Nintendo Is Pulling The Plug On One Of The Best Ways To Get Rare Pokemon

One of the best systems for getting your hands on rare Pokemon is set to close down in a few months, as Pokemon Bank will stop working next year. According to Serebii, the shutdown date has been penciled in for February 27, 2027.

This will effectively end the 3DS era of Pokemon, although the writing has been on the wall for a long time. Following the closure of the 3DS eShop in March 2023, 3DS owners were no longer able to download the app. Nintendo had already launched a replacement program for Switch, iOS, and Android a few years earlier, which served as a beefier upgrade when compared to Pokemon Bank.

The 3DS program still had value, as you could bring plenty of rare Pokemon from older DS–using a separate Pokemon app–Pokemon games to 3DS, and then move those Pokemon to Switch games in the series. There were a few limitations in place, but if you were looking to quickly complete a National Pokedex in recent Pokemon games, then having a 3DS and a menagerie of Pokemon in Pokemon Bank was the way to go. Games like Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire are especially good, thanks to how easy it is to encounter Legendary-class Pokemon in the endgame.

Beyond those two examples, this will impact on a lot of great Pokemon games from over the years. From Nintendo DS classics like Pokemon Black/White to later 3DS adventures such as Pokemon X/Y and Pokemon Sun/Moon, the Pokemon in those games will remain locked within their respective cartridges.

It’s worth noting that Pokemon Bank is also free to use, whereas Pokemon Home requires a monthly or annual subscription to house all of your pocket monsters. You’re also required to have a Pokemon Home subscription to link to Pokemon Bank for when you want to transfer your pocket monsters over. While you can store up to 30 of them for free in the app, that’s not nearly enough space to keep your entire collection in case you’ve been invested in the series for multiple generations.

There are over 1,000 Pokemon to collect–with more on the way when Pokemon Winds and Waves launches next year–so that free box can become cramped very quickly. You can also keep Pokemon in boxes in the Switch games, but being able to only move a few at a time from them to Pokemon Home and then to a new game can be an arduous process.

The Switch versions of Pokemon FireRed and LeafGreen will also receive Pokemon Home functionality in October 2026, allowing you to bring Generation One Pokemon over to newer games. Of course, each game costs $20, and any Pokemon taken from them to Pokemon Home cannot be deposited back into FireRed and LeafGreen.