It’s a massive year for the Pokemon brand, with the IP celebrating its 30th year of existence and the fandom preparing for the release of Winds and Waves in 2027, but it’s an equally big year for Pokemon GO. The popular mobile game launched 10 years ago, and while many players haven't kept up with their regular Pokestop spinning and curveball-throwing, there is still a dedicated community that proves the staying power of Pokemon GO. Nowhere is that more apparent than Pokemon GO Fest, a celebration of Pokemon GO the likes of which you can’t quite understand unless you see it for yourself. So I did.
Pokemon GO Fest hops the globe for three separate stops before a Global version releases to all players in mid-July. My destination was Chicago, Illinois, for the second leg of the Pokemon GO Fest Tour, a significant location considering its place in the event’s history. Chicago was host to the very first Pokemon GO Fest back in 2017, and once again the event has staked its claim on Grant Park alongside Lake Michigan. It’s a beautiful venue for a 3-day extravaganza where the Pokemon GO community comes together to do what they do best.
Discovering the Magic of Pokemon GO All Over Again
About a year ago, you could have counted me among those lapsed players who jumped on the bandwagon in 2016 but lost touch with the game over time. But in mid-2025, I found Pokemon GO to be a fantastic bonding experience for my son and I — a chance to get super invested in a video game, to learn all there is to learn about an IP as deep and vast as Pokemon, and to spend quality time outdoors with members of our community.
When I say that I am invested in Pokemon GO significantly more than in the beginning, that is no exaggeration. In some ways, Pokemon GO feels like a second job (or maybe a third job, if you count being a parent), but I love it. And now, as I reflect on my time at GO Fest, I am just as excited about the game as I was a year ago, but I also have some priceless memories to go along with it.
Both my son and I took a trip out to Chicago to find out what GO Fest is all about, and with one primary goal in mind: catch Mega Mewtwo. Or rather, catch Mewtwo with its Mega Level unlocked. If we were lucky, then that Mewtwo would be shiny, and if we were really lucky, that Mewtwo might also have a background, which, for the US GO Fest, featured the Chicago skyline. So while we came for the Mewtwo, what we found was a community that is as welcoming and friendly as any I’ve encountered in video games and an experience we won’t soon forget.
How Does Pokemon GO Fest Work?
So what exactly is Pokemon GO Fest? In its current iteration, GO Fest in-person events exist in two forms: the Park Experience and the Citywide Gameplay. The Park Experience is like your main event. It’s an all-out blitz of Pokemon catching and raiding the likes of which you won’t understand until you attend one of these events. Pokestops are abundant, raids rotate every 10 minutes, and smaller activities like a Pop Up Pokemon Center, photo ops, and community events give you something to do in between.
Tickets for the Park Experience go fast and they are broken up into 4-hour Morning and Afternoon sessions on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. When you arrive at the location, in this case Grant Park, and your session starts, the entire area comes alive.
For 2026, Pokemon GO Fest traded its habitat-focused layout for one that featured zones. Each zone revolved around and favored a specific type of gameplay, while offering plenty of raids as well.
- Recruitment Zone: This zone was focused on representing your given Pokemon GO Team, with tents hosting special activities and giveaways to team members.
- Conservatory Zone: Spawns aplenty in this zone, offering an opportunity to fill out your Pokedex with the added bonus of increased shiny rates.
- Cultivation Zone: Lower hatch distance rates and unique field research were part of this zone.
- Battle Ground: Team Rocket owns this zone, which hosted Shadow Raids as well as copious Rocket Grunt and Leader encounters.
This layout encouraged different types of play. If you wanted to focus on a specific raid target, like a Shiny Shadow Groudon, then you could spend the entire 4 hours in the Battle Ground, save for your assigned Mega Mewtwo raids. Or if you wanted to sample a little bit of everything, you could walk North to South and vice versa, hopping into whatever raid caught your fancy and catching Pokemon along the way. And if you have a Pokemon GO Plus+, chances are you will have nabbed quite a few Shiny Pokemon and hatched a bunch of eggs during your trek.
I found the experience to be a bit overwhelming at first. Crippled by choice, I simply targeted Mewtwo raids because that was our initial goal. But once I learned each zone’s benefits, we started doing that loop I talked about. And by the end, our feet were tired but our hearts (and Pokemon Storage) were full.And boy, what an ending. Mega Mewtwo was the big ticket item on the docket for Pokemon GO Fest 2026, a fitting choice given the 10-year anniversary. Each Park Experience attendee was given a set of two gyms marked on their map that would host Mega Mewtwo Y and Mega Mewtwo X 30 minutes before their session ended. Niantic knew what it was doing here, getting players to gather together in an environment that was infused with giddy excitement.While the Mega Mewtwo raids that will be part of Pokemon GO Fest Global are assumed to be Super Mega Raids, the in-person experience featured new Unity Raids with no lobby cap. Watching the number of players balloon to over 1,000 and counting down those final seconds until the raid started was what I imagine being in Times Square during New Year’s Eve is like. Only instead of waiting for a ball to drop, we were waiting for the most iconic Psychic Pokemon of all time to appear, and then furiously tapping our screens until it was defeated.
But tapping isn’t all you do in Unity Raids. Once Mega Mewtwo reaches a certain health threshold, the game asks players to unite and generate special energy to break the Pokemon’s shield. To do that requires lifting your mobile device into the air as if you’re Prince Adam transforming into He-Man. Cynics will say this is an embarrassing mechanic, and I don’t know how I would feel doing it in a crowded mall with “normies,” but among other Pokemon GO players it captures that sense of community that the game purported to offer at the very beginning. Seeing all of those phones in the air and with their camera lights turned on is quite the visual. A little silly? Maybe, but looking around at all those smiles made any self-conscious feelings fall away.Once you’ve got your Mewtwos, there is a little time left to catch some more Pokemon or do a few last minute raids, but things don’t end there. The Citywide Gameplay is just as much a part of GO Fest as the Park Experience.
Chicago Becomes the Playground at Pokemon GO Fest
Pokemon GO Fest attendees don’t fly in from all over the world just for that 4-hour Park Experience; there is so much more to do for the whole weekend. Niantic carved the city into four districts focused on the key pillars of Pokemon GO like trading and routes, with each offering Timed Research and their own medal. If you completed two of those four Timed Research, you would unlock another research that would reward either Mega Mewtwo X or Mega Mewtwo Y by the end. So even if you weren’t lucky enough to snag a Park ticket, you would come away with at least one Mega Mewtwo.Beyond that, most of the same Park Experience raids were dispersed throughout these districts, with increased Pokestops as well. And much like the Park Experience, the community was out in full force, regularly filling raids within a few seconds of you joining. It’s here where the community showed its strength the most, finding ways to coordinate different meet-ups and raid trains in key hubs around the city. If you were dedicated enough, you could go from 5am to 8pm and you wouldn’t be alone. Around every corner and in all active hours of the day, there were plenty of people still grinding.
While the Park Experience is the main event of Pokemon GO Fest, the Citywide gameplay helps keep that excitement going. Without it, the event might feel lackluster, and you wouldn’t have those crucial opportunities to see and explore the city of Chicago. It’s as much about providing a complete gameplay experience as it is a tourism boost.
Community is on Full Display
I, like most Pokemon GO Fest attendees, was in it for the early and exclusive opportunities, especially considering my son’s favorite Pokemon is Mewtwo. But my experience in Chicago won’t be defined by the copious Pokemon clogging up my storage, but the communal aspects that the event allowed. No doubt this was a one of a kind experience for my son and I, but it was made all the more special thanks to the people we met along the way. No matter where we were, someone would lean over and ask about our Pokemon GO exploits, share anecdotes about their experience in Chicago, and show off their most prized catches of the weekend.
For a game that some might be otherwise embarrassed to have open in public, at Pokemon GO Fest more people were swishing their fingers across their phones than not. Even Chicago natives who can’t tell the difference between Pikachu and Pichu were welcoming and friendly, curious about our experience in the city.If you’ve ever been to a Comic-Con or a big fan event, then you know what it’s like to be amongst “your people.” I met folks from all walks of life — grandparents, couples, young kids, international travelers — and all were extremely friendly and kind, and simply excited to be around other Pokemon GO players. I’ve had small glimpses of that communal aspect of Pokemon GO at home, but here it was taken to a joyous extreme.I am already waist deep in Pokemon GO thanks to the bonding experience it has created for my son and me, but Pokemon GO Fest showed a side of the game that I knew existed but hadn’t fully experienced firsthand. At a time when the world can feel uninviting and cold, being in Chicago was invigorating. The weekend of events offered plenty to do and a diverse set of experiences, but it truly was the community that made it memorable. We went into Pokemon GO Fest intending to catch a Shiny Mega Mewtwo and that mission was accomplished. But we also came back with precious memories that will last a lifetime.