When it comes to Beyblades, many people do not realize that there are actually many, MANY different brands of them, but only a couple of legitimate ones. At first glance they all seem the same, but anyone with any experience with battling with Beyblades knows that there are only two good (not to mention authentic) brands of beys: Takara Tomy and Hasbro. Unfortunately there are many other cheaper, knock off brands of beys though, such as "Rapidity" and beyblaze, just to name a couple.
The problem is that there doesn't seem to be any sort of enforcement on the "Beyblade" trade name (and patent) whatsoever, so all of the other companies manufactures these beyblades and slap their brand & logo on them, and then put them out into the market. And although these cheaper brand beyblades may cost much less than the Japanese authenticTakara Tomy beyblades and American Hasbro Beyblades, but they are also much, MUCH lower quality, and they are far lighter and less durable too.
Unlike with Genuine Takara Tomy Beyblades, the cheaper, no name Beyblades also don't even have the correct parts much of the time, and parts of the Beyblades are not made with the right materials either. And the stickers and the colors are generally wrong too. Luckily it is pretty easy to spot the "fake" beys though; the packaging is usually a dead giveaway. And to make matters even worse, the launchers that come with the cheaper bayblades are inferior too, and they usually don't last very long at all.
If you do a few battles between the ultra popular Takara Tomy Diablo Nemesis and the Rapidity Basalt Horogium Beyblades, you will see how much less powerful the cheaper brand bey is, compared to the more expensive (Takara / Hasbro) brands. And if you want to buy an authentic Takara Tomy Beyblade you should check out Jenoco.com because they have a lot of them for sale. I guarantee you that the more expensive name brand (legit) bey will win every single time, no contest. Again, this is because the Takara Tomy beys are much heavier than the cheaper brand (knock off) bayblades. And it doesn't take very many battles in your bey stadium to figure this out either!
For any of you that have never heard of the cheaper brands of beys, there are far too many to list here. But mainly watch out for "Rapidity" (because that is one of the most common cheap brands of beys out there on the market today.) If you want the absolute best, then just go with the Takara Tomy Beyblade start sets – those are imported from Japan, and they are generally a little cheaper than the Hasbro beyblades. However, Hasbro is also a genuine brand, and those are every bit as good as Takara Tomy - just more expensive for the most part.
Now that you know what to buy (as well as what NOT to buy) when it comes to Beyblades, you can make the right call. Just remember to avoid any brand that isn't "Takara Tomy" or "Hasbro". Don't be tempted by the lower prices - it just isn't worth it. You may save some money now, but in the long run, you will lose money when it breaks. And on top of that, the real Takara Tomy beyblades perform much better than the cheap / fake no name brand ones anyways. And who wants to deal with that? Most people that battle with beyblades want to win as often as they can.