How to battle Jessie and James in Pokemon GO (October 2021)

Many Pokemon veterans agree that you cannot have Team Rocket without Jessie and James, and Pokemon GO's Team GO Rocket is no exception.

Due to the dynamic duo not always appearing in Pokemon GO, some players may wonder how they can challenge Jessie and James in battle.

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Challenging Jessie and James in Pokemon GO

Team Rocket alongside their iconic Meowth Hot Air Balloon (Image via the Pokemon Company)

Before challenging Jessie and James in Pokemon GO, the player has to find them first. Jessie and James can be easily distinguished on the map due to them being found in their iconic Meowth hot air balloon.

However, finding this balloon is the difficult part. Rather than being a guaranteed encounter with a Rocket Radar like some players may think, Jessie and James' encounter chance is completely independent of that, making them just a rare encounter that can happen every time a Rocket Balloon spawns.

Rocket Balloons spawn in Pokemon GO once every six hours, this means that players have a maximum of four times every day to encounter Jessie and James. While they may not appear as often for some players as for others, Jessie and James' chances of appearing are entirely based on luck. The duo can only able to be challenged until October 15.

Unlike other Team GO Rocket battles, an encounter with Jessie and James gives the player the option to challenge the duo. Both Jessie and James have different teams every time they are able to spawn, unlike other Team GO Rocket members.

Jessie opens her battle with a Shadow Scyther. This can be a difficult battle to prepare for due to how unexpected of a choice it is for Jessie. Normally, whenever people think of Jessie from Team Rocket, many players may think that she would open with a Shadow Arbok. From there, she has an Ekans and Stantler. Overall, it's not a very hard battle.

James is arguably even easier. James opens with a Shadow Pinsir. This makes sense due to Scyther and Pinsir being counterparts in the main series of Pokemon games.

James' other Pokemon for this battle are very underwhelming as they are both unevolved Poison-type Pokemon. Koffing and Grimer will not give any Pokemon GO players too much trouble.

Players who want to challenge Jessie and James in Pokemon GO but do not know how to encounter them may be happy to know that there is no definitive way to encounter them, they simply appear for the player in their Meowth Balloon if the player is lucky.