Catching Pokémon in Pokémon GO

So... You've spent some time walking around, hunting a Pokémon, and here you are — finally in front of your prey.

However, you don't know what to do next... Don't worry, we're here to help you!

How to capture a Pokémon?

Once the Pokémon is in front of you, the deal gets tough: you have to capture it!

The difficulty of the capture depends on the Pokémon: a Zubat that moves constantly will be more difficult to catch than a wise Caterpie.

Also, a very powerful Dragonite will be much harder to capture than a frail but lively Zubat.

Catching a Pokémon means taking a shot — hold the Poké Ball, and then flick it towards the Pokémon with your finger to throw it.

You should try to aim inside the coloured circle in order to increase your chances of capture (in addition to increasing your experience gain).

The colour of the circle in question gives you a quick overview of the Pokémon's chance of capture:

Several factors can affect your chances of capture:

• The species of Pokémon
• The level of the Pokémon
• The type of ball used — Great Ball and Ultra Ball increase your chances of capture
• The use (or not) of a Berry
• The bonus for throwing a Curve Ball
• The precision of your throw — the smaller the circle, the larger the bonus

To throw a Curve Ball, simply spin the Poké Ball with your finger, then flick it to one side of the Pokémon, depending on the direction of rotation of the ball.

Note that if you cannot capture the Pokémon and it escapes, you will still earn 25 XP. It's far from the 100 XP awarded for a capture, but this hidden XP gain is still a consolation in case of failure.

Many other factors are present in the game, which do not affect your chances of capture:

• Your Trainer Level
• The number of catches you have made
• The types, statistics or IVs of the Pokémon
• If the ball hits the Pokémon while outside the coloured circle
• The number of tries
• The time or speed of the throw
• The time of day or the weather.

Some Pokémon will be able to escape the fight! By increasing your Trainer Level, you can find Berries that will make it easier to capture Pokémon!

When a Pokémon escapes from a Poké Ball you have thrown, it sometimes moves away from you, making it even more difficult to capture (its hitbox becoming smaller).

To make it come back as close as possible to you, just enable/disable Augmented Reality (AR). The Pokémon will then return to its original position on the screen.

Be careful, however — capture rates have nothing to do with the difficulty of touching a Pokémon with a Poké Ball (whether because of its movements or its hitbox).

The Pokémon GO Lure Module attracts wild Pokémon for 30 minutes, but must be inserted into a PokéStop beforehand.

By putting several lures side-by-side at PokéStop clusters, more Pokémon (sometimes even rare Pokémon) will then appear, with all trainers in the vicinity able to benefit!

For more information on capture rate and escape rates, check the individual Pokémon entries in our Pokédex.

Written by Holomovement. Translated from the French by Millenium.