Who is close to level 40?

I started a month after the game's release, and finally reached lvl 40 during the Halloween 2017 event. Most of my XP gains were from catching Pokemon, and several events that held double XP helped me reached lvl 40 faster. Considering the massive XP you get from legendary raids (in addition to the use of lucky eggs), reaching lvl 40 nowadays doesn't feel as prestigious as it seemed back in the days during the old gym system. Despite that, I would imagine only a small percentage of the entire PoGO player base still has even managed to hit lvl 40, but unlike the good old days, many are starting to catch up, and are trailing behind the footsteps of the lvl 40 life.

Prior to reaching lvl 40, my first goal was to hit lvl 40, and finally did. Thus, XP is no longer a necessity for me, and probably isn't for every other lvl 40 player. As a fellow lvl 40 player, I now have other goals I have made for myself to reach to continue being engaged with the game. Five of them that I hope to achieve someday are:

-Catch a 100% Mewtwo (my ultimate goal, it's my favorite Pokemon)
-Collect and fully max out one of every Pokemon to lvl 40 (maybe even try to get each of them with 100% IVs, too)
-Reach over 100k total catches
-Find and catch a 100% shiny Magikarp
-Get over 10k battle victories for my Dragonite and Lugia

As long as I continue to set goals for myself, I still enjoy the game. I will probably continue to play this game until Gen 4. Any generation of Pokemon beyond Gen 4 is uncharted territory for me, but perhaps I'm thinking too far ahead haha. Who knows what this game will be like when Gen 4 (or other future gens) is potentially released in the game. Hopefully, I'll be as interested in the game by then as I am right now! :]

OP...Is your pokebox up to date on this site?

First off, congrats on closing in on 40! That last leg from 39-40 (5mil XP) is no joke. Also, whether you're hitting lvl 40 tomorrow or a year from now, it's still a heck of a lot of work, so take pride in that accomplishment.

As for what to do after you hit 40, as you mentioned in your original post, it's all about creating goals for yourself. Several people I know have varying goals that include: chasing after 100% legendaries, competing to hit XP milestones (30, 40, 50mil total XP and whatnot), completing the Dex, maxing out their favorite mons, or investing in Mons for (hopefully) future pvp trainer battles.

For me personally, my goal after 40 was to hit gold on 100 gyms. Sounds like a heck of a grind (and it is), but I love battling gyms, and several people in my local Discord are chasing the same goal, so the friendly competition is enjoyable. I'm currently at 74, so I'm getting close, and I've been enjoying it every step of the way. ?

I am level 39 and not close to 40...XP never meant much to me. I have not been XP-farming ever (I do lucky egg evolutions though.)

40 only means that, if you were a grinder, you have resources. Other than that, not much. It could easily be the case that it's an XP farmer with no Stardust due to raids and few powered mons, a Mewtwo probably at 30.

Goals, there aren't many...I would want a good IV Aron but it's not super important and I want a Mewtwo. I keep saying I will quit after Mewtwo, because there is nothing left to catch that is a good addition to my fighters or defenders.

Going to raids at parks is almost a chore, but there are no groups nearby anymore because of the Mewtwo hunt. I like raiding in general though.

Been playing since Day 1, and I'm only as close to 40 as you are. XP has always been relatively pointless, once you get to the mid 30s and up, the differences in Pokemon effectiveness at those levels tends to be negligible. I used lucky eggs earned from levels to as great effectiveness as I could, but never spent any gym coins on them. I'm doubting I'll lose much motivation once I hit 40, but I'd still like them to increase the player level cap (even if it doesn't increase the mon level cap), just so I get that minor feeling of progression from the XP bar.

I reached level 40 a few days ago. I haven't done any lucky eggs since early in level 38, because I didn't see any real value in levelling up past L38 that justified spending coins on lucky eggs (I'm a free player, and am pretty stingy with my gym-earned coins).

As to whether L40 means anything, that's up to you. Nobody is likely to hire you as a high-priced pokemon consultant or anything, so the accomplishment is whatever it means to you personally.

I haven't cared about XP or levelling up for a while. My motivation is filling out my pokedex, and achieving my remaining raid goals, and the new ones that might come up. I've done a few Tyranitar duos, but I'd like to do a few more to prove that I can do it consistently. I would like to do the remaining Alakazam movesets I've not yet soloed (C/SB and C/FB). I'd also like to do a Victreebel duo, but once will probably be enough.

I also would like to accumulate enough candy and dust to max out my shiny Absol, along with a few other favorite mons.

Beyond those minor goals, I'd be happy to cut back on my playing time for a while. I still enjoy the game, but I spend too much time on it, and wouldn't mind dialing it back. I don't mind the time I spend raiding, but 80% of my playing time is just repetitive catching of garbage pokemon for the stardust (along with repetitive spinning of pokestops to acquire more pokeballs to catch more garbage pokemon). Sometimes, it feels like wasting time so that I can waste more time. But I'm not complaining about the game; I am just struggling with how much I should allow it to divert my time and energy away from other things.

I'm one million away from level 39, not close enough. I started on launch day and did mass evolution with lucky eggs to reach level 20 ASAP. After level 30 I cared no more for XP.
But I must admit that now that I'm getting closer to 40 I'm using eggs again during double XP events. So, level 40 is not an achievement that impresses me a lot, but I'm sure I'll feel good when I reach it.

About increasing the level cap... I would not expect that to ever happen. If Niantic does here as they did in ingress, the max level won't increase. But PoGo players make a lot of pressure, that could change it. I don't see how it would be necessary. It would unbalance the game. Are you going to be able to power up pokemon to level 50 and solo T4 raids? I don't see it...

I reached 40 during the first day of the thanksgiving double exp. Most of the exp is from the regular grind. Reaching level 40 didn't mean much in the way of losing motivation to me, just relief of not having to deal with mass evolving again. All the feeling of losing motivation has been about ex raids and other flaws in the current game.

EXP still matters if you make it matter, I'm aiming at 30 million currently and it's starting to look realistic. After that I'll consider going for "double 40".

My other current goals:
Collect more maxed out Pokemon. I'd like to get to 40, which is at least 3 million stardust away still.

Record soloing all tier 3 raids without repeating an attacker. Did this before (not Ninetales though, I don't think it was possible before gen 3) but didn't record it.

Other solo challenges like soloing Machamp with a single Lugia, soloing Machamp with a single Gardevoir (with healing), soloing Scyther with silly trash teams, soloing Scyther with a single Moltres, soloing Alakazam's all movesets with 6 unique attackers.

Grind my badges, I aim at getting each type badge to at least 1k and have some goals for the other badges too.

Collect a L1 specimen from each evolution line. This is probably never going to get finished because of hyper rares like Chancey but it does make the game more fun.

Complete the dex and then the gendered dex.

I think I have plenty to keep me occupied for a while. Pogo to me is all about setting your own goals and beating them. When I was in the low thirties it was tearing down enemy towers as often as I could. Now it's something different.

300k, I can smell it

Level 39 with 750k left, it's getting so close now, I can finally get my lucky eggs as rewards because I will definitely need them

I’m like 300k xp away from 44

I am now less than a level 30 account away from L40. That’s how I measure progress. Because of that, even though numerically there may be many trainers “getting close to 40” because they are 37 or 38, I understand that 37.5 is only half way to 40. In other words, only 39 is really “close to 40” but even the newby 39s are only 75% of the way to 40 (or a full level 34 account’s XP away from 40).

My objectives right now are mewtwo (2 days away from opportunity!!), 40 and dex entries. Still lucky egg on my way up. Haven’t bought them by themselves in a while. The boxes I buy have other stuff I want and the eggs are a bonus.

Honestly, it never meant anything, IMO. There's a guy in my city who is kind of famous in the local PoGo community because he has over 50 million XP. I have only 23 million but when we did a raid together I checked his stats in the lobby and he hadn't caught that many more than me, had less than half as many battle wins as I do and he can't solo any tier 3 raid bosses, whereas I can solo all of them. Some of the early level forties just spent a lot of money grinding with lucky eggs to pile on XP, which is only slightly more impressive than doing lots of tier 5 raids with lucky eggs.

Niantic has not given any indication that they will raise the cap. Many Ingress players have predicted that if they do raise it, in addition to XP, they'll add other requirements to require trainers to be more well rounded players, like minimum walking distance, battle wins, etc.