Pokémon Cards, Monster High and Polly Pocket Among 2026 National Toy Hall of Fame Finalists
The Pokémon Trading Card Game, Monster High dolls, Polly Pocket and Care Bears are among 12 toys competing for induction into the National Toy Hall of Fame in 2026. The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, announced this year’s finalists Wednesday, with the list spanning traditional board games, dolls, trading cards, electronic toys and playground staples.
The complete 2026 class of finalists is bingo, Bop It!, Care Bears, Mahjong, Monster High dolls, Mouse Trap, Pokémon Trading Card Game, Polly Pocket, slide, Sorry!, Tickle Me Elmo and Yahtzee. Several names on this year’s ballot stand out immediately.
Pokémon Trading Card Game – Few finalists have developed a secondary collecting market on the scale of the Pokémon Trading Card Game. The Pokémon TCG debuted in 1996 and has since grown into a worldwide card game and collecting phenomenon. The Strong noted that billions of Pokémon cards have been produced and credited the game’s accessibility and its connection with Pokémon’s anime, manga and video game audiences as major reasons for its lasting appeal.
Three decades after its debut, Pokémon cards now encompass everything from inexpensive modern releases to scarce promotional cards and early issues that can sell for substantial sums. The hobby also supports grading, card shows, competitive play and a large international collector community.
Its selection as a Hall of Fame finalist also puts the Pokémon TCG alongside another major collectible card game already in the Hall. Magic: The Gathering has previously been inducted, as have baseball cards.
Monster High – Mattel’s Monster High is another finalist with a significant adult collector following. Monster High arrived in 2010 with a first group of dolls that included Frankie Stein, Clawdeen Wolf, Lagoona Blue and Cleo de Nile. The characters combined fashion dolls with stories inspired by classic monsters, and many were packaged with diaries that expanded their individual personalities and backgrounds.
The Strong specifically acknowledged the collecting side of the brand, noting that Monster High encourages imaginative play among both children and adult collectors and has developed its own community. Original dolls, special editions, convention releases and later collector-oriented Monster High products have helped keep the franchise relevant well beyond its original toy aisle audience.
Polly Pocket – Polly Pocket also has roots that stretch directly into today’s vintage toy market. Introduced in 1989, the original Polly Pocket toys packed miniature figures and play environments inside colorful compact cases. A single clamshell could open into a tiny beach, café, cottage or other miniature world.
The Strong cited that intricate and portable design as part of the toy’s lasting appeal. Those early compacts have since become a collecting category of their own, particularly when original sets survive complete with their miniature figures and accessories.
Care Bears – Care Bears have been around since the early 1980s and have appeared across plush toys, figures, books, television, movies, games and home merchandise. That long history has also created several generations of Care Bears collectibles, ranging from vintage plush to modern collaborations and limited releases.
The Strong said the characters have remained recognizable through their themes of compassion, kindness and emotional development while continuing to appear across numerous forms of entertainment and merchandise.
Tickle Me Elmo – Tickle Me Elmo represents a very different piece of toy collecting history. Released in 1996, the electronic Sesame Street plush became the must-have toy of that year’s holiday shopping season. The toy laughed and shook when tickled, turning what could have been another character plush into one of the most memorable toy crazes of the 1990s.
Original examples now have an additional nostalgia factor for collectors who remember the extraordinary demand surrounding the toy when it first reached stores.
The remaining finalists cover an equally wide stretch of toy history. Bop It! debuted in 1996 with its familiar voice commands telling players to bop, twist and pull the handheld electronic game. Mouse Trap dates to 1963 and became famous for the elaborate plastic contraption assembled on its game board. Sorry! traces its gameplay lineage back to the ancient Indian game pachisi, while Yahtzee remains one of the best-known dice games.
Mahjong and bingo represent games with histories that extend much further back, while the humble playground slide rounds out an unusually diverse finalist group.
The public will have a role in determining which toys enter the Hall. Voting for the National Toy Hall of Fame’s Player’s Choice ballot runs from September 16 through September 23 at ToyHallOfFame.org. The three finalists receiving the most public votes will be combined with the top three selections submitted by members of the National Selection Advisory Committee. Collectively, the public counts as one member of the 23-member committee. The final 2026 inductees will be announced in early November.
The National Toy Hall of Fame considers four major criteria when evaluating candidates: icon status, longevity, the ability to encourage discovery and creativity, and innovation that changed play or toy design. Since the Hall was established in 1998, 90 toys have been inducted, including many names familiar to collectors such as Barbie, Cabbage Patch Kids, G.I. Joe, Hot Wheels, LEGO, Lionel Trains, Magic: The Gathering, Masters of the Universe, Matchbox Cars, My Little Pony, Star Wars action figures and Transformers.