A new Season of the GO Battle League brings a bunch of updates to the existing moves in Pokémon GO. While those moves that change stats are limited to PvP, new attack availability updates also impact the PvE (Raids) meta.

With the Forever Forward Season kicking off the second half of 2026, which Pokémon gain the most in Raids from the updates? Does the PvE meta get disrupted to a good degree?

Let’s find out!

Forever Forward Season: Attack Availability Updates

The following Pokémon gain access to new moves:

We will focus on only those changes that actually matter. For instance, Twister to Mega Pidgeot isn’t affecting the Dragon meta, right?! Nor is Surf to Kingdra.

Top Changes to Raids Meta from Forever Forward Move Availability Updates

Shadow Gigalith with Lock-On

The biggest winner of this update is a Pokémon that doesn’t even get a STAB move! But thanks to its crazy energy gains, it has always been a valuable addition to its recipients. Yes, I’m talking about the infamous Lock-On, and by adding it to Shadow Gigalith, we have a phenomenal Rock-type attacker.

Lock-On adds more than 11% boost to Shadow Gigalith’s damage output, and makes it stronger than Shadow Rhyperior and Mega Tyranitar. In fact, it’s only behind the yet-to-debut Mega Glimmora, the extreme glass cannon Shadow Rampardos, and the ever-dependable Mega Diancie in Rock DPS.

With Rock being such a fantastic offensive typing, you definitely need to prioritize Lock-On Shadow Gigalith to punish Bug, Fire, Flying, and Ice Raid Bosses!

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Shadow Conkeldurr with Force Palm

Conkeldurr has always been Dynamic Punch Machamp on steroids, and it is the Shadow form that made its way into the top echelon of Fighting types. Regular Lucario and Mega Heracross surpassed it in DPS, but not anymore!

With Force Palm in its arsenal, Shadow Conkeldurr overtakes both those Fighters and gains a 4.34% damage boost to its older self. This isn’t much, but you now have another Pokémon crossing Lucario, which is kind of a yardstick for Fighting-type performance. Since you can use only 1 Mega Evolution in your Fighting Raid entourage, Shadow Conkeldurr is still one of the best to add to the squad, and it’s better than ever.

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Quaquaval with Low Kick and Close Combat

Quaquaval finally learns a Fighting-type Fast Attack in Pokémon GO, and while it isn’t anywhere near the top attackers in its meta, it is undoubtedly usable in lower-tier Raids (1* and 3*). The Water subtyping helps Quaquaval resist Ice and Steel attacks, making it last quite long in the Raid battle.

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Shadow Swanna with Gust

The Flying type is one of the weirdest metas in Pokémon GO. It is ruled by arguably the strongest in the game, Mega Rayquaza, but powerhouses like Mega Salamence, Shadow Salamence, and Mega Charizard Y don’t end up in the rankings since they either don’t learn a complete Flying moveset (Salamence lacks a Flying-type Fast Attack) or have a poor Flying PvE moveset (Mega Charizard Y).

As a result, the Shadow variants of Staraptor, Unfezant, Honchkrow, and Toucannon feature in the top standings of Flying DPS. And for the most part, this happens because of a viable moveset (hello, Shadow Toucannon with Beak Blast). In the same vein, Shadow Swanna becomes a better Flying attacker than ever, thanks to Gust being added to its movepool.

While the increase in DPS may only be 5.25%, what matters is that in this limited attackers’ meta, Shadow Swanna brings value to the table, and is quite viable when facing Raid Bosses weak to Flying. Therefore, Shadow Swanna is a ‘winner’ of this shakeup, through earning its spot among the new crop of notable Flying attackers.

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Some important pointers

• At this point, it is worth mentioning that while Shadow Rhyperior with Drill Run is better than Earthquake, and the Pokémon is definitely meta-relevant per se, the DPS gain is only 0.66%, which hardly matters.

• Shadow Kingdra grabs a 4.3% boost to its DPS by replacing Hydro Pump with Surf, but unlike Shadow Swanna’s performance in the Flying type, Shadow Kingdra’s gains don’t make much of a difference.

• Galarian Zapdos and Sylveon are actually worse in Raids with their new moves: Low Kick and Fairy Wind.

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It’s quite obvious that Shadow Gigalith and Shadow Conkeldurr are the biggest winners for Raids, with the Rock-type attacker becoming super formidable in the Pokémon GO PvE meta.

All the best for Forever Forward and have a fabulous new Season, Trainers!

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