The Holiday Cup Guide: 2020 Edition

Holiday Cup is a special Winter themed PvP cup that takes place from Monday, December 28, 2020, at 1:00 p.m. to Monday, January 4, 2020, at 1:00 p.m. PST (GMT −8).

The Holiday Cup is held in the Great League format, and it allows only Pokémon 1500 CP and under. The Holiday Cup limits Trainers to use only only Normal, Grass, Electric, Ice, Flying, and Ghost typed Pokémon.

During the event, you’ll earn twice the Stardust for winning battles and completing battle sets.

The Holiday Cup meta

Reminder, here are the rules for the Holiday Cup:

• Great League, 1500 CP Limit
• Only Electric, Flying, Ghost, Grass, Ice, and Normal type Pokémon are allowed.
• No other restrictions. Legendaries, Mythicals, Shadows are all a-okay!

The Holiday Cup meta is essentially a trimmed down version of the Great League metagame, with some of the top contenders removed due to type limitations. For example, don’t expect to see Azumarill, Swampert or Galarian Stunfisk in the Holiday Cup.

Even outside of Holiday Pokémon, a metric ton of eligible Pokémon are commonly found in the top of Great League ranking charts. Here’s a list of best 40 Pokémon to use in the Holiday Cup, as ranked by PvPoke.

Holiday Cup Meta Explained

My PVP Academia has a great video that quickly explains the entire Holiday Cup metagame. Worth a watch, for sure!

Top 40 Pokémon to use in the Holiday Cup

Pokémon	Type 1	Type 2	Fast	Charge 1	Charge 2
Mantine	Water	Flying	Bubble	Bubble Beam	Ice Beam
Altaria	Dragon	Flying	Dragon Breath	Sky Attack	Dragon Pulse
Skarmory	Steel	Flying	Air Slash	Brave Bird	Sky Attack
Venusaur	Grass	Poison	Vine Whip	Frenzy Plant	Sludge Bomb
Tropius	Grass	Flying	Razor Leaf	Leaf Blade	Aerial Ace
Vigoroth	Normal		Counter	Body Slam	Bulldoze
Galvantula	Bug	Electric	Volt Switch	Discharge	Lunge
Snowy Castform	Ice		Powder Snow	Weather Ball (Ice)	Blizzard
Ferrothorn	Grass	Steel	Bullet Seed	Power Whip	Thunder
Obstagoon	Dark	Normal	Counter	Night Slash	Gunk Shot
Pelipper	Water	Flying	Wing Attack	Weather Ball (Water)	Hurricane
Shiftry	Grass	Dark	Snarl	Leaf Blade	Foul Play
Gliscor	Ground	Flying	Fury Cutter	Earthquake	Night Slash
Zapdos	Electric	Flying	Thunder Shock	Drill Peck	Thunder
Wigglytuff	Normal	Fairy	Charm	Ice Beam	Play Rough
Snorlax	Normal		Lick	Body Slam	Superpower
Bellossom	Grass		Bullet Seed	Leaf Blade	Return
Grotle	Grass		Razor Leaf	Body Slam	Energy Ball
Magnezone	Electric	Steel	Spark	Wild Charge	Mirror Shot
Alola Marowak	Fire	Ghost	Fire Spin	Shadow Bone	Bone Club
Lapras	Water	Ice	Ice Shard	Surf	Skull Bash
Whimsicott	Grass	Fairy	Charm	Grass Knot	Moonblast
Ludicolo	Water	Grass	Bubble	Energy Ball	Ice Beam
Noctowl	Normal	Flying	Wing Attack	Sky Attack	Psychic
Munchlax	Normal		Lick	Body Slam	Bulldoze
Cradily	Rock	Grass	Bullet Seed	Stone Edge	Grass Knot
Zangoose	Normal		Shadow Claw	Close Combat	Night Slash
Sableye	Dark	Ghost	Shadow Claw	Foul Play	Return
Lugia	Psychic	Flying	Extrasensory	Sky Attack	Aeroblast
Gengar	Ghost	Poison	Shadow Claw	Shadow Ball	Shadow Punch
Stunfisk	Ground	Electric	Thunder Shock	Mud Bomb	Discharge
Haunter	Ghost	Poison	Shadow Claw	Shadow Punch	Shadow Ball
Sceptile	Grass		Bullet Seed	Leaf Blade	Earthquake
Zebstrika	Electric		Spark	Wild Charge	Flame Charge

Our go-to team for Holiday Cup

Altaria

Alola Marowak

Obstagoon

With two additional Pokémon for coverage purposes:

Vigoroth

Wigglytuff

Altaria is a beast in this format and provides coverage against Counter users, Alolan Marowak, Vigoroth, Magnezone, Diggersby and Snorlax. Grass types are also easily defeated. Altaria does lose to Wigglytuff and Alolan Sandslash, but both can be managed by other members of this team.

Alolan Marowak is one of our favorite Great League Pokémon, and it’s a perfect partner for Altaria. A-Marowak provides coverage against Wigglytuff, Alolan Sandslash, Abomasnow, Whimsicott and most other Ice types that can defeat Altaria. Lanturn, Obstagoon and Diggersby are A-Marowak’s most common counters in this format.

Obstagoon is a relatively fresh addition to the GL meta, but it proves excellent against A-Marowak and – more importantly – against Ice types. Obstagoon has access to Counter, which makes well suited to counter Froslass, Drifblim, but also Diggersby, Magnezone and Alolan Graveler.

Wigglytuff is a monster, with Charm dealing a stupendous amount of neutral damage to most opponents in this Cup.

Vigoroth is always a good idea in GL, so we tend to use it here if Obstagoon is not available. Counter leads the offense.