How to transfer from Pokemon GO to Pokemon Home? (January 2023)

With the Pokemon franchise constantly expanding between generations and platforms, there are going to be some trainers who may want to take creatures from Pokemon GO into one of the other titles on the Nintendo Switch. Thankfully, Game Freak has given players a way to do so thanks to the Pokemon Home application.

Why would players even want to take their creatures away from their mobile game onto the consoles? With some players only taking part in the mobile experience to capitalize on the higher rate of encountering creatures with better IVs or shiny odds, many play the game to transfer to their home console.

As such, newer players who may have heard of this method for fast shiny collection may not know the specifics of how they can transfer their creatures over. The process is not that hard and can be repeated after everything has been initially set up.

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Transferring Pokemon from Pokemon GO to your console: Using Pokemon Home

A diagram showing some of the games that can connect to Pokemon Home (Image via The Pokemon Company)

The first thing players will need before they can transfer creatures to Pokemon Home from Pokemon GO is the Pokemon Home application, which is available on any mobile app store. While the Home program is not necessarily required on the Switch, players cannot send creatures from Home to any console game without it, so players will want to install it on their Switch too.

After linking the Pokemon Home app with the player's Nintendo account, they will be ready to transfer their creatures. Open the Pokemon GO app and access the Settings menu. This can be found after tapping the Poke Ball icon at the bottom of the screen and looking at the top right corner. Later, users will want to scroll all the way down; there, they will find the Pokemon Home option.

After selecting the option, players will be greeted with a wall of text basically explaining that creatures sent to Pokemon Home from GO cannot be sent back. Between paragraphs, players will see a green "send Pokemon" button.

Tap this to bring up yet another screen displaying the limitations of the transfer feature. This is also where users will familiarize themselves with "GO Transfer Energy."

In short, every creature in Pokemon GO has its own GO Transfer Energy cost depending on a few different factors. Standard creatures cost the least amount of energy to transfer, while most Legendary Pokemon and Shinies cost significantly more. GO Transfer Energy can either recharge naturally over time or players can spend Pokecoins to instantly refill it.

After selecting and transferring all the creatures they want to transfer, they will be given candies that would normally be granted if they transferred them to Professor Willow and the Pokemon will be waiting in Home. Doing so will also give a charge to the Mysterious Box used for spawning Meltan.

One of the best ways trainers can make use of this feature is by sending their Kanto Pokemon to Pokemon Let's GO: Pikachu or Eevee. Since these games only require 150 for a completed Pokedex, it is incredibly easy to obtain the Shiny Charm that is used for hunting Shiny Pokemon.

Since Trade Evolutions and Version-Exclsuives are much easier to find in Pokemon GO, using this method can save tons of time and resources while also netting some Shiny Pokemon.