Hobby Box vs. Blaster vs. Mega Box: What's the Difference?
Written by Brandon Lawrence, founder of The Card Breaks, a Minnesota-based sports and trading card business.
Sealed wax comes in a few standard configurations, and the names aren't always self-explanatory. Here's the general difference between the three you'll see most often.
| Configuration | Where sold | Typical price | Guaranteed hit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hobby box | Hobby shops, specialty online retailers | Highest | Usually — often autograph and/or memorabilia |
| Mega box | Retail | Middle | Sometimes, depending on the product |
| Blaster box | Retail | Lowest | Usually not guaranteed, though one can still turn up |
Hobby boxes
Sold through hobby shops and specialty online retailers rather than big-box stores. They're the most expensive configuration, and typically carry the strongest guarantees — often a guaranteed autograph, memorabilia card, or both, plus parallels and inserts not found in retail versions of the same product.
Blaster boxes
Sold at major retailers. They're the most affordable entry point into a given release, with fewer packs per box (commonly 4 to 15) and, in most cases, no guaranteed autograph or memorabilia hit — though one can still turn up.
Mega boxes
Also sold at retail, priced between a blaster and a hobby box. A mega box generally includes more cards than a blaster and often adds exclusive parallels of its own, and some mega box products do carry a guaranteed hit, at a lower price than the hobby version.
What none of this guarantees
Exactly what's inside any given box — specific players, parallels, or hits — is set by the manufacturer, varies by release, and is never something we can promise for an individual box. See our Sealed Product Policy for the full terms.
Browse what's currently in stock in Sealed Wax.