On this page I am not going to give you page long descriptions of each generation tag, you can find that in specialist beanie books and magazines, no on this page I will give brief descriptions of each generation hangtag just so you know roughly which is which. Oh and my advise when you are trying to guess.. "is my tag fake?" is study an authenticate Beanies tags, then when you come across a fake you will know straight away.
1st Generation: does not open. TY on front in skinny font. There is no birthdate or poem. This generation of tag was introduced in 1994.
2nd Generation: Much the same as 1st generation except the tag is now openable with to___ from___ with love on the inside 2nd generation tags vary according to the country the Beanie was distributed in.
3rd Generation: The heart shape is fatter and TY on the front is in balloon font. Again 3rd Generation tags vary according to the country the Beanie was distributed in.
4th Generation: Much more like the version we now have come to know and love. A yellow star had appeared on the front with the words, "Original Beanie Baby" also a poem and birthdate were now on the inside were to___ from___ with love had been. A webpage address had appeared together with the text "Visit our Web page!!".
5th Generation: The current hangtag. the same as 4th but the text had changed font and "visit our webpage!!" had disapeared leaving just "www.ty.com"
We realise We have not included all the changes etc. but this is just a rough guide which should help you to determine which generation hangtag your beanie has.