Raid Battles

Raid Battles are a unique new gameplay element introduced in Version 1.4 which have a co-operative slant in the game. Here, from time to time, a Gym will evict all the Pokémon within it and replace the Pokémon with a giant egg with a countdown, allowing you to get to there when a Raid is about to happen. When the countdown hits zero, a giant Pokémon will appear at the top of the Gym and a Raid Battle can commence. It lasts for 45 minutes.

Raid Battles require a Raid Pass or a Premium Raid Pass to access them. You can get 1 Raid Pass a day through a Gym, or purchase a Premium Raid Pass for multiple uses in a day. You can only hold one pass at a time.

You can have both public and private raids, with each Raid Battle having a difficulty level suggesting the amount of people that are recommended. You can have up to 20 people battle in a raid at once, and everyone works together regardless of teams. Private rooms are locked using passwords based on Pokémon.

There are eight different kinds of Raid Battles, with different Pokémon appearing with different eggs. You can tell the type by the appearance

Normal Rare Community Day Legendary
1 Star Raid Egg 1 Star Raid Egg 4 Star Raid Egg Legendar Raid Egg
Mega Legendary Mega Elite Ultra Beast
Mega Raid Egg Legendary Mega Raid Egg Elite Raid Egg Ultra Wormhole

Community Day Raids and Elite Raids cannot be done with Remote Raid Passes

Raid Battles - The Battle

Like with standard Gym Battles, you can bring in six Pokémon into the Raid Battle. This means, with the maximum of 20 players, there can be 120 different Pokémon used against the opponent. The opponent is larger than normal and has significantly higher CP, usually in the high 10,000s or 20,000s.

The battle system is exactly the same as in normal gyms with tapping being Fast Attacks, holding down being Charged Attacks and being able to swipe left and right to dodge.

You have five minutes to defeat this massive Pokémon, but if you do there are bonuses...

Raid Battles - The Rewards

First off, there are multiple different Items that can be obtained by winning a Raid Battle. You can get a Golden Razz Berry, a Rare Candy or a TM to teach your Pokémon new moves. These items can only be obtained by playing Raid Battles. In addition to this, you'll also get 3000 XP for completing a raid. You also get a number of Premier Balls. You will get more Premier Balls the more you damage the Raid Boss. 5 as standard for comnpletion then more based on the various factors. The factors are as follows

  • Who owns the gym - You get more if you're on the same team as the team that runs it
  • Damage inflicted by team - The team with the most damage inflicted on the boss gets a boost of Premier Balls
  • Damage inflicted by teams - The more damage your team gives, the higher amount of balls of Premier Balls
  • Damage inflicted by you - The more damage you give, the higher amount of balls of Premier Balls

The more important aspect, however, is the ability to capture the Pokémon that you battled in the Raid. This Pokémon will have higher CP and stats, at Level 20 in Normal Weather or 25 when weather boosted, but it can only be captured using Premier Balls obtained in the Raid. Once you are out of Premier Balls, then the Pokémon will flee, but you can use berries to make them easier to capture.

Raid Battles - Remote Raid Battles

Remote Raid Battles were introduced in April 2020 as a way to battle at Raids from a distance. This requires a special kind of Remote Raid Pass to work and has a few limits

First, except for at certain times, only 5 Remote Raid Battle players can be in a lobby at any one time. This prevents lobbies from being overrun by remote raids. Secondly there's a damage reduction in damage done by players who are raiding remotely. Like the limit to players, this can be removed at certain times as environmental factors deem fit.

To Remote Raid, you have to either see the Raid on your nearby, or have a Pokémon stationed at a gym where a Raid is taking place. For this, there is a distance limit of 4 kilometres.

Raid Battles - EX Raid Battles & Elite Raid Battles

EX Raid Battles are a special invitation Raid Battle. On occassion, an EX Raid Battle will be assigned to a Pokémon Gym and everyone who participated in a Raid Battle at the Gym in recent times will receive an invite and a special EX Raid Pass. This allows for them to participate in the EX Raid Battle during the allotted time. Due to them being invite only, they are quite rare and there's no way to determine where one will drop ahead of time.

In October 2022, a new kind of Raid Battle followed on called Elite Raid Battles. These took place on special Gyms assigned as EX Raid Gyms and have a 24 hour wait time before a 30 minute battle. They cannot be done remotely. Following completion of an Elite Raid, rare Pokémon will spawn in a 30 metre radius of the gym for 15 minutes.

Current Raid Boss List

Duration: 21/3/23-28/3/23

☆ List

No. Pic Name Type CP Max. CP At Capture
#0179
Mareep
Shiny Capable
3063
Normal: 566
Boosted: 708
#0582
Vanillite 3583
Normal: 590
Boosted: 738
#0587
Emolga 5049
Normal: 933
Boosted: 1166
#0613
Cubchoo
Shiny Capable
3304
Normal: 610
Boosted: 763
#0702
Dedenne
Shiny Capable
5352
Normal: 1051
Boosted: 1315

☆☆☆ List

No. Pic Name Type CP Max. CP At Capture
#0026
Raichu 16079
Normal: 1247
Boosted: 1558
#0087
Dewgong 12803
Normal: 1134
Boosted: 1418
#0603
Eelektrik 12354
Normal: 980
Boosted: 1225

☆☆☆☆☆ List

No. Pic Name Type CP Max. CP At Capture
#0642
Thundurus
Shiny Capable
46044
Normal: 1911
Boosted: 2389

Legendary Mega Raid List

No. Pic Name Type CP Max. CP At Capture
#0003
Mega Venusaur
Shiny Capable
62037
Normal: 1554
Boosted: 1943

 

Click Here for all previous Raid Bosses.