GO Fest 2026

[Sethallenpowell (Seth)]

How was your GO Fest weekend?

This was the first time I actually checked into a Community Ambassador event and it was awesome! There is a mall close to me that is an amazing spot to play Pokemon GO. Hundreds of people showed up! Never caught a shiny Mewtwo but my fiancée caught three so I got a shiny lucky one from her It was hilarious to see a parade of hundreds of players all following the ambassador around in his cape I wish I got a picture of it. I got asked if we were a flash mob about a dozen times.

Got the bottle cap and I’m using it on my shiny Espeon for a new master league team I’m working on.

Made tons of new friends from raids, ended up making it to level 59 at the very end of last night!

Also thought it was cool my fiancée managed to get the final strike in our very last raid!

[Jormdeworm]

Oh boy I always forget to write my GO Fest and Tour reports. I’ll try to remember this time…

[HurocaNitride]

Go Fest Recap
The first day was incredibly rewarding as I went to my local open-air mall to handle the Super Mega Raids. this took around 3 hours of both in-person and remote raids to gather enough Mewtwo Mega Energy X, but it was worth it. Nearly all the Mewtwo caught were pretty worthless (excluding the Shiny and the ones with a background), so they will be transferred today so I can rake in the Mewtwo Candy.
The second day was really tedious, due to the fact I was unable to show up for my first IRL meetup to handle the raids. In the afternoon, I finally made it back to the open- air mall I visited yesterday, and sure enough, one of the gyms was filled with more than 10 Trainers. I nearly missed the raid so I joined as soon as I got there. The next 4 hours were focused on Super Mega Raids, and while I did fall short, I did Mega Evolve a Mewtwo (not the one featured in both pictures) but walking will take me around 180 km for this one to Mega Evolve into Mega Mewtwo Y and 780 km to generate 3900 Mega Energy for both Mega forms. Other than that, I was able to get a Platinum Medal for catching all forms of Unown and I was finally able to catch Tropius, which leaves two Pokemon left before I get my Platinum Medal for the Hoenn Pokedex.

In conclusion, it was a very successful (and stressful) Go Fest to prepare for. I’m going to take a nap for now.
Deuces!

[vorgriff3 (Mike)]

Miraculous guessing landed my vacation on Global GOFest weekend this year. Spent most of the time raiding Mega Mewtwo. No hundos, but lots of 90%+ and a few shinies. Loads of mega energy for using them in months to come. Not sure what good a perfect Gimmeghoul might be; but my alt got one of those, plus a hundo Zacion. Sister’s trainer got a perfect Rayquaza.

It’ll take all week to sort and process the past 2 weeks of festival play. But it’ll be a labor of like (okay, I only loved PoGO from 2017-2019…)

[Sethallenpowell (Seth)]

@vorgriff3 Nice, if you caught any Hundo during the meetup I joined you got to win an official Pokemon GO Fest 2026 pin!

[Branebs]

I will try to find some time to post my report from GO Fest. Hopefully, tomorrow.

[Branebs]

I won’t be able to post my detailed report like before, only bits and pieces in several posts. As I remember something, I will add more.

[Branebs]

DAY 1
I prepared like I always do. When GO Fest began it was raining, so I played at home. Luckily, the rain stopped soon and the sun was shining again. I used incense, lucky eggs, star pieces, lure modules, party play, mega evolved Rayquaza, took snapshots, incubated eggs. I was excited for Unown spawns from incense and was finally able to catch them all! Raids were a problem because I don’t have friends here who play. I used 3 remote raid passes to catch Mewtwo X. I chose the path for Mega Mewtwo Y in the timed research because it’s the stronger one of them. I managed to do Entei and Rayquaza raids in person. I also got 1 Mewtwo with the special background from GO pass.
My results:
XP 1,470,842
Distance 4.8 km
Pokemon caught 484
Poke stops spun 94
Evolved Pokemon 5
Hatched Pokemon 6
Field research done 46
Team Rocket grunts defeated 4
Raid expert 5
XXS Pokemon 1
XXL Pokemon 4
Legendary raids 5
Stardust 286,973
Special background 1
Shiny Pokemon 12

[Branebs]

Frillish, Jynx and both Unown are new shinies

[Branebs]

Day 2 coming soon.

[NotanotherKangaskhan]

No pay to play and no dedicated time to play so no report for me.

[Branebs]

DAY 2

I don’t remember every detail, but Day 2 was great. I did Enamorus raid in person, then Mega Mewtwo Y remotely (but it didn’t have good IVs), Regidrago in person, Tapu Lele in person (and finally a shiny legendary with great IVs! ), Kartana in person, and then something crazy happened! I was invited to a remote Mewtwo Y raid in France and when I caught it, it turned out to be a hundo!!! Wow, what a fantastic catch! A month or so later, we were all gifted with hundo Mewtwo Y by Scopely, but this one I got by myself! After that, I did another remote Mewtwo Y raid to get more mega energy and this one had good IVs, so I’ll use it for future raids. Next, I did Zacian raid in person and got a special background. I did two more in person raids and got Latias and Latios (which had almost perfect IVs! ). I got 8 shinies + 1 from a lucky trade. Mawile, Unown V, Litleo, Spinarak, Dwebble, Unown A were found in the wild, Frigibax was hatched from a 10 km egg, Tapu Lele was caught in a raid and finally shiny Mewtwo was obtained via trade. In the end, I got Zeraora with good IVs! This year’s GO Fest was amazing!

My results:

XP 930,299
Distance 6.1 km
Pokemon caught 398
Poke stops spun 67
Evolved Pokemon 3
Hatched Pokemon 7
Field research done 39
Team Rocket grunts defeated 1
Raid expert 10
XXS Pokemon 1
XXL Pokemon 2
Legendary raids 10
Stardust 363,837
Special background 1
Shiny Pokemon 8+1 (lucky trade)

[Branebs]

GO Fest 2026

My results TOTAL (DAY1+DAY2):

XP 2,401,141

Distance 10.9 km

Pokemon caught 882

Poke stops spun 161

Evolved Pokemon 8

Hatched Pokemon 13

Field research done 85

Team Rocket grunts defeated 5

Raid expert 15

XXS Pokemon 2

XXL Pokemon 6

Legendary raids 15

Stardust 650,810

Special background 2

Shiny Pokemon 20+1 (lucky trade)

[Branebs]

GO Fest 2026 Mega Finale

I don’t have much to say about Mega Finale, I think this one wasn’t that spectacular like some from the previous years. I had mega energy to mega evolve every Pokemon that was in raids, so my main focus was on Armored Mewtwo, Mewtwo X and Mega Raichu. I used 2 remote raid passes on Day 1 to get Mewtwo X and I got 1 with great IVs from the 2nd raid. I caught my free Mewtwo Y hundo with special background and since I had 2 I didn’t do more Mewtwo Y raids. I did all other raids in person. Those were 1 Malamar, 3 Raichu, 3 Armored Mewtwo (finally got my first Armored Mewtwo!) I chose Froakie for Timed research and got Greninja with special background that can mega evolve. I didn’t get any shinies which was disappointing. It wasn’t the greatest event, but Armored Mewtwo somewhat saved it.

[Stridian]

I think that’s how I feel about Go Fest Mega Finale, if it weren’t for the Armored Mewtwo, it would have been very dull for me. I loved the opportunity to finally have that pokemon, I really didn’t think I’d be getting it anytime soon, so to have it now is really an awesome thing!

But what else? Not much if you don’t go for plenty of raids.

I loved the first part of Go fest, I had so much fun exploring, catching, and joining 2 mewtwo raids. I’ve come to the conclusion that raids can be quite a lot of fun when you have a many people and are able to join them. However, in this part of the event I think there was a good balance of playstyles (raids, hunting for specific pokemon, shinies, etc)

What I loved the most was the randomness of the shinies! I got 24 in total (including a shiny Mewtwo ) and, walking around, the possibility of finding 1 more was always there, which made the game more fun. I also liked having new research tasks in pokestops as the “habitats” changed, that added to the fun and novelty of the exploration. I think both these things (shinies + research tasks respawning) made me want to keep engaging more with the game.

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The same cannot be said for the finale, though. I got 2 shinies in total, that weekend, one being the 1st Finnekin (the one I chose) found in the wild at the start of the event and the other one was Chespin that popped up at the final minutes.

And that was it… And, believe me, I walked a lot and also in new areas with plenty of pokestops. I just couldn’t find anything. (I even broke my walking record for the week - seriously, next time marathon pikachu comes around I will get it! )

It really felt like the odds were not there for me at all and for a special event like this, boosted shiny odds should be the standard for everybody (and more research tasks!).

I also think that, if you won a mega raid, you should have got enough mega energy to mega evolve that pokemon. I don’t think we got enough energy and this was a special event not your regular mega raids during a normal week. Special event = special bonus.

What worries me here is how this sets a bad precedent for future events. Having a free go pass with no shiny boosted odds (so, really, almost a regular day…) and a paid one with boosted odds (from the start of the event or from rank 50 or something)? Nonsense! From what we know so far, Wild Area won’t have shiny boosted odds in the free version either. You could have double odds of getting shinies from the paid version, but removing it altogether from the free version? Awful!

I will not put so much effort (playing time) in that event as I did in go fest, it’s just not worth it this way. I will do routes for the mighty pokemon, but that will be pretty much it, I guess…

I know I’m complaning a lot, but the precedent here is really bad. Can you imagine community days with 2 versions? A free one where you unlock the shinies after reaching rank whatever and a paid one unlocking it from the start of the event? I know this is stretching it a bit, but the principle is similar…

Also, no stickers for this season anymore?! That’s cheap!

[HurocaNitride]

Go Fest: Mega Finale

Day 1: Went on a trip, mostly got to catch the starters and the rotating spawns. I did catch a lot of dragon types, but it wasn’t enough to get the Dragon Tamer Badge to Platinum. It was pretty good. I did reach rank 100 on the pass, though now I have an army of Delphox with backgrounds (that I honestly have no use for other than trading).

Day 2:

I then finally Mega Evolved my Hundo Delphox, and just caught as many Dragon typs as possible. I also grinded XLs for some hundos and got a lot of Stardust from the pass. I also progressed the Mega Levels of all Pokemon that haven’t reached Max Mega Level, and I also reached Best Buddies with Annihilape.