Individual Values (IVs) are an incredibly important component of getting a Pokémon ready for competitive battles. With the exception of Hyper Training, Pokémon’s IVs are unable to be changed after they are born - this means that Pokémon must be specifically bred to have good IVs. 

This process requires a little setup, but once you get into the swing of things, IV breeding is easy, especially if you’re lucky! 

Getting Started

Here’s a list of things you’ll need to get started with IV breeding. You can click on each one for an explanation of how and where to get them. 

• Access to the IV Judge function

• Perfect IV Ditto(s)

• The Oval Charm (Optional)

• A Destiny Knot

• An Everstone

• Power Items (Weight, Bracer, Belt, Lens, Band, Anklet) (Optional)

• A Pokemon with the Flame Body, Magma Armor or Steam Engine Ability (Optional)

The first step to getting Pokémon with perfect IVs is being able to check those IVs without hassle. Thankfully, there is a feature for this in the games - the Judge function. You can gain access to this feature by defeating Leon in the Battle Tower for the first time, at Rank 4. In Pokémon HOME, the Judge function is part of the Premium Plan. 

The Judge function will show phrases that represent the Pokémon’s IVs - some vague, some exact. The table below shows what each phrase means.

Now that we can visualize IVs, it’s time to gather the things we need to get started with breeding. The first (and most important) one is one of the Pokémon we will be using in almost all of our breeding - Ditto! Not just any Ditto, though - a Ditto with perfect IVs. 

Why Ditto, you ask? Ditto is able to breed with any Pokémon (except those in the No Eggs Discovered Egg Group), which means it is an incredibly flexible breeding tool and can be used in almost all situations.  

We highly recommend getting at the very least a Ditto with 6 31 IVs - this is incredibly useful and will be used in almost all your breeding. Beyond that, we also recommend getting a Ditto with 5 31 IVs and a 0 IV in Speed - this will help immensely when breeding Pokémon intended to be used under Trick Room.

“How do I get these Dittos?” you may be asking - 

The Oval Charm is a very useful Key Item that speeds up breeding by increasing the chance for an Egg to be produced. You can obtain it by defeating GAME FREAK’s Morimoto in the Hotel Ionia in Circhester after defeating the Champion. He appears as a Police Officer character and can be found on the second floor of the eastern branch of the hotel. He will challenge you to a Double Battle and Dynamax his Snorlax at the first opportunity. 

Important Items

There are a handful of extremely useful items for breeding, some of which are downright mandatory and some heavily situational. Here’s what they are, and how to get them:

The Destiny Knot is by far the most important item when breeding Pokémon - when held by either parent, it randomly selects 5 stats between both parents and passes those IVs down to the offspring. 

For example, it could select the mother’s 31 IVs in Special Attack and Speed, and the father’s 31 IVs in HP and Defense, as well as the father’s 0 IV in Attack, producing a baby with 4 perfect 31 IVs, as well as a 0 IV in Attack. The sixth IV will be randomly generated.

This item is incredibly important - without it, only 3 IVs between the parents are passed down to the offspring. This allows you to breed a perfect Ditto with a less than optimal Pokémon and get far better offspring within just a few tries. 

You can purchase Destiny Knots for 10 BP at the BP Shop in Hammerlocke Pokémon Center. For other locations, click here. 

Power Items are a little more situational than the Destiny Knot and Everstone - they will pass down the holder’s IV for the relevant stat to the offspring. This is useful when trying to force a 0 Speed offspring for Trick Room, and sometimes when trying to get a Special Attacker with 0 Attack IV. Otherwise, we recommend using a Destiny Knot!

Here’s a list of which item correlates to which stat:

Power Items can be bought at the BP Shop in Hammerlocke Pokemon Center.

Another aspect of breeding that can be sped up is the time it takes to hatch eggs. Keeping them warm and cozy is the answer to this - having a Pokémon with the Ability Flame Body, Magma Armor or Steam Engine will make eggs hatch twice as fast. 

The easiest way to achieve this is to catch a Carkol in Galar Mine - they always have either Flame Body or Steam Engine. However, if you’d prefer to use different Pokémon, here are lists of Pokémon that have Flame Body, Magma Armor and Steam Engine. 

Breeding

Now that you’ve collected all the resources you need, you’re ready to start getting some Eggs! Here’s a step by step guide to the average breeding process:

Initial Step:

1. Go to a Pokemon Nursery (either Wild Area or Route 5 - it makes no difference)

1. Select the parents (usually, this will be a Ditto and a Pokémon in the evolutionary line of the offspring you want to produce)

1. Equip them with items (often Ditto will hold a Destiny Knot, and if you have the desired Nature already, the other Pokémon will hold an Everstone)

1. Drop them off at the Pokémon Nursery

Hatching Step:

Cycle around until the lady outside crosses her arms 

Repeat Hatching Step until you get results you’re happy with

This is a basic outline for breeding, and assumes that both parents have good IVs. If one parent has imperfect IVs, breed until you get an offspring that is significantly better than the parent, and then swap it out for the parent in the Nursery. 

Additional Information

Egg Moves

Some Pokémon can only learn certain moves through being bred with other species that learn those moves - these are called Egg Moves. Some of these are incredibly important in VGC, such as Incineroar’s Fake Out and Parting Shot. Find out more about Egg Moves here. 

Regional Variants

Holding an Everstone will allow a Pokémon to pass down its Regional Variation if it is not in its native Region. For example, an Alolan Vulpix holding an Everstone will produce Alolan Vulpix offspring in Galar, while without the Everstone, the Vulpix would all be Kantonian. 

However, this can cause problems if you want to pass down a Nature at the same time - we recommend getting a Ditto with the Nature you want, putting an Everstone on it and breeding them until you get the Regional Variant Pokémon with the right Nature to circumvent this. 

Breeding for Shiny Pokémon

If you have an interest in Shiny Pokémon, there are a few additional steps you can take when setting up the breeding process. First, we recommend you get a perfect Ditto that is from a different language game to yours - for example, if you are playing in English, you could get a Japanese Ditto. You can use this Ditto as you would any other, however breeding it with a Pokémon of your game’s native language will heavily increase your Shiny odds. (1/4096 -> 1/682.7, 1/512 with Shiny Charm)

Additionally, you can obtain the Shiny Charm, which also greatly increases your odds of obtaining a Shiny Pokémon, by completing the Galar Pokedex and talking to the Janitor on the far left of the 2nd floor of Ionia Hotel’s western branch.