Summary

• Shiny Pokemon are rare, with generally only a 1/4096 chance of encountering them in the wild.
• A few games, such as Pokemon Sword & Shield, have DLC that increases your chance of success.
• Some shinies, like shiny Munchlax, are extremely difficult to catch with odds of 1/4,300,800.

Pokemon is one of the world's biggest franchises, and just one look at some of the iconic and adorable critters populating its world is enough to see why. What you may not know, however, is that for every Pokemon design, there exists an alternate version with different colors. These "shiny" variants account for just 1/4096 (or 1/8192 in games prior to X & Y) of a species, so they're extremely rare.

Despite this, some dedicated players spend their time seeking out these elusive shinies for their collections. One thing these shiny hunters would be quick to tell you is that not all hunts are created equal — for a whole host of factors, some shinies are far more difficult to obtain than others. Here's a look at the shiny Pokemon that, for various reasons, are the hardest but therefore most satisfying, to catch.

Updated on May 21, 2024, by Marissa Fiore: The Pokemon Series only continues to grow, and with it, the number of shinies that prove difficult to catch. Along with adding another entry, this list has also been updated to reflect our current publication standards.

16 🤪 Shiny Hunting Tera Raids

Pokemon Scarlet & Violet

While shiny hunting in Pokemon Scarlet & Violet has been made easier on the whole thanks to sandwiches that increase the odds of finding shiny Pokemon based on type, that doesn't include Tera Raids. There are two reasons for this. The first, which has less to do with odds but more to do with appearance, is that you can't tell when a Tera Pokemon is shiny by how the Tera Crystal looks or when you are joining a Tera Raid online.

The second has to do with the odds themselves. It doesn't matter if you've eaten a sandwich with your team before attempting to hunt these Tera Pokemon, these bonuses do not affect the odds within a Tera Raid. This keeps the odds of all Pokemon being shiny locked at 1/4096.

The Shiny Charm, which you get for completing the Pokemon Scarlet & Violet Pokedex, also does not increase your 𓄧shiny odds when it comes to Tera Raids.

15 Hat Po෴kemon

Pokemon Go

While Pokemon Go has a reputation for being incredibly easy to shiny hunt in due to its massively boosted shiny rate, Pokemon that are very rare within the game still make for challenging hunts. Some of Pokemon Go's rarest Pokemon are ones that spawn wearing hats for various celebrations and events in the game.

Given that these Pokemon are available for such short windows of time, few players have them, and even fewer have shiny versions, so it's safe to say that hat Pokemon are the rarest shinies in Pokemon Go.

14 ♓ Shiny Ditto

Ditto is a unique Pokemon to shiny hunt as, unlike almost every other Pokemon in the series, you can't breed it, making it impossible to use the Masuda Method - a common go-to for quick hunting. The only other unbreedable Pokemon are legendaries, though all of them are huntable in some way via very fast soft-reset encounters due to their roles in games' stories, or in places like the Dynamax Adventure den, Ramanas Park, or the Ultra Worhmoles.

This leaves Ditto as a Pokemon with no "quick" way to hunt. There are options available to avoid full-odds encounters - radar chaining, and Let's Go's catch combos are both possible - but Ditto is noteworthy nonetheless as a Pokemon where neither of the standard hunting methods are possible.

13 ꧃ An SOS Chain𒉰ed Beldum

Pokemon Sun & Moon

SOS chaining is a mechanic introduced in the Alolജa games that can cause wild Pokemon to call for help as they become damaged in battle, bringing other wild Pokemon into the battle. Knocking oꦅut the original Pokemon and damaging the ally so that it calls for help gets a chain going, and as the chain progresses, the allies called in have increased odds of being shiny.

The problem with Beldum is that it only knows one move - Take Down. This is a recoil move, meaning that every time it uses it, it'll damage itself, and eventually knock itself out. Even if you continually knock out Beldum as they call for help and are replaced by allies, a few unlucky turns with no calls for help are all that's needed to end your chain. A ghost-type that's immune to Take Down can fix this problem, but then you've got to worry about your own PP.

12 Aꦚny Pokemon In A Safari Zone

In the first four generations of Pokemon, one staple feature of the games was the Safari Zone, an area where you could catch uncommon and powerful Pokemon. Encounters in the Safari Zone don't work like they do elsewhere, though. Instead of battling to weaken the wild Pokemon, you simply throw things at it (Safari Balls, rocks, etc) until it runs away or you catch it. Safari Zone Pokemon typically rꦓun away in just 🎃a few turns, and they can be super hard to catch.

The mechanics vary slightly from generation to generation, but that's the general idea and it's easy to see why this makes for such brutal shiny hunting. It's common to finally encounter a shiny only to have it flee before you can catch it.

11 The Kalos Starter Pokemo🍎n

Pokemon X & Y

The soft reset method of hunting sees frequent use for a few types of Pokemon. Legendaries are one common example, but Starter Pokemon are another: who wouldn't want to play through the whole game with an extra-special version of their partner?

What makes Generation 6's starters such a nasty hunt is the time between resets. There are over two minutes of cutscenes between your save point and finding out if your choice is shiny or not. An honorable mention goes to Generation 7's Starters for having a similar problem.

10 💦 Faraway Island Mew

Pokemon Emerald

Faraway Island was exclusive to Pokemon Emerald and originally only accessible by attending a distribution event in Japan. However, it's now possible to get there yourself by taking advantage of some glitches in Emerald's code — a lot of glitꦛches. Known as the "Pomeg Berry Glitch," this is a ridiculously lengthy and complicated process of over 30 steps to ultimately access the island yourself.

Of course, once getting there, it's not even over. Mew still has to be hunted by soft resetting like any other special Pokemon encounter.

9 Curry Pokemon ꦫ

Pokemon Sword & Shield

Sword and Shield's Wild Area introduced the camping mechanic to the Pokemon series, and one of the options available to you within a camp is to cook a curry for your Pokemon. Sometimes, wild Pokemon will be drawn in by the smell of the meal, and when they approach you, you have the option to catch them.

Curry Pokemon can indeed be shiny, making this a viable hunting method. The problem is that cooking a curry is a tedious process - far longer than the likes of a soft reset - and once you've cooked it, the odds of a Pokemon even showing up are slim.

8 ౠ Dynamax Adventure Zygarde

Pokemon Sword & Shield

In Pokemon Sword & Shield's Crown Tundra, Dynamax Adventures🃏 boost shiny odds 🐓to an amazing 1/100. Because of this, they're seen as a fairly relaxed way to catch shiny Legendaries, but there's one Pokemon to whom this breezy attitude cannot apply: Zygarde.

In addition to already being a strong Pokemon, Zygarde's ability means that just when it's getting to half health — right as players would be gaining the upper hand — it changes forms, regenerating health and gaining a massive stat boost. It also has two powerful spread moves, meaning it can wipe your whole squad very quickly. And, if you're super unlucky on the RNG, you'll have to win this battle potentially upward of 100 times. Good luck.

7 🐻 Roaming 💞Legendaries

Particularly prevalent in Gen 4, roaming Legendaries move around the map as the player does, making them very difficult to encounter. Hunting one of these roamers means saving your game before causing the Pokemon to start roaming, wandering the region until the roamer is encountered, and then if it's not shiny, reloading the save and repeating ("soft resetting").

This is an incredibly tedious process, as, unlike soft resets for a static Legendary, it can take a very long time between loading saves. Catching a shiny roamer would be very exciting𒐪, but finding it in the first place is no mean feat.