Tokens and emblems are a unique category in Magic: The Gathering. They are produced alongside regular cards in booster packs, some have significant collector value, and many players want to catalog them alongside their main collection. However, scanner app support for these non-standard cards is inconsistent across the market.

The challenge with scanning tokens is that they do not follow the same identification patterns as regular Magic cards. Tokens often share names across dozens of printings with different artwork, they lack unique collector numbers in older sets, and their card frames differ from standard Magic cards. A 1/1 white Soldier token has been printed with different art in countless sets, and distinguishing between them requires the scanner to rely heavily on artwork matching.

Lotus Scan includes support for scanning commonly produced tokens from standard booster products. When you scan a token, the app attempts to identify the specific printing based on the artwork and set context. For tokens from recent sets, this works well since each set typically has unique token artwork. For older or promotional tokens, results may be less reliable as the database coverage for these niche printings is less comprehensive.

Emblems are even more niche than tokens. These are created by planeswalker abilities and have been physically printed in relatively small numbers compared to tokens. Scanner support for emblems is limited across all apps, and you may need to manually add emblems to your collection by name rather than by scanning.

Other scanner apps handle tokens differently. ManaBox has basic token support but often defaults to the wrong printing. Delver Lens includes tokens in its database but accuracy for older printings is spotty. TCGPlayer's app can sometimes identify tokens since they are listed on the TCGPlayer marketplace, but the scanner's general accuracy issues extend to tokens as well.

For players with valuable token collections, such as foil tokens from older sets or unique promotional tokens, the most reliable cataloging method is to scan what you can and manually verify or add the rest. Some tokens, particularly double-sided tokens, foil tokens from premium products, and oversized tokens, may require manual entry regardless of which app you use. As token databases continue to expand across scanning platforms, automated support will improve, but for now a combination of scanning and manual curation gives you the most complete collection record.