Pokemon GO is finally adding its most requested feature, but there's a huge catch

After years of players asking developers Niantic, Pokemon Go finally adds remote trading. The feature was included as part of a new update this week, but players won't be able to use remote trading just yet. In fact, the remote trading feature in Pokemon Go it has a few caveats, which will frustrate many players.

Pokemon Go offered the option of remote trading during the pandemic, but this is something else. Remote trading is exactly what the name suggests: trading with anyone in any part of the world. However, if you want to make your first remote trade, there are a few steps to complete first.

Pokemon GO adds a new forever friends status

Remote trading Pokemon Go first requires achieving a new friendship status called “Forever Friends”. Before the Pokemon GO update this week, the highest friendship level in Pokemon GoBest friends, 90 friendship points required. Forever Friends blows that add up to 180 friendship points. So if you were to start with a brand new friend, it would take a total of 180 days to reach Forever Friend status.

The good news is that Pokemon Go just added weekly challenges where groups of 4 can get an extra 7 friendship points after completing a task. My first weekly challenge asked our group to catch a total of 500 Pokemon, with no maximum or minimum per person. One person could complete the weekly challenge all by themselves and still get 7 friendship points with the other members of their group.

How Remote Trading Works in Pokemon GO

Once you come across Forever Friends with a friend Pokemon Gomost heavy lifting is done, but other restrictions still apply. To coordinate a potential trade, you mark the Remote Trade markers of each Pokemon you're willing to trade. This tells all Forever Friends that these are Pokemon you're willing to part with if they have a compelling offer. You would then look at the marked forever friend Pokemon and decide which one you would be interested in.

At any point in the process, either party can decide they don't want to continue with the remote trade, and the whole thing can start over. Obviously, if you have an outside way to contact your Pokemon GO friend, you can coordinate a remote trade to ensure it's completed, but other friends can simply look at their selection and decide to trade.

You can make a happy trade with Pokemon GO's new remote trading feature!

It seems like unnecessary hoops to jump through in order to take advantage of the remote trade, but things are rarely simple in Pokemon GO. While it will take time for players to earn Forever Friend status, perhaps the biggest frustration with the feature is that you can't trade a Pokemon until 30 days after you catch it. This means you can't simply catch a Pokemon and immediately offer it to a Forever Friend.

Pokemon GO trading restrictions

The usual trading requirements will also apply to remote trading, including Stadust costs for different types of Pokémon (Legendary or Shiny) and whether or not they are registered in both players' Pokedexes. For those unfamiliar, you cannot trade:

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Even if you don't plan on taking advantage of Remote Trading, the new Forever Friends status is still a welcome addition to Pokemon GO. As you earn friendship points with Forever Friend, you will earn XP and unlock more remote shops. The Pokemon GO blog post doesn't explain, but it sounds like remote trades will be tied to the new currency/item. It's not clear if both players need to have the item to complete a long-distance trade, or how often you'll earn them, but we should start learning more about that once players reach Forever Friend status.

My take on Pokemon GO remote trading

While it's great to see Pokemon GO finally add a remote trading feature, it's hard to imagine that's what players had in mind when they first started asking Niantic for a way to trade Pokemon with friends in different locations. There are already some guardrails in place to prevent exploitative Pokemon GO deals, but it seems like there are too many hoops to jump through. It's the first step towards a feature that many thought might never come.