As before, you can select a Buddy to join you and earn Candy as you explore, but now, your chosen Pokémon will appear on the map, can aid you in battle, and be played with and fed in AR mode. As with the Friendship system, you can develop a relationship with your Buddy over time - giving you a series of rewards as you become more and more attentive. On this page:
You can play with and feed berries to your Buddy in AR mode Your Buddy will follow you on the map screen Increasing your Buddy level unlocks a range of perks, including additional aid during the catch phase, a CP boost, and finding items Up to three players can share the same AR space with their Pokémon to take a picture
As before, walking a set distance (1km, 3km, 5km or 20km, depending on the rarity) will earn you Candy, and this still works outside of the Buddy system - meaning you don’t have to have them on the map in ‘Adventure’ mode for this to work, in case you forget to fed them regularly. You can also swap between multiple Buddies (up to 20) per day, allowing you to earn the above perks across multiple Pokémon. Next, press the Play! button. Your phone camera will then activate. If you are in AR mode, you must find a flat surface. Point towards it until yellow footprints appear, then tap. If it then says you are too close to your Buddy, back away a step or two, and it should appear. If you’re struggling, remember you can disable AR mode in the Settings, so the Pokémon will simply appear on the screen. With the Pokémon visible, you can play by rubbing it. You can also feed it by tapping the Berry icon. Unlike during the catch phase where berries are simply tapped, on the Buddy screen they must be thrown like a Poké Ball to your Buddy’s mouth. You don’t lose your Berry if you miss however, so keep trying! Once they are fully fed, they will join you on an Adventure, where they can start earning Hearts for that day… To make them appear on the map screen, you have to make sure they are fully fed. Feed your Buddy some Berries - three regular Berries will do - and their mood will increase, and you’ll be told they will have joined you on an Adventure. They will join you on the map for around three hours, with a hunger gauge appearing around their icon next to the Trainer button in the bottom left corner. Feel free to top that gauge up with Berries as you play, or just wait until it’s fully depleted before feeding them again. Note if you switch between Buddies, their hunger meter will fully empty, so you’ll have to feed them again. While at this sounds frustrating, a benefit is you’ll be able to feed them again quicker if you switch back and forth, and earn some fast and easy Hearts. When your buddy is ’excited’ - as indicated by a cheering icon surrounded by Hearts - then you’ll receive the following benefits:
Candy distances will be halved Your daily Heart cap increases to 20
Getting a Pokémon excited, then, has its perks. To get it excited, there are two methods: To make a Pokemon ’excited’, you can either:
Use Poffin - a shop-only item you can purchase from the shop for 100 Coins - which also fills all feeding heart meters for the day Perform enough actions to reach a certain threshold
Though the second one is ‘free’, it’s neither easy or particularly obvious from the outset. You must collect 32 ‘points’ from performing various activities, but you cannot do them at once - each individual activity has a 30 minute cooldown, with the exception of walking.
Here’s how many points you get from each activity (thanks to 7Kushi from reddit for the following image):
Some clarifications on the above, thanks to TheTraveller on reddit - you can get multiple Battle points within a half hour if you Battle different ways (Trainer Battle, Team Rocket Grunt battle, Team Rocket Leader battle, Gym battle, or Raid) and Souvenirs, Presents and visiting new Stops have no cooldown, just like walking.
It’s also important to note that, with the introduction of the Season of Celebrations on Tuesday, 1st December, the number of hearts you can earn daily from battling was increased to three.
As well as this, there is also a decay of 1 point per 30 minutes, but provided you perform any activity (even if it’s the same as one previously) it’ll reset.
And, when you are excited, it’ll last around the same as when your Buddy is fed - three hours - and you’ll need to keep performing activities to keep it going.
Needless to say, the Poffin is the fastest way to get this started, which unfortunately but understandably, also happens to be the monitised option. Getting your buddy Excited is great for events like Community Day, and though ironically the flurry of activity you’re bound to put your buddy through during the event is the most likely chance you’ll get a buddy excited naturally, our recommendation is to buy a Poffin and use it up front, if you can spare the coins - that way you get the benefits right away.
You can earn up to 10 Hearts per day (or 20 when ’excited’) by performing the following activities:
Note, your Buddy must be in Adventure mode for them to count. So for example, if you jump into AR mode and play with them before feeding them up so they appear on the map, you won’t get a Heart for that action.
The Season of Mythical Wishes continues with the Winter Holiday event, which has brought Mega Glalie to Pokémon Go. Don’t forget to partake in the new Go Battle League season.
Elsewhere, be sure to use Daily Adventure Incense for the chance of encountering Galarian Articuno, Galarian Zapdos and Galarian Moltres.
Earning a number of Hearts will increase their level. Here is every tier, their perks and how many days it takes to reach them:
Thanks to gralll on reddit for helping with the numbers of hearts required.
Between the catch assist and CP boost it’s worth levelling up your Buddy for these benefits alone - and with Souvenirs, we have another thing to collect!
