Posted in: Games, Mobile Games, Niantic, Pokémon GO | Tagged: Lunar New Year, Niantic, Niantic Labs, pokemon, pokemon go

The Lunar New Year Event 2021 Kicks Off In Pokémon GO

The Lunar New Year event kicks off today in Pokémon GO. Let's dive into the details including the boosted Pokémon and the new Mega Raid.

The details for the Lunar New Year in Pokémon GO include:

Tuesday, February 9, 2021, at 10:00 a.m. to Sunday, February 14, 2021, at 1:00 p.m. local time Red Pokémon—like Krabby, Goldeen, Magmar, Magikarp, Miltank, Meditite, Tepig, , [sic] and more—will appear more frequently in the wild! If you're lucky, you might spot a Gyarados in the wild.

So we don't get a new Shiny, but we do get Gyarados in the wild. This was also a feature of last year's Lunar New Year event, in which Gyarados had a noticeably boosted Shiny rate. It was a rare spawn but was easier to find in the wild than, say, Deino during Dragon Week. One thing to note, though, is that Gyarados is also being released in Mega Raids, which generally give the species a permanent Shiny rate of one in 60. This may impact Gyarados's Shiny rate.

In any case, it's great to have another shot at Shiny Miltank, which will also be featured in tonight's Spotlight Hour.

Pokémon representing animals associated with Lunar New Year will be hatching from 5 km Eggs! Keep an eye out for Rattata, Ekans, Mankey, Ponyta, Mareep, Houndour, Miltank, Torchic, Bagon, Buneary, Tepig, and Litleo.

Also stay tuned for a separate piece on the event's raid rotation, along with tips regarding which species are worth your raid pass and which are worth a pass.

Latios and Latias will be appearing in five-star raids from Tuesday, February 9, 2021, at 10:00 a.m. to Saturday, February 20, 2021, at 9:00 a.m. local time. Mega Pidgeot, Mega Gyarados, and Mega Ampharos will be appearing in Mega Raids from Tuesday, February 9, 2021, at 10:00 a.m. to Saturday, February 20, 2021, at 9:00 a.m. local time.

Pokémon GO trainers can find complete Raid Guides to these all coming to Bleeding Cool. Yesterday, we featured Latios and Latias Raid Guides and will release Mega Gyarados and Mega Pidgeot Raid Guides beginning today. These guides break down the top ten overall counters, the top ten budget counters, the Shiny odds, and the 100% IVs of each species.

In celebration of the Year of the Ox, Tauros, the Wild Bull Pokémon, will be featured in Timed Research!

While perhaps not as exciting as a Legendary, it's exciting to see Pokémon GO once again pick up the pace of these Timed Research questlines. You can find our full breakdown of the event's tasks and rewards coming soon.

Gifts will contain more Poké Balls, so be sure to send lots of Gifts to your friends. You're more likely to become Lucky Friends with your friends, so be sure to swap Gifts, battle in raids, and trade with them! When you trade a Pokémon, it'll be more likely to become a Lucky Pokémon. Trading range will be temporarily increased to 40 km from Monday, February 8, 2021, at 1:00 p.m. to Monday, February 15, 2021, at 1:00 p.m. PST(GMT −8).

This is the first time this extent of friendship bonuses have been offered in Pokémon GO for quite some time. If you don't have friends nearby to trade with, my personal advice is to search social media for local raid groups. These will often be able to supply you with friends willing to trade that you will now be able to trade with without ever meeting in person.

Good luck out there, fellow trainers!

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