Pokémon GO August 2025 Raids: Lugia, Ho-Oh, Dark Skies and Necrozma

Here’s what came to raids in August 2025, and what I said to focus on.

The August 2025 raid schedule

• 4 to 11 August: Lugia, with a nice shiny with green on its belly, and Mega Ampharos in 4-star raids. Of the two, Mega Ampharos was the better one as a top 10 Electric attacker.
• 11 to 18 August: Ho-Oh, with its great shiny, and Mega Slowbro, which has an ok shiny but an incredible design.
• 18 to 25 August: the Dark Skies event leading up to Eternatus, with Zacian and Zamazenta returning and Mega Pidgeot in 4-star raids.
• 25 August to 2 September: Necrozma with Mega Salamence. Necrozma is kind of useless if you don’t fuse it into Dawn Wings or Dusk Mane.

For the Necrozma fusions, see my Dusk Mane or Dawn Wings guide. For Zacian and Zamazenta, see my crowned forms guide.

The new Shadow raids

Mid-month there were lots of new Shadow raids:

• 1-star: Shadow Bellsprout, Shadow Aipom, Shadow Teddiursa and Shadow Seedot
• 3-star: Shadow Absol, Shadow Girafarig and Shadow Whirlipede

The top three were Shadow Absol, then Shadow Teddiursa evolved into Ursaluna, then Shadow Bellsprout evolved into Victreebel.

Matt's takeShadow Absol is pretty much just as strong as Shadow Kyogre, so don't sleep on that one.