Pokemon Go Trade Distance: What is the maximum limit?

Trading Pokemon is a popular component of the series in the mainline games, with many players swapping legendary Pokémon with friends to fill out their Pokedex, or to take advantage of trade evolutions, but we have a distance restriction in Pokemon Go that complicates things, so what is the maximum distance allowed for these trades?

You won’t be allowed to trade at all if you’re not close enough, after all, simply being Pokémon Go friends won’t be enough.

Why should I care about the max distance for trades in Pokemon Go?

Simply put, as mentioned above, if you’re outside the allowed range and not in specific events that allow otherwise with the special trades system, you won’t be able to trade at all.

As you can imagine, that makes this maximum trade distance quite important for anyone who wants to be doing any trading whatsoever in Pokemon Go. And even if you’re not that bothered about trading usually, you’ll probably need to use it to clear some research tasks at some point.

And remember, traded pokemon will in some cases have the candy cost of their evolutions reduced to 0, making them a cheaper option where available.

READ MORE: Pokemon Go: How to earn Stardust in 2021

Trading Requirements in Pokemon Go

With the basics out of the way, you must fulfil all of the following conditions to be able to trade in Pokemon GO:

• Be at least Trainer Level 10
• Be within trade distance of the Trainer you wish to trade with
• Be friends with that Trainer to send the request / accept their request

It sounds pretty simple so far, right? Fortunately, the requirements are actually quite simple to manage.

The only real issue there with trading in Pokemon Go is that the maximum trade distance can be quite restrictive if you don’t happen to live near other players unless you’re going to spoof GPS location or fake GPS movement, anyway – both of which are likely to earn bans if detected.

So, how big is the trade distance you may be wondering? Well, the default Pokemon Go trade distance is a measly 100m.

Yeah, it’s not particularly great, is it? 100km would be significantly preferable, but that’s a far cry from what we have. Luckily for us, Niantic has also been experimenting with changing that trade distance a few times, and during the Covid-19 pandemic, there have been plenty of times it’s been boosted to 40km or so via increased trade range special events.

So if you’re set on trading with your buddies who aren’t living right next to you to swap some legendaries or just fill out your Pokédex, keep an eye out, you might just see an event that makes it much more simple to do so with a long distance trading boost.

You might want to hold off on trying to trade for that elusive shiny Mew though, unless you’ve got a lot of Stardust to expend, like a cool 1,000,000 to spend just to complete the trade. And yes, that is a real example of the prices.

If you want to reduce those somewhat insane prices, increasing your friendship level from good friends to great friends, best friends or ultra friends is your best bet, as the level of friendship directly reduces those costs the higher it gets.

In other words, you probably want to wait to trade those new Pokémon, whether it be a new legendary or Mythical Pokémon, Shiny Pokémon or an Unown your friend doesn’t have yet, trading is expensive. So expensive in fact, it might be better to save for the higher level part of the game so that Machoke might take a while before you can get your trade discount.

Trading will also almost always result in a lower CP and HP pokemon unless you get lucky, so it’s best not to rely on it regardless.

READ MORE: Pokemon Go: How to find Shiny Pokemon, Shiny Odds

Anything else to know about the Pokémon go trade distance and trading system?

Provided you are within trade range distance with fellow trainers where you live, and you have them added as a friend or know their trainer code, you can just tap on your friend’s portrait in your friend list and hit the trade button to start a real-time trade – make sure you have an active internet connection too.

You’ll need to be within close range of your friend if there isn’t a bonus event modifying the range though.

There is also a maximum daily limit to the amount of trades in the Pokémon go trading system though, which thankfully is high enough at 150 that you’re unlikely to hit it without trying to do so on the average Monday. Of course, future events and new types of trades may change things, but it’s hard to predict what they could do – in the meantime, the trading medal will remain an expensive one to obtain.

If you’d like to read more about trading though, you can find details here. Outside of the max trade distance itself, there are quite a few restrictions on what you can trade, and the Stardust cost isn’t exactly low for most trades, so checking in to see what to expect is a good idea.

These restrictions and rules are consistent across all systems the game is present on as well, so no matter if you play on Android, iPad, tablet or iPhone you’ll likely need to deal with all of this.

As always, you can find more Pokemon pieces on The Click right here, and more by me personally here