80s Cartoon Toys and Memorabilia: Where Collectors Start

The 1980s toy-led cartoons are where most vintage collectors start: The Transformers, He-Man, G.I. Joe, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, ThunderCats and Care Bears each have a long toy line tied to the show. Pick one show, learn what its original figures came with, then buy complete pieces in the best condition you can afford.

Which 80s cartoons have collectible toys?

The table lists every 1980s show and film we track, sorted by first air or release date. Shows with a guide are linked; the others are listed so you can see the whole decade, and get their own pages as we cover them. The toy maker column names the company behind the original line, where we have confirmed it.

Why did so many 80s cartoons come with a toy line?

Many of the decade’s best-known shows were developed together with a toy line, so the toys and the episodes arrived side by side. That is why an 80s collection usually starts from a show and fans out into figures, vehicles and playsets.

The pairing drew criticism at the time. The advocacy group Action for Children’s Television accused networks of airing cartoons that worked as promotions for their toy lines, naming He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, My Little Pony and The Transformers. In 1990 Congress passed the Children’s Television Act. Under its rules, as FCC Commissioner Susan Ness summarized in 1994, programs for children 12 and under carry no more than 12 minutes of commercials per hour on weekdays and 10.5 minutes on weekends.

For collectors, the result is a decade of deep, well-documented lines. Each wave of figures has a known cast, known accessories and a known packaging style, which makes it possible to check a piece against a list.

Several of these lines started before their shows: the Masters of the Universe and G.I. Joe figures came out in 1982, a year before the cartoons, and the Care Bears began as American Greetings characters.

Vintage 80s action figures on eBay

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• Transformers G1Browse →
• Masters of the UniverseBrowse →
• G.I. JoeBrowse →
• Ninja TurtlesBrowse →

What makes one original worth more than another?

Four things separate one original from another. None of them is a price, and two examples of the same figure can sit far apart.

A reissue is a licensed toy in its own right, and often the easier gift. It is still not a 1980s original, so check the version before you pay an original’s price. Knockoffs and bootlegs copy a real figure without a license; we leave them out of every listing on this site.

Which 80s cartoon movies have memorabilia?

Several shows reached theaters too, and each film brought posters, home video and sometimes new toys. He-Man and She-Ra: The Secret of the Sword opened on March 22, 1985, and The Care Bears Movie on March 29, 1985. The Transformers: The Movie followed on August 8, 1986, and introduced a new cast of figures; our Transformers movie guide covers its toys. The Land Before Time, a standalone film, opened on November 18, 1988.

A movie tied to a series sits under that series on this site, and a standalone film gets its own row in the Movies table above.

How do the 80s compare with the 90s?

The 80s lines were built around the toys, with large casts and many vehicles. Many 90s collectibles grew from comic books and studio series instead, such as Batman: The Animated Series and X-Men. If your interest runs into that decade, start at our 1990s cartoon memorabilia guide.

The shows in this section

Each show below has its own guide to the original toy line, what a complete piece includes, the reissues and the licensed lines made since. Shows still listed as plain rows in the table above will get guides in later batches.