AFL Cards Price Guide 2026: What Are Your Footy Cards Worth?
An AFL card's value comes down to five things: the player, how scarce the card is (especially serial numbering), the set it came from, its condition, and whether it's a rookie or signature card. A common base card is worth cents; a signed, numbered rookie of a current star can be worth four figures. Here's how to tell which of your AFL cards are worth money — and how to check any card's value from a photo in seconds.
AFL card price guide: typical values by card type
There's no official AFL cards price guide, so here's a live one. The ranges below are built from current eBay AU asking prices for real cards in each category, refreshed automatically — a starting point, not a substitute for checking the exact card and condition.
| Card type | Typical value (AUD) | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Signatures & premium parallels On-card autos, gold/holo parallels and low-numbered inserts | $10–$43 typically $27 | Christian Petracca AFL Footy Stars Signature $43 |
| Blue-chip rookies & chase cards Key rookies and star cards that drive the market | $1.8–$30 typically $15 | Nick Daicos 2023 AFL Footy Stars $30 |
| Retired legends Base and insert cards of retired greats | $4.1–$25 typically $9.8 | Gary Ablett Jr 2019 AFL Footy Stars $25 |
| Established stars Base Footy Stars cards of current AFL stars | $2.5–$5 typically $3 | Bailey Smith 2022 AFL Footy Stars $5 |
| Teamcoach & common inserts Teamcoach base and everyday insert cards | $2–$17 typically $2.6 | Nick Daicos 2023 AFL Teamcoach $17 |
| Common base cards Ordinary base cards of squad players | $1 typically $1 | Jack Steele 2023 AFL Footy Stars Base $1 |
CardLoft valuations: median asking values across the live Australian market, updated September 2026. Ungraded cards in typical condition; graded, serial-numbered and one-of-one cards sell for multiples of these figures. Value your own AFL card free →
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What makes an AFL card valuable?
Before chasing any one card, it helps to know the levers that move price. The same player can appear on a 50-cent common and a $1,000 chase card in the same year — the difference is everything below.
- Player: legends and in-form current stars command the biggest premiums.
- Scarcity and numbering: serial-numbered parallels (e.g. /399, /99, /25) are worth far more than unnumbered base cards.
- Set and tier: premium hobby products and rare vintage sets sit well above mass-retail base cards.
- Condition: sharp corners, clean surface and good centring matter — small flaws move the price a lot.
- Rookie status and signatures: a player's first cards, and on-card autographs, are the strongest multipliers of all.
How much are footy cards worth on average?
Most of them are worth very little, and that is the honest headline. An ordinary base card of a squad player from any recent Footy Stars set is a cents-to-a-dollar card, and a shoebox of them is worth roughly what the postage would cost. Footy card prices only get interesting at the top of the pyramid: serial-numbered parallels, signed rookies, patch cards and genuinely scarce vintage.
The price guide table at the top of this page is the fastest way to place a card. It groups real, currently-listed AFL cards into tiers — common base, Teamcoach and everyday inserts, established stars, rising rookies, retired legends, blue-chip chase cards, then signatures and premium parallels — and shows the typical AUD range for each. It refreshes automatically from live eBay Australia data, so it moves with the market rather than freezing at whatever a printed guide said years ago.
Use it to triage, then check the individual card. Two cards in the same tier can sit at opposite ends of its range depending on the player and condition, and a graded copy of either can sell for a multiple of both.
Is there an AFL card catalogue or checklist?
There is no single printed AFL collector card price guide catalogue in current circulation — the Australian market has never been big enough to sustain one the way Beckett does in the United States. What does exist splits into two halves, and collectors need both.
For identification, use the checklists. Select publishes a checklist for each release listing every base card, insert and parallel with its print run, and the set's own card numbering tells you where a card sits. That answers what a card is, which is the half a catalogue is genuinely good for.
For pricing, the reference Australians actually use is eBay Australia's sold (completed) listings for the exact card in similar condition — the price guide table above turns that same data into typical ranges by card type so you do not have to run the search card by card.
Which AFL card sets matter?
Select Australia has been the official, sole AFL licensee since 1993, so almost every modern AFL card you'll find is a Select product. The flagship is the annual Footy Stars set — the mass-market release sold in packs at Kmart, Target, 7-Eleven, BP and newsagents. It's where most collectors start, and the 2025 base set ran to 234 cards at around $4 a nine-card pack.
Above Footy Stars sit the premium, hit-driven lines that hobby collectors chase. Supremacy (issued in 2019, 2021 and 2024), Dominance, Footy Stars Prestige and the newer Seamless product — built around game-worn jumper patches from 140-plus jumpers — are where the low-numbered parallels, on-card signatures and patch cards live. These premium sets cost much more per pack but carry the cards that hold real money.
Even within the mass-market Footy Stars set there's a clear hierarchy. Each year's insert program runs from common foil cards down through tiered, serial-numbered parallels — recent sets have used names like Luminous, with parallels numbered anywhere from a few hundred copies down to runs of 99 or fewer, plus signature inserts and ultra-rare redemption cards seeded roughly one per case. The insert names change every season, but the structure is always the same: common base, then foil and colour parallels, then low-numbered cards, then signatures and patches, then near-one-of-a-kind chase cards at the very top.
What about vintage AFL cards?
The vintage end is where the genuine scarcity lives, and it's worth knowing the makers. Scanlens produced VFL/AFL cards from 1963 to 1987 and is the foundational Australian maker — the 1963 first set contained just 16 cards and is widely called the "holy grail" of footy cards. Stimorol took over briefly around 1988–1991 (the last sets to come with chewing gum), followed by Regina from 1992. If a card looks old and isn't a Select issue, these are the names to look for.
Vintage rookie cards of legends are the affordable entry point to the serious end of the hobby. A 1985 Scanlens Tony Lockett rookie or a 1986 Scanlens Gary Ablett Sr rookie typically trades in the low hundreds of dollars in good condition — far less than the modern records, but genuinely scarce and historically important. Select's mid-1990s releases, especially the 1994 Cazaly Classics and the 1996 Hall of Fame set, are credited with sparking the modern AFL collecting boom and remain popular.
Which AFL cards are the big chase cards?
In modern sets, the marquee chase is the Draft Pick Signature — a rookie's autographed card from their first Select release, issued across low-numbered parallel tiers. Patch and relic signature cards (like those in Seamless), low-numbered colour parallels and multi-signature "booklet" cards of legends round out the top end. Rookie-year cards of current stars such as Nick Daicos and Harley Reid are among the most actively chased, and cards of modern greats like Dustin Martin and Bulldogs captain Marcus Bontempelli hold steady interest. Recent number-one picks Sam Walsh and Matt Rowell, Norm Smith medallist Will Ashcroft and two-time Coleman medallist Charlie Curnow each have their own market worth knowing.
To put a ceiling on it: the most valuable AFL card on record is the 2021 Select Supremacy "1000+ Goalkicker" quad-signature card — Lockett, Dunstall, Wade and Ablett Sr, the only living 1,000-goal players at the time — numbered to just 25, with card #1 selling for $50,000 in early 2022. Vintage can shine too: an 1894 Bill Crebbin card sold for $10,110 on eBay Australia in 2018, and a rare 1963 Scanlens Graham "Polly" Farmer fetched around $7,200.
Predictor and redemption cards are another chase to watch for: cards tied to season awards and results like the Brownlow Medal, Coleman Medal, Rising Star and the premiership, sometimes redeemable for a special patch or signature version once the result is known. They combine scarcity with a story, which collectors pay up for.
Those are the headlines, not the norm. Most cards — even of star players — trade for single or double-digit dollars. Treat the records as the rare top of a very tall pyramid.
Which AFL cards should I pull aside to check?
If you're sorting a collection, these are the cards most likely to be worth real money, roughly from most common to most valuable:
- Base cards: the standard, unnumbered cards — usually worth cents unless they're a key rookie in top condition.
- Foil and colour parallels: shinier versions of base cards, more collectable but still common.
- Serial-numbered parallels: anything with a number like 47/199 printed on it — the lower the number, the scarcer.
- Rookie and Draft Pick cards: a player's first cards, especially signed Draft Pick Signatures of players who became stars.
- Signature and patch/relic cards: on-card autographs and cards with a piece of game-worn jumper.
- Vintage Scanlens (1963–1987): genuinely scarce, with legends' rookies the standouts.
How much do condition and grading matter?
Condition is judged on four things: centring (how even the borders are), corners, edges and surface. For a card you might sell or grade, even small whitening on a corner or a faint print line on the surface can cut the price noticeably — so handle older cards by the edges and store them in penny sleeves and toploaders.
Grading means sending a card to a service that authenticates it and assigns a score from 1 to 10, then seals it in a tamper-evident slab. A high grade can multiply a card's value and reassures buyers it's genuine and unaltered. The scale runs in whole numbers with some half-grades, but famously there's no 9.5 — which creates a steep value jump between a 9 and a gem-mint 10.
Australians mostly use the US graders — PSA, Beckett (BGS) and SGC. Since PSA paused direct international submissions in 2025 (following US tariff changes), most Australians now submit through local authorised dealers and bulk-submission services, and a handful of Australia-based graders such as TCG Grading and Card Grading Australia also operate. Expect turnaround measured in weeks to months and a real per-card cost, so grading only makes sense on cards you expect to score highly. Value the card first, then decide.
How does the Australian AFL card market work?
AFL is the deepest Australian card market, but it's still small by world standards — for years the hobby didn't even have a formal price guide, which tells you how thinly many cards trade. In practice that means any given card may have only a handful of recent sales to learn from, so prices can swing and a patient buyer or seller often does better than a rushed one.
The standard price reference is eBay Australia's sold (completed) listings — what cards actually changed hands for, not the hopeful asking prices you see on active listings. Most day-to-day trading happens on eBay Australia and in Facebook buy/swap/sell groups, with local card shops and shows filling in the rest. eBay offers buyer and seller protection; Facebook and direct deals are cheaper on fees but carry more risk, which is worth weighing before you trade.
How do I value my AFL cards from a photo?
You don't need to memorise checklists or type anything. CardLoft works as a free AFL card price checker: photograph the front of the card and it identifies the set, card number and any parallel, then estimates the current value from current eBay Australia listings — usually in seconds. It's the quickest way to work through a whole box and find the few cards worth a closer look.
For the best match, fill the frame with the card, shoot it straight and front-on, use even light to avoid glare, and keep the set symbol and card number in focus.
How do I trade AFL cards safely and get the best price?
Once you know what a card is worth, the next risk is the trade itself. Counterfeit cards and fake graded slabs do circulate, and Facebook groups and direct deals carry the most risk because they have no built-in buyer protection. The safe trading guide covers how to verify cards and slabs and avoid the common scams — and CardLoft is built around trading inside closed, invite-only groups, so you're dealing with people you actually know.
To get the best price when you do sell: use clear, straight, well-lit photos of the actual card; describe the condition honestly, including any flaws; and price against recent sold listings, not optimistic asking prices. For a genuinely valuable card, getting it graded first can lift the price and build buyer confidence, and selling around moments of interest — finals, a Brownlow, a breakout season — rarely hurts.
Frequently asked questions
Are 1990s AFL cards worth anything?
Most 1990s Select and Regina cards are common and worth only a few dollars, but condition-sensitive stars, early inserts and signed or numbered cards can be worth much more. Vintage Scanlens cards from 1963–1987 are the genuinely scarce ones. Check the specific card against recent sold listings rather than assuming the whole era is valuable.
What's the most valuable AFL card?
The record is the 2021 Select Supremacy "1000+ Goalkicker" quad-signature card (Lockett, Dunstall, Wade and Ablett Sr), numbered to 25, with card #1 selling for $50,000 in early 2022. It combines the strongest value drivers: multiple legends, on-card signatures and extreme scarcity.
Where do I sell AFL cards?
eBay Australia, Facebook buy/swap/sell groups, local card shops and card shows are the main options. eBay gives you the widest audience and buyer protection; for higher-value cards, getting them graded first can lift the price and build trust with buyers.
Do I need to grade my AFL cards before selling?
No. Grading only makes sense for cards likely to score highly and worth enough to justify the cost and months-long wait. Value the card first — if it's a common or in average condition, grading usually costs more than it adds.
Which rare AFL cards are worth money?
The rare AFL cards worth real money are the scarce, signed and low-numbered ones: Draft Pick Signature rookies of players who became stars, serial-numbered parallels (the lower the run, the better), on-card autographs, game-worn patch cards from lines like Seamless, and genuinely scarce vintage Scanlens cards from 1963–1987. A common base card of the same player is usually worth cents — scarcity and signatures are what create the value.
Is there an AFL cards price guide?
There's no official one, so the table at the top of this page is a live substitute: typical AUD ranges by card type, built from real eBay Australia listings and refreshed automatically. The Australian market is small and thinly traded, so no printed guide could keep up with it — the underlying reference is always eBay Australia's sold (completed) listings for the exact card in similar condition.
How much are footy cards worth?
Ordinary base cards are worth cents to a dollar each, which covers most of any shoebox. Serial-numbered parallels typically run from a few dollars into the low hundreds depending on the print run, signed rookie cards of current stars reach three and four figures, and the record AFL card sold for $50,000. The price guide table above gives the typical range for each card type.
Where can I find an AFL card price guide catalogue?
No printed AFL collector card catalogue is in current circulation. Use Select's per-release checklists to identify exactly what a card is, then price it against recent eBay Australia sold listings — or use the tiered price table on this page for a typical range, and photograph the card for an estimate on the specific one.