Trainers, with the exciting news that we now have remote Shadow Raids in Pokémon GO, remote Dynamax and Gigantamax battles are not far behind.
From May 19, 2025, at 11:00 a.m. PDT (GMT −7), remote Max Battles go live, along with a new 1500 Max Particle limit. Trainers will be able to join Max Battles remotely by using both a Remote Raid Pass and the usual number of Max Particles.
It’s important to note that there are also changes for those who choose to participate in Max Battles in-person. Trainers who participate in Max Battles in person will earn more Premier Balls and XP than before as an incentive to battle in person. More Premier Balls will be a very welcome addition!
We’re thrilled that those who haven’t been able to participate in in-person Max Battles before are now going to be able to, especially for disabled trainers, and the rural communities who couldn’t get the numbers together before.
So, why am I writing this article? Because myself, and others here at GOHub, are concerned about how remote Max Battles are going to work. If you haven’t been able to participate in them before, they are a whole different ball game compared to raids. There is strategy, planning, and team work required in order to successfully take these tricky bosses down, as well as a lot of preparation.
Some of you may remember my first experience of Gigantamax Battles, and the article I wrote about them. To call them a disaster would be accurate. The majority of trainers had assumed the Max Battles would be like raids, that they could go in with fairly unprepared basic Pokémon and just tap away. Alas, without the necessary preparation, we were doomed for failure.
With remote Max Battles enabling everyone to simply jump in to lobbies without communication, we are concerned that the division between those who have been participating in Max Battles already, and those who have not, will only get wider, with potential for resentment from both sides. With Max Battles you cannot be ‘carried’ like you could be in raids. This is especially true in Legendary Dynamax Max Battles, where only 4 trainers can work together to defeat the boss.
We are concerned we will see newer trainers left behind because more experienced trainers don’t want to risk failing their battles, and conversely, we are worried that the experienced trainers will be left to do the work while newer trainers rest on their laurels.
Firstly, don’t panic! Max Battles can seem very overwhelming at first, but there is plenty of help at hand. Have a read of some of our articles to learn about the mechanics of Max Battles, as well as advice on which Pokémon make the best attackers and defenders/chargers:
- Attacker Tier List
- Defenders/Chargers Tier List
- Pokémon GO Max Battle Guide: Best Strategies, Moves and Pokémon
Our absolute top tip is that you need to be prepared. This means for each Max Battle boss you need to ensure you have an optimal team as best you can. This means not only evolving your Pokémon through to their final evolution, but also levelling up the appropriate Max Moves, and ensuring their fast move is their fastest move/super effective typing.
Speaking of fast moves, your fast move is absolutely key in Max Battles. Your fast move not only charges your Dynamax Meter, and the quicker you can fill that up, the quicker you can Dynamax/Gigantamax, but it also denotes the typing of your attacking type Max Move. With Gigantmax Pokémon, they have a set typing for their Max Move, so ensure you have their quickest fast move, but with Dynamax Pokémon, the fast move dictates the typing of the attacking Max Move. So for example, if your Dynamax Blastoise has a Dark type fast move, it will have a Dark type Max Attack move.
You don’t need to level up all of your Max Moves for all of your Pokémon, it depends on the individual Pokémon and their use. For example, we wouldn’t advise investing into your attacking move for Blissey, because Blissey is a designated defender/charger Pokémon.
This article goes into each aspect of our top tips, advice and how Dynamax battles work, and we strongly recommend reading it.
Start out battling local tier one and two Max Battles. You can build yourself a fantastic team this way, even if you haven’t been able to obtain any Gigantamax Pokémon yet. All of the First Partner (starter) Pokémon are fairly easy tier one Max Battles, and can all be great counters.
There is an easy way to maximise your Max Particles so that you can make full use of more than your daily allowance. With the new daily limit, you can hold 1500 Max Particles, but there is an easy trick to allow you to collect more than the daily collection limit of 800!
Max Particles are essential for participating in Max Battles and levelling up Max Moves. You can collect them through the following ways:
- Visiting Power Spots:
- Each visit to a Power Spot rewards you with 100 Max Particles.
- Clicking on a Power Spot may also give a bonus of 20 Max Particles.
- Walking:
- Walking 2 km rewards you with 300 Max Particles.
- Daily Cap:
- You can collect up to 800 Max Particles per day, but this seems to be a soft cap.
- However, by visiting 6 Power Spots and claiming your 2 km walking reward, you can earn up to 1020 Max Particles despite the soft cap.
You can view how many Max Particles you have collected in your nearby menu, under the Power Spot section. It shows you how many Max Particles you currently have, and if you tap on it, it will also tell you how many Max Particles you can collect on the day. Keep an eye on this, and when you have 120 or less available to obtain for the day, collect your walking bonus Max Particles!
With 1500 as the maximum you can hold, this is also a great help ahead of any Max Battle events. We recommend maxing out your Max Particle storage ahead of any event, so that you can participate in as many Max Battles during the event as possible. So far only Venusaur, Blastoise and Charizard have returned for a second rotation as Max Bosses, so it may be a while before we see other bosses return too.
Once you have the basics of Max Battles down, the next biggest thing that helps is communication. In person it is easy for one person to volunteer to be the defender of the group, but when the some in the group are remoting, this is much trickier.
When you are in the Dynamax phase, you can see what moves your team mates are using because of the animation that will appear over their Pokémon in the top centre part of the battle screen. If a shield appears, Max Guard is being used, if a heart appears Max Spirit is being used, and if the battle animation appears, an attacking move is being used. Only one person needs to use Max Guard, so if you keep an eye on this top section and see someone appears to be using Max Guard with a defender type Pokémon, you may opt to switch roles in the next phase to optimise damage. While this is less effective than in-person communication, it is something you can use to try to ensure impactful teamwork.
If you have local group chats or discords, even if you can’t be there in-person, you can still let your fellow trainers know what sort of team/role you are offering so they can plan too.
The more open and prepared you can be, the more likely you are going to be to succeed. We hope that the established in-person communities will open their arms to the newbies, and the newbies will also put in the work so that they aren’t ‘letting the side down’, so to speak. What makes Pokémon GO great is the community, and how we help each other. This is an opportunity to teach each other, learn from each other, and enjoy even more success!
Team work and preparation are your best friends with Max Battles, and we can help each other along to ensure success! Listen, learn, and read up and be a team player. With collaboration, we can take down these Max Battles better than ever!
