Pokemon Go Fest: Global Event Guide

Go Fest, Pokemon Go's premier event is here. Go Fest 2025 is shaping up to be one of the absolute best events that we've seen. Not even mentioning the bonuses, the release of the much-hyped Crowned formes of Zacian and Zamazanta alone are reason enough to hit up this event. As we've already extensively covered up until now, these two are game-warping monsters to a certain degree, so don't miss them! The weapon wolves aside, what else is on-offer this time? Well, let's jump in and take a look.

General Bonuses

All players will be able to enjoy the following bonuses throughout Go Fest 2025:

• One hour Lure Modules
• 8 hour Party Play duration
• Photobombs when taking a snapshot

The Ticket

Love it or hate it, Go Fest 2025 has a ticket for sale. The ticket costs $14.99 USD or equivalent local currency, and offers a number of various rewards and boosts:

• A Special Research line that will result in an encounter with the Mychical Pokemon Volcanion (highlighted below)
• Exclusive Incense spawns of regional and rare Pokemon (highlighted below)
• An increased Shiny encounter rate
• Special research with branching paths for "Sword" and "Shield.
• Access to hourly Global Challenges
• Habitat-themed Collection Challenges
• Up to 3 Photobombs per day
• Buddy Pokemon gain more hearts for activities during event hours
• 9 free Raid Passes per day from Gyms during event hours
• Open 40 gifts per day during event hours
• Up to 6 Special Trades per day and 1/2 Stardust trade cost during event hours

In conjunction with the above, players who purchase their ticket from the Pokemon Go Web Store will also receive 3 Premium Battle Passes, 5 Rare Candies, and 5 Max Revives.

So is this ticket worthwhile? If you don't mind spending on the game, then yes. There is a lot of value here in terms of the amount of resources that you can garner, especially if you intend to go hard and heavy into hunting down Zacian and Zamazenta. However, there's nothing here that's exclusive that is hugely impactful to long-term gameplay. The Crowned formes aren't locked behind a paywall, and Volcanion will definitely become available to everyone given time, so missing the ticket isn't going to absolutely cripple your account for the foreseeable future.

Raid Priorities

As we've covered in the above articles, Zacian and Zamazenta are definitely the headliners for this event. These two are tremendously powerful and useful, so don't miss the opportunity to add them to your roster.

The Secondary Headliner: Volcanion

Volcanion.... always seems to fall in the shadows. It pretty much never finds a niche, and that's the case here as well. Despite the fact that it's got the extremely interesting and SOMEHOW STILL UNIQUE Fire/Water typing, Volcanion's pretty mediocre. It's a solid investment for new players due to its role compression, but it's overall just a dex filler, If you don't buy the ticket in order to encounter Volcanion, don't worry too much; Mythical Pokemon from major events always release to the general player-base a few months later.

Habitat Overview & Priorities

Habitats determine most of the spawns that will be available over the course of the event, with habitats changing every hour to offer a new set of Pokemon in the wild. Each habitat cycles in twice per day, so players will have 4 hours of each habitat if they play all of the assigned hours.

Moonless Volcano

The Moonless Volcano biome has a few really strong options for PvP in particular, so if you're big into the Great or Ultra Leagues in particular then this is definitely a biome for you.

Galvanic Dojo

Hypnotic Tundra

Fae Swamp

Day Long Encounters

In addition to the habbitats above, these Pokémon will also be appearing throughout the day.

Incense Encounters

As highlighted above, these spawns correspond to the various biomes highlighted above with the exception of Unown, which will be available all day and will have formes based on the day that you play:

• Saturday will have Unown in its S, W, O, R, and D formes.
• Sunday will have Unown in its S, H, I, E, L, and D formes.

Note that all of the Pokemon in this section will only spawn for Ticket Holders!

Tips

• Kingambit is one of the latest additions to the game with a very premium evolve requirement of taking down 15 Steel or Dark type Pokemon in raids. Both Zacian - Crowned Sword and Zamazenta - Crowned Shield are steel types so make sure to buddy up your Bisharp if you want to evolve one into Kingambit!

• Mega-Evolve according to your goals. Whether you’re raiding or focussing on wild spawns, having a Pokemon mega-evolved will grant you more XP, candy and candy XL for every catch. Make sure you prepare in advance what Pokemon covers Types of the Pokemon you want to prioritise. These easily overlooked bonuses can yield big payoffs if you’re playing most of the event! If you want to focus on taking down raids make sure to check our raid guides to see which Pokemon will help you take down raids the fastest!

• Consider various Adventure Effects and see if one is worth considering.
• Dialga (Origin Forme) gives Roar of Time, which pauses the duration of items like Incense, Lucky Eggs, and Star Pieces.
• Palkia (Origin Forme) gives Spacial Rend, which increases the encounter distance for wild Pokemon.
• White Kyurem gives Ice Burn, which will slow the catch circle and increases Catch Rate.
• Black Kyurem gives Freeze Shock, which will keep Pokemon from moving on the catch screen and increases Catch Rate.
• Dusk Mane Necrozma gives Sunsteel Strike, which will attract day-themed Pokemon in a manner similar to Incense. However, it does not stack with actual Incense!
• Dawn Wings Necrozma gives Moongeist Beam, which will attract night-themed Pokemon in a manner similar to Incense. However, it does not stack with actual Incense!
• Zacian - Crowned Sword gives Behemoth Blade, which increases Attack by 10% in Raids, or 5% in Max Raids
• Zamazenta - Crowned Shield gives Behemoth Bash, which increases Defense by 10% in Raids, or 5% in Max Raids
• If you're buying the ticket, then definitely buy it from the Web Store for the added bonuses. It's a bit more of a hassle comparatively, but it's worth it.