How to choose your first tarot deck

The deck you learn tarot on should not be the prettiest one — it should be the one whose pictures will still mean the same thing to you in six months. Most beginners pick their first deck on aesthetics and end up frustrated by month three because the imagery doesn't line up with what the books are describing. There is a simpler answer, and it has been the simple answer for over a hundred years.

The deck I tell every beginner to start on is the Rider-Waite-Smith, the 1909 deck illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith and edited by Arthur Edward Waite. Every serious tarot book in English assumes the RWS visual vocabulary. Every modern deck inherits from it. Learning on RWS gives you a key that opens every other deck; learning on anything else gives you a key shaped for one lock.

Why the RWS, specifically

Three reasons.

Pamela Colman Smith illustrated every card. Before Smith, most tarot decks had decorated suit symbols on the numbered Minors — five swords on the Five of Swords, no scene — meaning beginners had to memorise meanings from a book rather than read from an image. Smith was the first to give every Minor a fully illustrated scene with a story. Those scenes are the visual grammar the entire English-language tarot tradition uses.

The symbol vocabulary is consistent. RWS uses a stable iconography — the rose, the lily, the lemniscate, the pillars, the pomegranate, the dog at the gate. Once you have learned the symbols on one card, they reappear on others. The deck rewards study; you can read more closely as you grow.

Every book references it. Rachel Pollack's Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom, Mary K. Greer's working method, Jessa Crispin's The Creative Tarot — every book on the beginner reading list treats the RWS as the default. Learning on a different deck means double-indexing every passage you read.

The original 1909 print has been republished many times; the most faithful modern reproduction is the Smith-Waite Centennial Edition by U.S. Games. You can find it under $20 in most countries.

Three excellent modern alternatives

If the historical aesthetic doesn't land with you and you are sure you want a different starting deck, three options preserve the Smith iconography while updating the visual register.

The Modern Witch Tarot (Lisa Sterle). RWS-faithful structure, contemporary characters across a range of body types and ethnicities. The colour palette is brighter and the figures are more recognisable as people who exist in 2024. Good first deck if RWS feels remote.

The Light Seer's Tarot (Chris-Anne Donnelly). Painterly, softer, more emotional in tone. Still RWS-faithful in symbol vocabulary. Good first deck if the historical decks feel too austere.

The Wild Unknown Tarot (Kim Krans). Black-and-white-and-gold, animal-and-element-based. Departs further from the RWS than the other two — the Minor scenes are abstract, not story-illustrated — so it is more demanding for beginners but rewarding for anyone with a strong visual orientation.

If none of those land, default back to the original Smith-Waite. The point is consistency with the books.

What to avoid in your first year

Three categories of deck are tempting and wrong for beginners.

Marseille-style pip decks. The historical Marseille tradition is beautiful and worth studying eventually (see Jodorowsky on the books list), but its Minor cards are decorated with suit symbols only — no scenes. You'll have to read from number and suit alone, which is plausible at year five and brutal at month two.

Thoth tarot. Aleister Crowley's deck, illustrated by Lady Frieda Harris. Visually extraordinary, intellectually ambitious, layered with esoteric correspondences. Almost no beginner I've taught has stuck with it; the symbolism load is too dense before you have your own framework.

Themed novelty decks. Anime-themed, dragon-themed, fairy-themed, witch-aesthetic-themed. Many are beautifully made. The problem is that they tend to alter the iconography in unpredictable ways — a Sun card that doesn't include a sun, a Strength card without the lion — and you'll be guessing whether the alteration is meaningful or just decorative. Pick one for year two, after you can recognise when a deck is breaking the standard on purpose.

Sourcing the deck

In the United States, U.S. Games and Llewellyn are the standard publishers. In the UK and Europe, Rider Books and Lo Scarabeo are both widely distributed. Buy new from a bookshop or a reputable online deck retailer; avoid Amazon for tarot if you can, because counterfeit decks circulate there and the print quality is sometimes poor enough to harm the reading.

Don't buy used. The cards will carry their previous owner's habits — bent corners, worn edges in particular places — that you will read as meaningful when they aren't. A new deck arrives neutral.

When you're ready for a second deck

You will know it is time when the deck you have stops giving you fresh readings — when the cards feel "too familiar" and you can predict what your interpretation will be before you've looked at the card. That usually happens between months 9 and 18. The right second deck is one that disagrees with your first in a productive way: if you learned on RWS, try a Marseille for year two; if you learned on a modern deck, try the original Smith-Waite to see what was being preserved.

To work with a verified reader on selecting your first deck — or watching how a reader uses theirs — many of our practitioners offer a beginner-orientation session that walks through deck choice and the first month's practice.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best tarot deck for beginners?

The Rider-Waite-Smith deck — specifically the Smith-Waite Centennial Edition by U.S. Games. Every English-language tarot book treats it as the visual standard, and learning on it gives you a key that opens every other deck.

Can I learn tarot on a Marseille deck?

You can, but it is significantly harder. Marseille-style pip decks decorate the numbered Minors with suit symbols only — no scenes — so you have to read from number and suit alone. That is a plausible practice at year five; it is brutal at month two. Start with a scenic deck.

Do I need to buy my first deck new?

I recommend it. A new deck arrives neutral; a used deck carries the previous owner's wear (bent corners, worn edges in particular places) that you may unconsciously read as meaningful. The "you must be given your first deck" folklore has no historical basis — Pamela Colman Smith would have laughed at it.

How much should I spend on my first tarot deck?

Between $15 and $25 USD for a standard new deck. The Smith-Waite Centennial Edition is widely available in that range. You do not need a luxury edition; the cards print at the same quality.

Should I get a guidebook with my deck?

The little white book that ships with most decks is brief and adequate as a reference. For learning, buy Rachel Pollack's Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom separately. The little white books are no one's primary teacher and shouldn't be yours.