If you’ve recently kicked off your Pikachu adventure, or you’re finding it tough to keep pace with the super keeno competition out there, here are our tips on how to level-up fast on Pokémon Go. While there’s an element of just getting out and doing more with the app on the go, a lot of it comes down to doing more a little smarter than the average bear, so you maximise the speed that you level-up and don’t feel like it’s too much of a chore to catch up.
If you haven’t already discovered why it’s important to level-up fast, you haven’t got far enough into the game, but it won’t be long before it becomes your number one objective. The reason for this is that there are level-based caps on how far you can power-up your Pokémon, so just as you start to get one of your best getting close to being competitive, you’ll get stopped from powering it up any further until you get to the next trainer level, which is why it becomes job one.
Top tips to level-up fast in Pokémon Go:
Here’s everything you need to know about how to level-up fast in what has become the biggest app of the year. Just don’t blame us when you become so hooked that you start scouring the countryside for Pokémon instead of your screen.
1. I said, it’s all about the eggs, bout them eggs, no bacon – OK, so there’s no bacon in the game, unless you really squint at Slowpoke, but there are eggs, which are as much of a lifeline for levelling up fast as they are for big hauls in Pokémon intake and the powering-up benefit of Stardust. Opening a 5K egg can bag you in excess of 1,000 XP, so it can have a huge impact.
However, there are some finer points you might need to take into account in terms of maximising the impact of Pokemon eggs. The first of these is to combine them with trainer points doubling Lucky Eggs, which you should activate when you have a couple of them ready to hatch. This turns those 1,000 XPs into 2,000 XP. If you have a couple of these cracking open at the same time then you’ll be flying up the levels in no time.
The other big thing you need to think about is keeping a good supply of new eggs coming in, so you’ve always got one or two incubating, which means you’ll need to be spinning Poké Stop disks on a regular basis. This will require a fair bit of travel, which means walking, running or cycling around a loop or stretch of Poké Stops, but then you’ll need to cover a fair amount of ground anyway to crack open the eggs in the first place, so it all ties in together.
If you want to really push the envelope on this, you can think about investing in additional incubators to be able to have more eggs on the go. Although, these can only be used three times, so they’re not the best long-term investment. If they were unlimited use, they’d be invaluable, and Pokémon Go would probably make even more money for creators Niantic, but with just three hatches before they break and a cost of around £1.20 (150 Poké Coins), it’s not really a great deal.
2. Gotta catch em all – while egg hatching, the associated hiking and bike riding regime and the glory of the Lucky Eggs is the biggest impact combo of activity you can deploy to rack up the trainer points fast, there’s a lot to be said for the bread and butter of the game; catching Pokémon. If you can combine this with your egg hatching jaunts and the joys of the Lucky Egg then you can be adding big volumes of XP to your tally. Throw in some Incese and Lure Modules too and you’ll be crunching serious numbers. Just make sure you factor in enough Poké Stop spins to have a good stream of Poké Balls to catch them all with.
3. It’s evolutionary my dear Watson – adding well timed evolution into the mix is another sure way to crank out the levels as quick as possible. Again, saving up a batch to unleash while you’ve got your Lucky Egg engaged will help you maximise your potential for XP rewards. This will require a heavy Pokémon catch strategy, so you have the right amount of Candies to make it work.
4. 1.21 giga-Poké Stops – they don’t give you that much XP individually, but if you go on a high condensed run of Poké Stop missions then you can smash in some good level-up potential. Again, combine this with a Lucky Egg and ten Stops can mean 1,000 XP, so it can soon make a big difference.
How quickly can you level-up?
If you do everything above, and time everything right with the Lucky Eggs, as well as putting in the hard yards on the move, you can be levelling up comfortably around once a day until you reach level ten and above. The only way to go beyond that pace would be to give up on life in general and devote yourself exclusively to the app, which a few people have done. However, you could take one of the days on the weekend and really get out and active on a massive bike ride to do the occasional double level-up day to speed things up further and also boost your exercise quotient for the week, you healthy gamers, you.
Things get slower when you reach level ten, because the XP points needed to level up start to creep up with 10,000 to start with, rising to 15,000 and above as you go higher into the teens. In addition to the bigger XP requirement, you’ll also find that you get much less (none for the most part) lucky eggs given to you. At this stage you’ll need to move on up to our more technical strategy below.
More advanced level-up tactics
OK, so you can start using the advanced level-up tactics right from the moment you pass level 5 in Pokémon Go, but it becomes easier when you’re a bit more experienced, because it entails getting your Pokémon into gyms to be able to collect the all-important Poké Coins from the store. Essentially, when you get one tucked safely away in a gym you can head to the store to collect ten free Poké Coins (tap the disc in the top right hand corner of the screen). Collect enough and you’ll be able to start back with the Lucky Egg double XP strategy we mentioned above.
Once you’ve collected your reward, you’ll have a 21hr window where you won’t be able to collect any more free coins, but as soon as the counter is down again you’ll be able to repeat the trick. You get 10 coins for each Pokémon you get into a gym, so if you get two in and press collect, you’ll get 20 coins, and so on, but as usual you won’t be able to do it again for 21-hours. To become a zen master of getting your best fighters into a gym, you’ll need to work on your battle tactics, so as soon as you’ve got these mastered, you’ll need to commence the placement and start harvesting your Lucky Egg pocket money. Read our guide to getting your Pokémon into a gym for everything you need to know.
