Pokemon Go's Friendship Bonuses Revealed

Pokemon Go's new Friendship Levels offers a ton of incentives for those players who choose to exchange gifts and Pokemon with other players.

Earlier this week, Pokemon Go launched a new "friendship" feature that allows players to add other players to their friends list via a 12 digit code. Players who are friends in Pokemon Go can exchange gifts (in-game item bundles that are distributed from PokeStops) and trade Pokemon with other players.

Every time a player exchanges a gift, trades Pokemon, or battles alongside one of their friends in a Gym or Raid Battle, they increase their "Friendship Level" with that player. There are four Friendship Levels, each of which offer increasing bonuses with other players, along with a one-time XP bonus.

The biggest perk to increasing your Friendship Levels with other players is that it gives players a Stardust discount when trading Pokemon. Each trade costs Stardust to complete and players can significantly decrease this cost by becoming better friends with a player.

Here are the base costs for trading different types of Pokemon:

Non-Legendary or Non-Shiny Pokemon Already Registered to Pokedex: 100 Stardust

Non-Legendary or Non-Shiny Pokemon Not Registered to Pokedex: 20,000 Stardust

Shiny or Legendary Pokemon Already Registered to Pokedex: 20,000 Stardust

Shiny or Legendary Pokemon Not Registered to Pokedex: 1,000,000 Stardust

And here's the discounts that players will get for trading with one of their good friends:

Good Friends: 0%

Great Friends: 20%

Ultra Friends: 92%

Best Friends: 96%

So, while it costs a million Stardust to receive a Legendary Pokemon you don't have via a trade, players can knock that cost down to just 40,000 Stardust.

Players also get some useful bonuses if they battle together with one of their friends in a Gym Battle or a Raid Battle. Players get an Attack Bonus if they battle or raid with a friend, and they get extra Premier Balls when a raid is complete if they beat the raid with a friend.

Here's the battle bonuses players get when they battle with a friend:

Good Friends: 3% damage bonus, no extra Premier Balls

Great Friends: 5% damage bonus, 1 extra Premier Ball

Ultra Friends: 7% damage bonus, 2 extra Premier Balls

Best Friends: 10% damage bonus, 4 extra Premier Balls

Finally, players get an XP bonus whenever they "level up" their friendship level with another player. Players get 3,000 XP for becoming Good Friends with another player, 10,000 XP for becoming Great Friends, 50,000 XP for becoming Ultra Friends, and a whopping 100,000 XP for becoming Best Friends with another player.