Gigantamax Charizard counters, weakness, and battle tips in Pokémon Go

Gigantamax Charizard was one of the first Gigantamax Pokémon to show up in Pokémon Go, alongside its fellow Kanto starters, Blastoise and Venusaur. The first time around, Charizard was pretty hard to beat, but now there are a few more Dynamax Pokémon that can help you take it down when it returns on March 8 and 9.

Even still, Gigantamax Charizard can be tough to beat — and it doesn’t have nearly the amount of good new counters that its fellow starters now have. That being said, you’ll want to be as prepared as possible before attempting this fight.

Below, we list Gigantamax Charizard’s weaknesses and best counters in Pokémon Go, as well as general tips for taking it down.

Gigantamax Charizard weakness

Being fire- and flying-type, Charizard has a few weaknesses: rock-, water-, and electric-type moves. Unfortunately, there’s still not really any rock-type Pokémon to take advantage of Charizard’s extra vulnerability to the typing, but there are lots of water- and electric-types you can use.

Charizard is resistant against a lot of different move types: fighting-, bug-, steel-, fire-, grass-, and fairy-types. That being said, don’t bring those move types unless you’re using them to build up the max gauge quickly.

Gigantamax Charizard best counters

For your damage-dealing Pokémon, you should try to bring at least one of the following:

• Gigantamax Kingler with Bubble
• Gigantamax Toxtricity with Spark
• Dynamax Inteleon with Water Gun
• Dynamax Zapdos with Thunder Shock
• Dynamax Kingler with Bubble

For tanks, you should try to bring one or two of the following with the Max Guard ability:

• Gigantamax Charizard with Dragon Breath
• Dynamax Charizard with Dragon Breath
• Dynamax Blastoise with Bite
• Gigantamax Blastoise with Bite

Even if you don’t have these powered up, consider just bringing the strongest Dynamax Pokémon you have. If you have a maxed out Dynamax Gengar and your Dynamax Zapdos isn’t leveled (and you don’t have the means to power it up), just bring your Gengar.

General Gigantamax Charizard tips

If you’ve been struggling in Max Battles, here’s some general tips to survive — and make sure you’re an asset to your team. Gigantamax battles involve way more strategy than the usual rampant tapping that you do in raids, so make sure to know what you’re doing before jumping in.

• Make sure you have enough players. High-efficiency groups with maxed out investments can take down the Charizard with fewer people, but practically, if you don’t have hundreds of spare candy and even more Stardust laying around, this isn’t going to be an option for you. Make sure you have as many people as possible to ensure that you get your fiery lizard.
• Don’t sleep on Max Spirit and Max Guard. Teams work best when there’s a variety of moves, not just maxed-out attacks. Each player should bring Pokémon with the defensive and healing moves unlocked as well. Max Guard will focus single-target damage towards you and reduce the damage taken; Max Spirit will heal the whole party. These moves are really important to make sure your damage-dealers can keep dishing.
• Remember to swap to super effective moves when it’s time to Dynamax. For Dynamax Pokémon, their max moves are determined by whatever type their fast move is. This means if you have a Darmanitan with Fire Fang, it will know Max Flare. A Gengar with Lick will know Max Phantasm. Take advantage of this and make sure to swap to a Pokémon that will deal super effective damage to your target before Dynamaxing, if you can.
• Focus on your fast moves. You want to spam your fast moves to build up that Dynamax meter and often times, using your charge move is actually a DPS loss when compared to the damage you could be doing with your max move will be. Spam those attacks!
• Level up a few ‘mons, but you don’t have to go too hard. Depending on your group size, you absolutely do not need to max out all your Dynamax Pokémon to level 40-50. While this will make it easier on the rest of your group, if this isn’t an investment you can make, you don’t have to stress about it. Power things up as high as you can afford to, but don’t fret if you don’t have a maxed out Pokémon.
• That all being said, make sure to come as prepared as you can be. This is a team effort and there’s a chance that a full group of four can still fail. Do not just bring your unleveled Dynamax Wooloo expecting a free ride to a powerful Pokémon. (After all, if everyone does that, then you certainly won’t clear the battle.) Again, you don’t have to completely max out your Pokémon, but it will be better for everyone involved if you bring something helpful to the table.
• Keep your eye out for a shiny Charizard! If you clear the raid, there is a chance that the Charizard you catch will be shiny — which also means it’ll be a guaranteed catch. Use a Pinap Berry to score extra candy if you get lucky enough to find a sparkly Charizard.