's a currency pool most players only build up by dusting a long run of unwanted duplicates first.
What Changed: Trade Tokens Are Gone
Trading used to run on a separate Trade Token currency; that system has been fully retired and replaced by Shinedust across every tradeable rarity. If you're reading an older guide or a friend's outdated memory of the rules and it mentions Trade Tokens, treat it as stale — Shinedust is now the only currency the trade screen asks for. Duplicate cards convert into Shinedust automatically as you open packs, so the currency you need for trading builds itself in the background without any extra step or menu to visit.
- Trade Tokens are no longer part of the trading system
- Shinedust now covers every tradeable rarity, from free Commons to 30,000-cost Shinies
- Duplicates convert to Shinedust automatically the moment you pull them
What You Can Never Trade
Two rarities sit permanently outside the trading system no matter how much Shinedust you're holding, and one whole card category is excluded regardless of its rarity. This is worth knowing before you build a trading plan around a specific card — no amount of saved Shinedust will unlock these.
will- Immersive Rare — never tradeable, at any Shinedust price
- Crown Rare — never tradeable, at any Shinedust price
- Promo cards — excluded from trading no matter their rarity, including promo Commons
For those three categories, Pack Points and pack luck are your only paths — trading simply isn't an option, so don't hold out for a friend to bail you out of a missing promo or Immersive Rare.