Players walk around the real world staring at their phones, waiting for Pokémon to pop up on a map. Once they find one, their phone's camera turns on, and the Pokémon in question is superimposed over the camera video in an Augmented Reality experience. It's proven quite popular so far! If you want to be the very best (like no one ever was), this Pokemon Go Beginner Tips guide will help you get started.
Setting Up Your Character
One of the first things you'll be doing is setting up your account. You can use one from the Pokémon Trainer Club or a Google Account. Functionally they're identical, although I've seen a greater degree of issues reported with Trainer Club accounts as opposed to Google accounts myself.
You have some cosmetic options for your avatar. You'll be able to change your skin tone, hair color, and the color of your clothes as well as choose between the two sexes. This is purely cosmetic. Your avatar will be shown on the map walking around as well as standing next to your Pokémon you have stationed in Gyms (more on that later).
There's also an optional tutorial that will tell you all of the basics. I won't go over it here as I'm covering most of the stuff in it anyway. It doesn't take terribly long and it can't hurt to give it a spin.
You will also pick a name for your character. This name will be shown next to your Pokémon stationed at gyms.
After your account and character are set up, you'll get to pick your starter Pokémon.
Battery Saver
Pokémon GO can be a battery-hungry app. There's a "Battery Saver" mode in Settings. However, there is one tip that's been reported as saving a good bit of your battery.
Pokémon GO makes use of the Google Maps API. When you're running the app, it's streaming data on your location. If you're staying in the same area, you can manually download the map for an area. Search for an area in the Google Maps app. Click on the name at the bottom of the screen, select Download, and you're sorted. If you have a "Home" area set, you can download that area by going into Settings and tapping on "Offline areas."
Choosing Your Starter Pokémon
Once you get plopped down into the game world, you'll be able to choose from one of the three traditional starting Pokémon: Bulbasaur, Charmander, or Squirtle. In a nod to the animated series, you can also grab a Pikachu by walking away from the first three starters. Just move towards the edge of the detection circle in any direction and Pikachu should pop up!
You only get to pick one of the four starters. However, you'll still be able to encounter the starters in the wild or by hatching eggs.
Using the Tracker to Find Pokémon
You have your character all set up and your starter Pokémon. Now it's time to go out and catch some more! Pokémon GO is a much simpler affair than the handheld games. You walk around for a bit until a Pokémon pops up on the map. You tap on it and enter into an encounter to capture it.
If you look at the bottom right of the map, there is a white bar that probably shows a few different Pokémon on it. Tapping on it opens up a menu that will show up to nine different Pokémon encounters that are near you. Each encounter has a number of footprints below it that indicate the range. There have been varying accounts of the distance equivalent of each step, but in my observation, it equates to roughly the size of the detection ring.
You can choose to "focus" on one of the encounters by tapping on it. The white bar will show the Pokémon as a shaded silhouette. (Pokémon you've previously captured will appear in full detail.) Walk roughly the distance of the detection circle. If the number of footprints doesn't go down, turn around and walk in the other direction. If it wasn't North or South, return to your starting point and walk East or West until you track it down.
Bear in mind that you won't always have to do this. You'll find plenty of Pokémon wandering around wherever you go. That said, this knowledge is useful if you're really after a certain species of Pokémon.
Water, Grassy Areas, and Moving Leaves
Parks & Bodies of water can factor into what Pokémon will pop up in an area. If you're keen on finding some different Pokémon, head down to your local park or river! Just remember to be safe and not trespass on private property when doing so. And remember that a lot of parks and other public areas officially close at a certain time of night, even if they don't necessarily have gates to close. Make sure to read any and all signage at park entrances and consult your local laws.
You may also notice leaves fluttering about on the map. These are usually an indicator that a Pokémon is at that particular spot. Head towards it, and hope for the best of luck!
Catching Pokémon
Now that you know how to find Pokémon in Pokémon GO, it's time to learn how to catch them. Once you tap on a spawned Pokémon on the map, you'll enter into an encounter. You'll see the Pokémon superimposed over your camera image (or a generic background if you've turned off Augmented Reality at the top right of the capture screen) and a Pokéball in front of you.
Capturing a Pokémon is as simple as swiping up on the Pokéball to throw it. If it hits the Pokémon properly, they'll be caught in the ball. They'll struggle for a bit, and if you're lucky they're captured!
That's the basics of it. There are some slightly more complex elements to it that will emerge as you play.
Firstly, Pokéballs are consumable items. If you throw one and you miss, that Pokéball is gone. Pokémon can also escape from the ball if you're unlucky.
Secondly, you'll notice a white circle around the Pokémon with a moving colored circle inside of it. The white circle is the hitbox for your Pokéball throw. The color of the interior circle measures the difficulty of capturing the Pokémon on a gradient from Green (easy) to Yellow (medium) to Red (hard). Expect to use a lot of Pokéballs on the more difficult captures.
Landing your Pokéball in the interior circle will get you bonus experience with greater bonuses for hitting a smaller interior circle (up to double at the tiniest size). You can also "spin" the Pokéball by shaking it around in a circle to throw a curveball. Curveballs give you an extra 10 XP (on top of 100 XP total) and might not be worth it if you're low on Pokéballs. You also get a bonus for capturing new types of Pokémon!
Pokémon can dodge or bat away thrown Pokéballs. If the Pokémon you're trying to catch knocks one of your Pokéballs off-kilter, wait for them to be between attacks before attempting a throw.
Lastly, as you level up you'll get better quality Pokéballs. Great Balls unlock at Level 12, and Ultra Balls unlock at Level 20.
Once you've captured a Pokémon, you'll get Candies for that species (used for evolving and powering up), some XP and Stardust.
Powering Up Your Pokémon
After you've netted a few Pokémon, you might want to power them up a bit. Every Pokémon in Pokémon GO has a Combat Power (CP) rating, which is sort of like its level. You'll want higher CP Pokémon if you decide to start fighting at Gyms.
Powering up Pokémon costs a certain amount of Stardust, as well as Candy for that species of Pokémon. As an individual Pokémon gets stronger, the costs will go up.
Don't waste your Candy powering up all of your Pokémon. Power up a few of your best. You can have each of your Pokemon appraised by your Team Leader, so it is always best to keep your 3-star Pokemon with high CP for each species and power those up.
Transfer Away Extra Pokémon To Get More Candy
Transferring Pokémon will permanently remove the Pokémon from your inventory and give you Candy for that species of Pokémon. I recommend holding onto no more than two of each type of Pokémon and transferring away the weakest ones you have.
Some quests will have you needing to Transfer Pokemon to complete them and you may even earn XL Candy to power up your Pokemon further.
Evolving Pokémon
Certain Pokémon can be evolved into different, stronger Pokémon. For example, the ubiquitous Rattata can be evolved into a Raticate.
Evolving doesn't cost any Stardust, but it does cost an awful lot of Candy. The evolution cost is a bit different for each Pokémon. Still, it's generally at least 25 Candy for a Pokémon with two successive evolutions and 50 Candy for a Pokémon with only one evolution. There are special cases as well—Magikarp and Wailmer cost 400 Candy to evolve into Gyarados and Wailord respectively.
Evolving Pokemon will allow them to get much stronger and learn new moves alongside receiving bonus XP for adding a new Pokémon type to your Pokédex. You will also get a separate XP bonus simply for evolving a Pokémon, even if you have it in your Pokédex.
Having dozens of Pokemon that are able to evolve and using a Lucky Egg before mass evolving them is a surefire way to gain an immense amount of XP through the usage of a sole Lucky Egg.
Incubate Eggs and Get More Pokémon By Walking
One of the items you can get from PokéStops is Pokémon Eggs. Pokémon Eggs are hatched by placing the Egg within an Incubator and walking either 2, 5, or 10 kilometers, depending on the type of egg.
Everyone gets a free "infinite use" Incubator to place their Pokémon Eggs into. You'll also get breakable Egg Incubators as a Level-Up Bonus, or you can purchase them from the shop. These "limited" incubators break after 3 uses.
Hatching a Pokémon from an Egg will get you a bonus of Stardust and Candy for that particular species of Pokémon. Make sure to put a new Egg in your Incubator after you've just hatched one—you wouldn't want to let all of those footsteps go to waste.
Using Items
There are quite a few items in Pokémon Go. The vast majority of them are consumable. You'll get items from the Shop, from PokéStops, and when you level up your Trainer. Leveling up your Trainer will also unlock new items at certain milestones; some of these items will begin to appear at PokéStops after they've been unlocked.
Here's a short list of the important items.
Pokéball: Used to capture Pokémon you encounter in the wild.
Great Ball: Better chance of capturing Pokémon. Unlocks at Level 12.
Ultra Ball: Even better chance of capturing Pokémon. Unlocks at Level 20.
Revive: Revives fainted Pokémon and heals half of their HP. Unlocks at Level 5.
Max Revive: Revives fainted Pokémon and heals all of their HP. Unlocks at Level 30.
Potion: Heals injured Pokémon for 20 HP. Unlocks at Level 5.
Super Potion: Heals injured Pokémon for 50 HP. Unlocks at Level 10.
Hyper Potion: Heals injured Pokémon for 200HP. Unlocks at Level 15.
Razz Berry: Makes your next capture attempt easier. Unlocks at Level 8.
Egg Incubator: Incubates a Pokémon Egg for you. Breaks after three uses. Gained as a Level-Up Bonus or purchased from the Shop.
Incense: Attracts more Pokémon to your area for 30 minutes. Gained as a Level-Up Bonus or purchased from the Shop.
Lure Module: Attracts more Pokémon to a PokéStop for 30 minutes. To use it, tap on the PokéStop, tap on the white capsule above the picture, and apply the module. Gained as a Level-Up Bonus or purchased from the Shop.
Refilling Your Items at PokéStops
As said in the previous section, Pokéballs are consumable items. Pokémon GO is a free app, but players can purchase PokeCoins with real money to be an assortment of items, passes, and more.
Some items can't be purchased in the Shop, such as Potions and the higher qualities of Pokéball. Once you've unlocked an item by reaching the required Trainer Level, you will begin to find that particular item at PokéStops.
PokéStops are fixed locations in the real world represented as floating cubes on the map. When a PokéStop is within your detection ring, the symbol will change to a Pokéball. Tap on the stop, spin the picture, and you'll get anywhere from three to six random items. PokéStops refresh every five minutes.
Joining a Team
Once your Trainer has reached Level 5, you can pick between one of three teams: Team Valor (Red), Team Mystic (Blue), and Team Insight (Yellow). The choice you make can be changed with a Team Medallion once every 365 days, but you should still take time to think about the decision. The opportunity to change teams will not be readily available.
To join a Team, click on a Gym (regardless of whether or not you're in range of it). You'll get a short cutscene, and then you'll be given the choice of the three teams.
Gyms and the Gym Defender Bonus
One of the three teams in Pokémon GO can control a gym, and up to six Trainers can station Pokémon at that Gym.
Aside from bragging rights, each Gym you have a Pokémon stationed in will net you a bonus of 50 PokéCoins every day. You'll get this bonus for every Gym you have a Pokémon stationed in at the end of the day.
It is best to station Pokemon in as many Gyms as you can, so when they are knocked out, you will earn a maximum of 50 PokéCoins each day. For each Pokemon stationed, you can check where they are stationed, how long they have been stationed, and how much CP they have left before they are knocked out.
If you are able to, you can always go back to a Gym to feed your Pokemon berries to regain CP.
Gym Battles
You can fight your Team Leaders to receive Stardust rewards each day. The higher the difficulty you choose for the Team Leader Battle, the more Stardust is gained. Stardust can only be gained once per day through this method, but you can fight Team Leaders
Battles are a fairly simple affair. You swipe left or right to dodge attacks, tap to attack your opponent, and hold to use a special move. Special moves use up a slice of the power bar, which is filled by making attacks.
When you're fighting at enemy Gyms, you'll be able to select a team of up to six Pokémon. It defaults to your strongest, healthiest Pokémon, but you can change this before you enter. You can swap Pokémon mid-battle if you'd like to, and that might be a good idea.
Neutral Gyms
Some Gyms will be white with no Pokémon assigned. These are "Neutral Gyms" and are not owned by any team. Claiming them is as easy as getting in range and stationing one of your Pokémon there.
If you successfully defeat all of the Pokémon at a Gym, don't forget to place one of yours inside the newly freed Gym. Try to always place your highest CP Pokemon or Pokemon with very few weaknesses.
Ingress Intel Map
Ingress is another AR game released by Niantic a few years back. The data on the points of interest that serve as Gyms and PokéStops is there because a lot of Ingress players put it there.
Ingress has an Intel Map on the game's official website that tells you the locations of "Portals" in the game. Portals serve as points of interest that players in Ingress fight for control over between the two teams in the game.
The important bit relating to Pokémon GO is that the Ingress Portals are also the locations of PokéStops and Gyms. Unfortunately, there's no way to tell for certain whether an Ingress Portal is a PokéStop or Gym. However, if you're looking for PokéStops and Gyms in your area, it can serve as a good guide for worthwhile places to travel to.
It's reasonable to assume that Niantic will be rolling out a similarly functioning map for Pokémon GO in the future. There are also third-party solutions in the works, although every one of them that I've seen is struggling under the load of millions of people playing the game. None seem to be usable at the time of writing.
We'll see a world map for Pokémon GO points of interest sometime soon, whether it's from Niantic or a third party. In the meantime, at least you can use the Ingress Intel Map to get an idea of your surroundings without having to travel around!
Take a look at our feature about why PokemonGo Fest 2021 wasn't worth $5, or maybe a more positive look at how the game's community came together during the 2020 lockdown.
One of my earliest memories is playing Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo Entertainment System. I've had a controller in my hand since I was 4 and I… More about Robert N
