LEGO's Arcanine Set Has 1,190 Pieces and Not a Single Minifigure

A Fan Site Published the First Detailed Look at Arcanine

On September 27, the fan site TheBrickFan published its hands-on look at Arcanine, the 1,190-piece Pokémon set numbered 72160. It is the kind of coverage collectors wait for: someone has bags open on a table, torso already snapped together, joints already tested before the rest of us get our hands on it. The review focuses on the build itself, the sequence of bags, the way the legs come together with ratchet and ball joints. That is useful, and we will get to it. But a single hands-on report only tells you what one box feels like to build. It does not tell you where that box sits next to the other 25 Pokémon sets already logged in our database, or what 1,190 pieces actually buys you compared with everything else wearing the same theme sticker this year.

That gap is exactly what this article closes. We track official part counts, minifigure counts and release data across the whole catalogue, which lets us put a single hands-on report inside a wider frame: how big is Arcanine really, who is it competing against on your shelf, and what does the piece count actually tell you about the build time and display space this set needs.

Twelve Hundred Pieces Puts This Dog in Third Place, Not First

Strip away the marketing and Arcanine is, first and foremost, a number: 1,190 pieces. In our database that places it third among the 26 Pokémon sets tracked so far, ranked purely by part count. The theme average currently sits at 732 pieces, so Arcanine comes in about 500 parts above the typical Pokémon release. That is a meaningful gap. It is not a small companion piece you finish over lunch, and it is not a pocket accessory you toss in a bag. It sits in the upper tier of a theme that, numerically, is still mostly built from small and medium sets.

Third place sounds impressive until you see what is ahead of it. The gap to the top of the theme is not close, and that is where the story gets more interesting than a single review can show.

The Distance to the Top Two Sets Is Not Close

The two Pokémon sets bigger than Arcanine are not really in the same conversation. Venusaur, Charizard and Blastoise (72153), this year's triple-creature display piece, carries 6,838 pieces, about 5,600 more than Arcanine. Pikachu and Poké Ball (72152) comes in at 2,050 pieces, about 900 more. Both of those sets are built around either multiple creatures sharing one box or a flagship character the theme was clearly designed to sell hardest.

Arcanine is not trying to be either of those things. It is built as a single, mid-flagship animal, meant for a shelf spot of its own rather than a centerpiece cabinet holding three creatures at once. That is not a knock. It just tells you what kind of purchase this actually is before you commit to it.

Rayquaza and the Umbreon Battle Set Trail Close Behind

The next two sets down the ranking sit much closer to Arcanine's size. Rayquaza (72168) has 1,083 pieces, about 100 fewer than Arcanine, and Umbreon vs. Garchomp Championship Battle (72165) has 831 pieces, about 400 fewer. Together with Arcanine, these three form a genuine middle tier: big enough to be a real weekend build and a real display object, small enough that nobody needs to clear a whole shelf to fit one.

That clustering also tells us something about how this theme's releases are being paced. Rather than one giant flagship and a swarm of tiny sets, there is a deliberate middle band of four-figure and near-four-figure creature builds, and Arcanine sits comfortably inside it. If you already own Rayquaza or the Umbreon battle set, Arcanine slots in as a natural next purchase rather than a step up or down in ambition.

The Rest of This Year's Wave Is Built From Pocket-Sized Sets

Look at what else came out of the Pokémon theme in the same year as Arcanine, and the contrast sharpens fast. Premier Ball (30729) has 46 pieces. Trainer Supplies (30730) has 56. Poké Ball Smart Tag Case (6644842) has just 31. Training Tree (6644864) has 46, and Trophy (6668941) has 41. Even the more substantial small sets, Ditto as Squirtle: Movie Night at 185 pieces, Mini Pokémon Center at 233, and the Kanto Region Badge Collection at 312, stay well below Arcanine's part count.

Those sets exist for a different reason. They are impulse pieces, gifts, small add-ons you build during a lunch break. Arcanine belongs to a different category entirely: a sit-down build meant to be posed and kept out on display. Anyone shopping this theme right now is effectively choosing between two very different kinds of purchase, and it is worth knowing which one you are actually getting before you order.

Every One of the 26 Pokémon Sets in Our Database Is From This Year

Here is a fact that gets lost in single-set reviews: the Pokémon theme itself is brand new. Every one of the 26 sets currently in our database, from the very first release to the most recent, carries the same year, 2026. There is no older wave to compare against, no earlier flagship this set is quietly replacing. Arcanine is not an update or a second edition of anything. It is part of a theme's opening lineup, full stop.

That matters for how you read every comparison in this article. Third place in part count is not third place after years of shifting flagships, it is third place in the theme's very first year of existence. The ranking will move as more sets arrive, and it probably will not stay put for long given how quickly this theme is already filling out its catalogue.

Zero Minifigures Is Not an Oversight

Arcanine ships with no minifigures. That number, zero, is exactly what our database records for this set, and it is worth stating plainly rather than treating it as a gap. This is a creature build. The entire part count goes toward the animal itself, its articulation, and whatever small display element sits underneath it. There is no trainer figure, no accessory human character eating into the piece total.

For some collectors that is a plus: every piece counted here is doing work on the model you actually came for. For others, especially those building out a shelf of posed trainer-and-creature scenes, a minifigure-free set means Arcanine stands alone rather than joining a wider display narrative. Know which collector you are before you decide this is the set for you.

What the Early Build Notes Tell Us About How It Goes Together

According to TheBrickFan's hands-on report, the build starts the way most creature sets do, with the torso assembled first, before the bag-by-bag construction fills in the rest of the animal. The site's reviewer noted ratchet joints going into the front and hind legs, plus at least one ball joint. Ratchet joints hold a pose at fixed increments rather than letting a limb flop freely, which is exactly what you want in a display piece meant to stay upright on a shelf for months.

We would treat the finer build details as still developing. The published review was itself mid-build when it went out, and fan site accounts of newly released sets sometimes get amended once full instructions are public. What is solid, from our side, is the part count and the theme placement. What is still forming, from theirs, is the exact play-and-pose experience once every bag is open.

Who Should Actually Put This on a Shelf

Arcanine fits a specific kind of buyer: someone who already has a Pokémon or creature-building habit and wants a mid-size animal that does not demand a whole shelf to itself, unlike the 6,838-piece Venusaur, Charizard and Blastoise trio. It also fits someone who has already worked through the theme's smaller accessory sets and wants to graduate to something with real build time and real presence once finished.

It fits less well if you are chasing the theme's biggest number. That title belongs to 72153, by a wide margin, and no amount of enthusiasm for Arcanine changes that. It also is not the set to reach for if minifigures matter to your display, since this one has none at all.

Currently Listed as New, With No Retirement Date in Sight

As of our latest database check, Arcanine appears on the official new-arrivals listing and does not appear on any retirement list. That is a fairly ordinary status for a set that belongs to a theme still in its first year of full-scale release. There is no rumor of an imminent retirement circulating that we can confirm, and nothing about the theme's current shape suggests this particular animal is a short-lived exclusive.

We also do not yet have an interactive 3D model of this set built out on our own side. That is a production note on our end, not a reflection of the set's availability or quality, and it will change as we work through the rest of this year's Pokémon wave.

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