Pokémon’s 30th anniversary is happening in 2026, and its birthday is on Feb. 27. Pokémon is the world’s largest grossing media franchise of all time, having made a lifetime revenue estimated between $115 billion to $150 billion. This far surpasses second place which even on the high end of estimates puts Hello Kitty at $80 billion. Pokémon was able to achieve this in only 30 years. 

Every year on Feb. 27, Game Freak (the original company behind Pokémon) and Nintendo celebrate the franchise. It is that day because in 1996, the original Pokémon games (being Pokémon Red and Green) were released in Japan. 

This year, that would put Pokémon day on Friday, Feb. 27. Here’s a history of what typically happens on Pokémon day and what to expect from the Pokémon company this year.

First Pokémon Anniversary 

The first anniversary of Pokémon was celebrated as the 10th anniversary in 2006. While not technically a Pokémon day by name, it served the same function. The Pokémon company held the “Journey Across America” tour which spanned 24 cities. It had Pokémon trading card game tournaments, distributions of rare Pokémon, people wearing costumes of different Pokémon, and screenings of the newest TV special at the time.

The First Pokémon Day

The first real Pokémon Day was held in 2016 to celebrate the 20th anniversary. The first real Pokémon Day was a big deal because it set the annual tradition of having what’s called a “Pokémon Presents” on the anniversary.

In Pokémon, there are these things called generations. Every time a core set of games is released (which comes with new Pokémon and gameplay mechanics) marks a new generation. During the 20th anniversary, the Pokémon company announced the seventh generation with the games “Pokémon Sun and Moon”. 

Not on Pokémon Day itself but still during the 20th year, Pokémon released the hugely successful mobile game “Pokémon Go”. In its first week it reached 10 million downloads and by two months it had 500 million downloads.

25th Anniversary

This year was more for the fans than for the general public. There were more details shared on the much anticipated follow up to the fan favorite spinoff game “Pokémon Snap” titled “New Pokémon Snap”.

There also came the announcement of remakes to the generation four games titled “Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl” and the beginning of a new series that they’ve since continued which is somewhere between a mainline core game and a spinoff game. This series is called the Legends Series. This first game in the series they announced that day was called “Pokémon Legends: Arceus”.

What to Expect for the 30th Anniversary

There has already been some promotion done leading up to this year’s Pokémon Day – such as a Super Bowl ad featuring Lady Gaga and a custom logo for each of the 1,025 Pokémon. But what’s going to be presented on the day of?

The biggest thing that is anticipated is the announcement of Pokémon’s 10th generation. For a while now there has been a new generation every two to three years. Generation nine began in 2022 and online leaks show that there is enough progress in development that unless they burned everything down and started over, generation 10 could be expected by the end of this year.

Many of the mobile games will also get updates and that will likely take up a good chunk of the early parts of the presentation. There will also possibly be a release date given for the previously announced game meant to serve as the permanent hub for competitive Pokémon titled “Pokémon Champions”.

Overall, it’s shaping up to be an exciting anniversary for the world’s biggest media franchise and whether everything listed happens or not, it’s a big deal for a franchise to last for 30 years and still have such a big fan base.