Niantic announced earlier today that the long-anticipated friendship feature will be releasing later this week for Pokémon GO.
“The Friends feature will start rolling out to Trainers later this week, allowing you to connect with your real-life friends and keep track of their adventures in Pokémon GO. You’ll be able to send them items, earn bonuses – and even trade Pokémon!”
To create a friendship with another trainer, the task is simple – ask the trainer for his or her trainer code, enter said code in your Pokémon GO app, and a request will be sent to him or her, who then simply has to accept the request!
Now that your friendships are blooming in Pokémon GO, it’s time to level up that friendship level! You level up your friendship level by sending gifts, trading, and participating in raids/gym battles with your friends. Your friendship status with other trainers will be elevated from friends to great friends, and eventually to best friends. Raising your friendship level has its perks of course. Participating in battles with a great friend or higher will net you an attack boost, while trading with a great friend or higher will cost you less stardust for the trade. Special trades (trades for legendary/shiny Pokémon) will cost a significant amount of stardust, so be sure to save those trades for your best friends!
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