How to beat Groudon in Pokémon Go – Weaknesses, counters, strategies

Groudon is one of the most powerful Ground-type Pokémon you can obtain in Pokémon Go. With it returning to five-star raids starting on January 19, alongside the Hoenn celebration, you’ll be able to try your chance at catching a good one to use in the Master League. The event continues until January 24.

It does have a best moveset that we recommend you use to have the best chance to succeed. But before you can add it to your collection, how do you take it down?

Groudon weaknesses

Groudon is a Fire and Ground-type Pokémon. It’s weak to Grass, Ice, and Water-type attacks, but it’s resistant to Electric, Poison, and Rock-type moves. You want to primarily focus on using Water-type attacks against it during the raid.

Best Pokémon to counter Groudon

Given Groudon’s weaknesses, we recommend you use Gyarados, Palkia, and Kyogre.

Gyarados is a Flying and Water-type Pokémon. It’s also one of the superior choices to use in both the Ultra and Master League, much like Groudon, and many have it to help counter Groudon, so it makes sense also to use it in raids. For PvE, Gyarados has a maximum CP of 3,391, an attack of 237, a defense of 186, and stamina of 216. It’s best moveset consists of dragon breath for its fast move, and then aqua tail and crunch for its charge moves. To optimize Gyarados for this raid, you probably want to swap crunch for hydro pump.

Next, we have Palkia, a Dragon and Water-type Pokémon. Another Pokémon many trainers use in the Master League to take down Groudon, so it’s the perfect choice to take with you in the raid. Although it’s an extremely rare Pokémon, so not every trainer might have it. For PvE, Palkia has a maximum CP of 3,991, an attack of 280, a defense of 215, and stamina of 189. The best moveset for Palkia to use its dragon breath for its fast move, and then aqua tail and draco metero for its charge moves.

The final recommended choice we think every trainer team should use is Kyogre, a Water-type Pokémon. It’s the opposing legendary Pokémon to Groudon, and it’s also a fearsome Pokémon to use in raids and PvP. It’ll be able to resist a handful of Groudon’s Fire-type attacks, and it’ll be able to do some heavy damage with its Water-type moves. Kyogre’s PvE stats list it as having a maximum CP of 4,652, an attack of 270, a defense of 228, and a stamina of 205. The best moveset it can learn is waterfall for its fast move, and then surf and blizzard for its charge moves. All of these are super effective to Groudon, making it an outstanding choice to use in a five-star raid.

Top Pokémon counters to Groudon

These are the other top Pokémon counters to use against Groudon during the five-star raid.

• Salamence
• Feraligatr
• Jynx
• Mamoswine
• Weavile
• Mewtwo
• Glaceon
• Roserade
• Venusaur
• Alolan Exeggutor

There are a handful of trainers who do use Grass-type Pokémon against Groudon, but we recommend being careful with these Pokémon. If Groudon uses the one Fire-type attack it does have, fire blast, they could go down pretty quickly and without too much of a fight.