Today Niantic are launching a new process for you to become a Community Ambassadors! Their community program launched in July 2022 in partnership with the Silph Road, with the goal to support Trainers worldwide to host local events and bring the community together. With the closure of the Silph Road, a new system has been put in place for this program.
With this new revised process Niantic are recommitting to this goal, and also want to make it even easier for Trainers to become recognized as leaders of their local communities. Starting now Trainers from the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Australia and New Zealand can apply, with more regions being added at a later date.
Application Process
The application form to become a Community Ambassador can be found here. Niantic ask you to read through the below information before applying to ensure your application is successful.
What has changed?
- The application process is now fully run by Niantic. There is no need to consult
or visit external websites or resources. - The minimum size for a recognized community that regularly meets and plays Pokémon GO has been reduced to 10 people.
- Applicants need to run a total of 4 local community events. These are not limited
to Pokémon GO Community Days; they can be Raid Days, Trading Meetups,
GO Battle League Tournaments, and meetups for the Global Pokémon GO Fest
event.
What steps do I need to take to become a Community Ambassador?
Fill out the application at the end of this page to kick-off your journey. After an initial review of your application you will receive an invitation to join a community of applicants. Over the next weeks or months you need to submit a total of 4 community events that you have run along with a group photo of the event.
Pass a final background check for you and a safety check of your community.
More information about joining the Community Ambassador Program can be found in
the FAQ at the bottom of this article.
General Information about the Community Ambassador Program
What is the Community Ambassador Program?
The Community Ambassador Program supports local, in-person Pokémon GO communities around the globe by empowering their experiences. Community Ambassadors can receive special perks for their communities, like item codes for giveaways, access to Niantic representatives for special feedback sessions, early access to new features, and other opportunities to support their community’s growth.
Individuals who run in-person events in their area, grow their communities, and create and connect safe spaces for Trainers to play can apply to become one of Niantic’s Community Ambassadors.
What does a Community Ambassador do?
A Community Ambassador is someone who voluntarily runs events in their local community with the gratitude and assistance of Niantic. Niantic recognizes how much passion and hard work it takes to bring people together, and this program is built to help leaders do just that.
What does Niantic look for in a Community Ambassador?
- Diversity. Pokémon GO Trainers include people of many nationalities, identities,
and ethnicities. We want to ensure that our Community Ambassadors do, too. Professionalism and quality of character. Being a Community Ambassador means that you’ve been recognized by Niantic. Our Community Ambassadors should always treat others with respect, honesty, and kindness. - Positivity. We know that communities grow in the image of their leadership, and the best communities are built by creating and highlighting the positive instead of focusing on the negative. Opportunities for critical feedback should be treated with respect—never with cruelty or anger.
- Safety. Community Ambassadors should strive to ensure that both their communities and the spaces they play in are secure. All communities are required to have digital presences that are family-friendly, publicly open to members over 13 years of age, and include common sense rules that facilitate safe spaces and practices. When gathering to play, Community Ambassadors should ensure that the areas they choose are safe for trainers and avoid unsafe environments.
- Integrity. Communities should avoid cheating in all forms. That includes discussing cheating or using bots, websites, or other tools that encourage cheating. Community Ambassadors should always do their best to ensure that their communities remain cheat-free.
What does a community receive for being part of the Community Ambassador Program?
Your community is featured on the official community map, so other Trainers can
find and join your local events. Community Ambassadors who register and run events through our program will receive special incentives like item codes and swag to share with their communities for Community Days and other events.
Community Ambassadors will also be able to provide feedback directly to Niantic. They will have access to one-on-one opportunities to learn more about Niantic, and for them to learn about you!
Be part of a global community of local leaders that support each other to manage and grow their own local communities. As Niantic continue to grow and develop the program, they may extend additional opportunities and benefits to help you foster a healthy and safe community for others to play in.
How do I become a Community Ambassador?
Use the below application form here start your journey as a community Ambassador. Additional information can also be found in Niantic’s FAQ below.
FAQ
Q: What is the Community Ambassador Program?
The Community Ambassador Program supports local, in-person Pokémon GO communities
around the globe by empowering their experiences. Community Ambassadors can receive
special perks for their communities, like item codes and swag for giveaways, access to
Niantic representatives for special feedback sessions, and other opportunities to support
their community’s growth.
Individuals who run in-person events in their area, grow their communities, and create and
connect safe spaces for Trainers to play can apply to become one of Niantic’s Community
Ambassadors.
Q: What does a Community Ambassador do? Are they an employee or a volunteer?
A Community Ambassador is not a Niantic employee, contractor, representative, or
volunteer. A Community Ambassador is someone who voluntarily runs events in their local community with the gratitude and assistance of Niantic. Niantic recognizes how much passion and hard work it takes to bring people together, and this program is built to help leaders do just that. We do not restrict what a Community Ambassador says or does; they have the freedom to give positive or negative feedback publicly. However, we do require that interactions are professional—all feedback should be respectful, constructive, and should never attack the people who work on the game.
Q: What does Niantic look for in a Community Ambassador?
Diversity. Pokémon GO Trainers include people of many nationalities, identities, and
ethnicities. We want to ensure that our Community Ambassadors do, too. Professionalism and quality of character. Being a Community Ambassador means that you’ve been recognized by Niantic. Our Community Ambassadors should always treat others with respect, honesty, and kindness.
Positivity. We know that communities grow in the image of their leadership, and the best
communities are built by creating and highlighting the positive instead of focusing on the
negative. Opportunities for critical feedback should be treated with respect—never with
cruelty or anger.
Integrity. Communities should avoid cheating in all forms. That includes discussing
cheating or using bots, websites, or other tools that encourage cheating. Community
Ambassadors should always do their best to ensure that their communities remain
cheat-free.
Q: How do I become a Community Ambassador?
Fill out the application form located at the end of the linked page. This will start your journey to become a Community Ambassador. Once your application is received through the form, it will undergo an initial review. If successful, you will receive an invitation to join a Discord community of applicants.
In the following weeks or months, you will be required to submit a total of four
community events that you have organized. Please include a group photo of
each event as part of your submission. The submission can only be done within
the Discord group.
As the final step, both you and your community will need to pass a thorough
background check.
Q: How does Niantic vet their Community Ambassadors?
Niantic has established an internal process to ensure that candidates meet our standards. Upon applying to the program, applicants will go through the following checks. Pokémon GO account checks for any history of cheating, with an emphasis on the last six months
Background checks for recorded incidents involving the safety of families and children.
A series of customer service and community checks. These checks help verify that the community is moderated and has common sense rules. This process also checks to see if complaints have been reported against the applicant in the past six years.
Not all applicants are guaranteed to become Community Ambassadors. Community Ambassadors may lose their status at any time if they engage in any behavior that can be
considered against our standards, is harmful to their community, or violates our Terms of
Service.
Q: What is the purpose of the Discord Channel?
The purpose of the Discord group is exclusively to facilitate the onboarding process for the
Community Ambassador program. It is not intended for discussions related to game features or other topics. Please note that only trainers who have successfully completed all the required steps within this group and have passed the background check will be recognized as official Community Ambassadors. For any inquiries regarding the onboarding process and becoming a Community Ambassador, please feel free to pose your questions within the Discord group, where a special channel is created to ask such questions.
Q: What are the requirements for a Community?
We require that communities are respectful, family-friendly, and exemplify a willingness to
support each other in a friendly, constructive manner. In order to qualify and remain in good standing, communities must meet the following requirements:
- Community leadership must be over the age of 18.
- Community leadership should have rules and regulations in place to ensure all members must be over the age of 13.
- Communities must be public and accessible for anyone to join.
- Your community cannot be locked behind any form of paid gate, such as a Patreon or Steady membership.
- Communities must have a presence on Campfire and use it to organize their events in order to receive in-game rewards. If your community does not currently have access to Campfire, we will provide that for you.
- Communities must be family-friendly.
- Communities cannot publicly advocate for or share information about cheating. Your community should have rules and regulations to govern what happens if members of your community discuss cheating. Communities with high amounts of cheaters or public discussion of cheating will be removed from the program.
- Communities must be actively moderated and maintain a set of rules that
encourage good behavior. - Communities must maintain an active, positive space for members
- We will periodically check community hubs to ensure their content is meeting our
requirements. Failure to meet requirements will result in immediate removal.
Q: My community is quite small, am I able to apply?
Your community needs to include at least 10 Trainers.
Q: What are the requirements for a Community Ambassador to run an event?
In order to receive incentives, events must always do the following:
- Be held safely. If there are potentially dangerous elements involved, such as inclement weather or other harmful environments, Community Ambassadors should cancel events or reschedule for an alternate location.
- Be held in-person and focused on in-game experiences, such as Raid Hour, Community Day, Battle Days, or other events. Incentives will not be supplied for events in which the community does not meet in-person.
- Be scheduled and collect RSVPs using Campfire.
- Have at least five attendees.
- Have a Community Ambassador present.
Q: What does a Community receive for being a part of the Community Ambassador program?
Your community is featured on the official community map, so other Trainers can
find and join your local events. Community Ambassadors who register and run events through our program will receive special incentives like item codes and swag to share with their communities for Community Days and other events.
Community Ambassadors will also be able to provide feedback directly to Niantic. They will have access to one-on-one opportunities to learn more about us—and for us to learn about you!
Be part of a global community of local leaders that support each other to manage and grow their own local communities.
Q: Do I need any specific language skills for becoming a Community Ambassador?
A basic ability to communicate in written English is a requirement to become a Community
Ambassador.
Q: Can I leverage my progress with the Community rank at TheSilphRoad to speed up my journey towards becoming a Community Ambassador?
Unfortunately, we are unable to consider previously submitted event data at TheSilphRoad for the new onboarding process. However, you have the opportunity to submit your hosted events, provided they occurred on or after April 2023. These events can be resubmitted within the Discord group as a part of the overall 4 events you need to submit. These events
can only be submitted, if you also provide a group photo from the event.
Q: I have other questions about this program. Where should I direct them?
You can email [email protected] with any questions.
A Note About Cheating
- Community Ambassadors’ accounts must be in good standing and pass a check with Niantic in order to qualify. Additionally, your community space may not actively encourage or advocate for any sort of cheating. To help you navigate this topic and help you avoid violating the Terms of Service, we are providing the following examples to assist you.
- TRICKS: If something happens inside of the Pokémon GO app, without any external influence, then this is not cheating. If you perform any action inside the app that leads to an unexpected, but possible, behavior, this is not considered cheating.
- Tricks are OK to talk about, but are not confirmed or supported by Niantic.
- PHONE CHEATS: If you leave the Pokémon GO app and change something about your
- phone’s settings to impact gameplay, this is cheating. This may include manipulating standard functions on your phone through its settings, such as switching GPS on and off or changing time zones in the settings.
- Talking about phone cheats or encouraging members to use them should not be allowed on your community hub.
- THIRD-PARTY CHEATS: Using a third-party device or third-party software to manipulate data or the Pokémon GO app, or using a manipulated third-party version of Pokémon GO, is cheating. This category includes using a bot to play Pokémon GO or using software to manipulate your GPS signal.
- Talking about third-party cheats or encouraging members to use them should not be allowed on your community hub.
These are only a few examples. If you are unsure, check the Niantic Terms of Service. We can’t foresee all the ways someone might cheat in Pokémon GO, so if you encounter something that feels wrong but is not classified as cheating in our guidelines, act with caution. Talking about cheating is a serious topic for us and can cause a community and its Community Ambassador to be immediately removed.
If you or your Community Hub have had any previous issues with cheating, please let us
know so this information won’t affect our relationship in the future. An offense that occurred before you joined the program does not exclude you from participation as long as you are open about this
