Fun Fact Fridays: The Contents of a Booster Pack

As anyone who opens current booster packs knows, there are 15 cards in a booster pack. You get 10 commons, 3 uncommons, a rare or mythic rare, a tip card (not counted in the 15), and a basic land. Alternatively, you could get 9 commons and 1 foil of any rarity instead of 10 commons (foils are 1 for every 67 regular cards.).

In some cases this is different, like with guildgates and the chance at a shockland or Maze's End in place of the basic lands in Dragon's Maze or like in Journey into Nyx there is a very small chance of getting a "God" pack which has 15 mythic rares.


Today packs come in the form of 15 cards like mentioned before and 6 card packs (3 guaranteed commons, 1 uncommon, a land, and either a common, uncommon, rare, mythic rare, or foil in the last slot). It has been that way since Conflux.

  

Of course, back when Magic was starting out, most packs had 15 cards, except these:

        

Arabian Nights, Antiquities, The Dark, Fallen Empires, and Homelands all had 8 cards in each booster pack. Arabian Nights and Antiquities had 6 commons and two uncommons. Some sets didn't have rares, just some less printed uncommons (Some cards are printed two or more times on the uncommon card sheet and others are printed once on an uncommon sheet. Different sources say sets have rares when there isn't an actual rare sheet. Those "rares" are the one printing on the uncommon sheet). The Dark, Fallen Empires, and Homelands did have rares, but it was still 6 commons, and then either two uncommons, an uncommon and a rare, or two rares.

  

Alliances and Chronicles both came in 12 card booster packs, each with 8 commons, 3 uncommons, and 1 rare.

Lastly, Unglued came in 10 card booster packs. In my research, I can't find what types of cards were in each pack based on rarity.