Pokémon GO - How to Reach Best Friends Quickly (2025 Guide) | PokeInsight

Friendship is one of the most powerful systems in Pokémon GO. It gives you huge XP bonuses, cheaper trades, better raid performance, and from 2025 onward it also feeds into the new Forever Friends and Remote Trading features.

This guide explains how Friendship levels work in 2025, how many days it really takes to reach Best Friends, and how to level up as efficiently as possible.

All Friendship Levels in Pokémon GO (2025)

The core Friendship levels are:

Friend – you’ve just added each other
Good Friends – basic trading unlocked
Great Friends – small raid and trade bonuses
Ultra Friends – strong bonuses and discounts
Best Friends – maximum bonuses
Forever Friends – a new level above Best Friends that unlocks Remote Trades and extra rewards

The first four upgrade based on unique days of interaction with a friend.

How Many Days to Reach Best Friends?

If you interact once per day with the same friend, the minimum time to reach each level is:

Good Friends: 1 day
Great Friends: 7 days total
Ultra Friends: 30 days total
Best Friends: 90 days total

So in practice, it takes about 90 days of daily interaction to become Best Friends.

Missing a day doesn’t reset anything – it just delays the next level.

What Counts as a Daily Friendship Interaction?

Any one of these actions per day will increase your Friendship (once per friend):

Sending or opening a Gift
Trading Pokémon together
Battling in the same Raid
Battling a Gym together
Battling each other in Trainer Battles

Do as many of these as you like, but only the first interaction per day counts toward leveling.

Best Friends Rewards (Why You Want It)

Reaching Best Friends gives you:

A big 100,000 XP one-time bonus
The highest Stardust discount on trades
The maximum raid damage bonus when raiding together
The most extra Premier Balls after raids

Because the XP reward is so large, many players coordinate Best Friends levels and use a Lucky Egg just before triggering the final interaction.

How Forever Friends Works Above Best Friends

From December 2025, you can keep progressing beyond Best Friends:

After becoming Best Friends, you start earning Friendship Points with that Trainer.
Each normal interaction can give up to 1 Friendship Point per day.
Weekly co-op challenges can grant extra Friendship Points on top.
When you reach 90 Friendship Points after Best Friends, you become Forever Friends with that Trainer and both receive one Remote Trade to use with each other.
You can keep earning points and hit that 90-point threshold again to earn more Remote Trades with the same Forever Friend (but unused Remote Trades don’t stack, so you must use one before you can earn another).

Forever Friends doesn’t replace Best Friends – it builds on top of it.

Fastest Way to Reach Best Friends

1. Prioritize Active Friends

Focus your effort on:

Local players you see in gyms or raids
Friends who send and open Gifts regularly
People who respond if you message them about Lucky Egg timing

Inactive friends slow your progress.

2. Use Gifts as Your Daily Backbone

Gifts are the easiest way to keep streaks going:

Spin PokéStops and Gyms to stockpile Gifts
Each day, send at least one Gift to your target friends
Encourage them to open your Gift that same day

If both of you are consistent, you will almost never miss a day.

3. Stack Raids and Battles When You’re Online Together

Whenever you’re playing at the same time:

Join raids together
Battle gyms
Do some Trainer Battles

Even if you already got your daily interaction from a Gift, these activities build Friendship Points once you hit Best Friends and are pushing toward Forever Friends.

4. Use Reminders and Nicknames

To avoid wasting days:

Set a daily alarm to send/open Gifts
Rename your key friends (e.g., “BEST SOON 3D”) so they’re easy to find
Check who hasn’t had a blue interaction ring yet today

A little organization saves weeks of lost progress.

5. Maximise XP With Lucky Eggs

For XP grinding:

Watch your friend list for “1 day to Best Friends” or “1 day to Ultra Friends”.
Coordinate with your friend so you’re both online at the same time.
Activate a Lucky Egg.
Trigger the last interaction (usually opening a Gift) to double the XP reward.
If possible, trigger multiple Friendship level-ups within that same 30-minute Egg window.

This is one of the fastest ways to gain Trainer Levels in Pokémon GO.

Summary: From Friend to Forever Friend

~90 days of daily interactions → Best Friends
After Best Friends, earn Friendship Points → reach Forever Friends
Forever Friends rewards include Remote Trades and extra XP
Consistency (one interaction per day) is the real key

If you keep up daily Gifts and raids with a small group of reliable players, you’ll hit Best Friends in around three months and be well on your way to your first Forever Friends and Remote Trades.

Pokémon GO - How to Reach Best Friends Quickly (2025 Guide)