What Is Pokemon Home?

What is Pokemon Home? Here’s how to transfer your pokemon into Sword & Shield and beyond.

Pokemon Home is a new mobile service designed to make collecting and trading pokemon easier for players. The service has both a free and a paid tier, so you can try it out before you commit to the premium tier. It also has some limitations in where pokemon can be transferred, which we’ll go over later. With the release of Pokemon Legends: Arceus, here is everything you need to know about Pokemon Home.

Where to Get Pokemon Home

The app released in February 2020 and is available on the eShop, iOS, and Android. You will need both the Switch app and one of the mobile apps to access all of the features.

To download the app on your Switch, open the eShop. Then search for Pokemon Home and download it. You will need to be on a WiFi connection to download the app, but you don’t need a Nintendo Switch Online subscription to use Pokemon Home.

The app offers cloud-based storage for your pokemon that is intended to replace Pokemon Bank. You can link your Nintendo account to the eShop and mobile versions of the app to view your Pokemon Box in both locations. Pokemon can be freely transferred between Pokemon Sword and Shield, but other games have limitations.

Pokemon Games Compatible with Pokemon Home

Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield
Pokemon Let’s Go Pikachu and Pokemon Let’s Go Eevee
Pokemon Bank on 3DS
All 3DS Pokemon Games (with Pokemon Bank)
Pokemon Go
Pokemon Brilliant Diamond*
Pokemon Shining Pearl*
Pokemon Legends: Arceus*

*Support for these games has been promised, but is not available at this time.

Pokemon Home offers both free and paid plans for players. You can test the mobile app and eShop apps for free with a few limitations.

Features	Basic (Free)	Premium (Paid)
Moving Pokemon from Pokemon Bank	No	Yes
Number of Pokemon that can be deposited	30 Pokemon	6,000 Pokemon
Number of Pokemon in Wonder Box	3 Pokemon	10 Pokemon
Number of Pokemon in GTS	1 Pokemon	3 Pokemon
Room Trade	Participate	Participate and Host
Judge function	No	Yes

How much does Pokemon Home cost?

A Premium subscription is available if you need more storage space for your Pokemon. You can pay for the service in one, three, and twelve month increments.

1 month (30 days) – $2.99
3 months (90 days) – $4.99
12 months (365 days) – $15.99

Transferring Pokemon

You can transfer some Pokemon to Sword & Shield that were not originally a part of the Galar region Pokedex. This is possible using Pokemon Home to transfer these Pokemon into the games. Pokemon that are newly transferable include: