What Carries Over When Transferring to Pokemon Champions
What Carries Over When Transferring to Pokemon Champions
TL;DR: What carries over when transferring to Pokemon Champions: your Pokemon's species, nature, shiny status, ability, and any moves that exist in Champions all come through intact. EVs and IVs are replaced by the unified Stat Point (SP) system, so training values no longer matter, and held items stay behind. Transfers work as "visits" through Pokemon HOME, so nothing is permanently changed, and you do not need a HOME Premium plan.
Quick answer: what carries over when transferring to Pokemon Champions
If you only read one section, make it this one. Here is exactly what carries over when transferring to Pokemon Champions from HOME, and what gets left behind or replaced.
| Attribute | Carries over? | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Species and form | Yes | The species must be available in Champions; Pokemon that are not in the game cannot be sent |
| Nature | Yes | Works the same as the main series: +10% to one stat, -10% to another |
| Shiny status | Yes | Shinies stay shiny in Champions |
| Ability | Yes | Including Hidden Abilities |
| Moves | Partially | Moves that exist in Champions carry over; unimplemented moves are unusable during the visit but are not deleted |
| IVs | Not used | Champions' stat formula has no IV term; original IVs stay untouched on the HOME record |
| EVs | Replaced | Champions uses Stat Points (SP) instead; your EV spread is preserved in HOME and restored on return |
| Held items | No | Items return to your bag when you deposit a Pokemon into HOME, and HOME cannot pass items into Champions |
| Ribbons and marks | Preserved | They stay attached to the Pokemon's record; a visit does not erase them |
The core design principle: Champions borrows your Pokemon rather than taking them. The battle-relevant identity (nature, ability, shiny, learnset) travels with the Pokemon, while training values are replaced so ladder play is about decisions, not breeding hours.
Step-by-step: how to transfer Pokemon from Scarlet/Violet to Champions
The most common mistake is looking for a transfer option inside Champions. There isn't one at the start of the flow — the transfer is initiated from Pokemon HOME. Here is how to transfer Pokemon from Scarlet/Violet to Champions:
- In Scarlet/Violet, open the boxes and use the HOME connection to deposit the Pokemon you want. Any held item is automatically returned to your bag at this point.
- Open Pokemon HOME (the Switch or mobile version both work) and confirm the Pokemon arrived in your HOME boxes.
- From HOME, connect to Pokemon Champions and select the Pokemon you want to send. They are flagged as "visiting" Champions.
- Launch Champions. The visiting Pokemon are now available for team building and ranked play.
That is the entire pipeline: Scarlet/Violet → HOME → Champions. The same HOME-centered flow applies to Pokemon coming from other compatible games. Once your Pokemon are in, our first 30 minutes guide covers what to do next.
Do you need Pokemon HOME Premium for Pokemon Champions?
No. Sending Pokemon to visit Champions works on HOME's free Basic plan. Premium is not a requirement for the Champions connection.
Where the plans do differ is capacity and legacy features. The free Basic plan stores up to 30 Pokemon, while Premium raises that to 6,000 and unlocks extras like transfers from Pokemon Bank. If you are moving a full competitive box collection through HOME, the 30-slot limit on the free plan becomes the practical bottleneck, not the Champions connection itself.
One Premium feature matters less than you might expect: the IV judge function. Since Champions does not use IVs at all, checking them before transferring is pointless for Champions purposes. A 3IV Pokemon and a 6IV Pokemon perform identically once they arrive.
Do EVs and IVs transfer to Pokemon Champions?
No — and this is the single biggest change for competitive players coming from Scarlet/Violet.
IVs are not used. Champions replaces the EV/IV system entirely, and its stat formula has no IV term — stats are calculated purely from base stats, SP, and nature. Whatever a Pokemon actually has in HOME is irrelevant: the Ditto you spent weeks breeding and the 2IV story-team starter are equals here. When a Pokemon returns to HOME, its real IVs are right where you left them — nothing is overwritten.
EVs are replaced by Stat Points (SP). Champions uses one unified training system instead of EVs. You get 66 SP to distribute per Pokemon, with a cap of 32 SP in any single stat. The math is clean:
- HP = Base + SP + 75
- Every other stat = floor((Base + SP + 20) × nature multiplier)
Your EV spread from Scarlet/Violet is not converted into SP; it simply stays on the Pokemon's HOME record and comes back when the visit ends. Inside Champions you build the SP spread from scratch, which means transferred Pokemon and freshly obtained ones are on identical footing. For the full system, including how far 66 points actually stretch, read our Stat Points explained guide.
The practical upshot: there is no longer any stat reason to transfer one Pokemon over another. Transfer for the ability, the shiny, the ribbons, or the sentiment — the numbers are equalized on arrival.
Do held items transfer to Pokemon Champions? No — here is what to do instead
Held items do not transfer to Pokemon Champions at any point in the chain. The item is stripped early: when you deposit a Pokemon into HOME from Scarlet/Violet, its held item is automatically returned to your bag in that game. HOME itself cannot store items, so there is nothing to pass along to Champions.
Mega Stones follow the same rule. Mega Evolution is Champions' battle gimmick — there is no Terastallization, Dynamax, or Z-Moves — but any stones your Pokemon held in older games stay in those games like every other item. Anything item-related is handled on the Champions side when you set up your team, not imported from a previous game. You can browse which Pokemon have Champions-legal Mega forms in our Pokedex.
So before transferring, there is no need to carefully unequip anything. The game does it for you, and nothing item-related is lost.
Can you send Pokemon back to Scarlet/Violet? How the visit system works
Yes. Transfers to Champions are not one-way. Pokemon sent to Champions are marked as "visiting" in HOME, and you can end the visit and return them to your HOME boxes, then move them onward to Scarlet/Violet or any other compatible game they are legal in.
When a Pokemon returns from Champions, it reverts to its pre-visit state: real IVs back in place, original EV spread intact, ribbons and marks untouched. The visit model is why the IV/EV replacement described above is safe — Champions never writes over your Pokemon's main-series data, it just ignores parts of it while the Pokemon is a guest.
Two things worth knowing:
- A Pokemon that is visiting Champions is unavailable elsewhere. You cannot trade it in HOME or withdraw it into Scarlet/Violet until you recall it.
- Recalling and re-sending is cheap, so there is no penalty for experimenting. Send a Pokemon in, test an SP spread on ladder, pull it back later if you need it for a Scarlet/Violet event.
Moves that do not exist in Champions
Champions does not implement every move in the series. When a transferred Pokemon knows a move that is not in Champions, that move is unusable during the visit — but it is not deleted. The move is still on the Pokemon's record and is right where you left it when the Pokemon returns to HOME.
Move management inside Champions happens when you configure the Pokemon there, not through main-series tutors or TMs. You are not locked into the four moves a Pokemon arrived with: eligible moves from its learnset can be set from within Champions, alongside its SP spread, item, and ability. This is also why you should not delay a transfer to re-tutor moves in Scarlet/Violet first — set the Pokemon's Champions moveset in Champions.
When planning sets around what is actually available, build them in our Team Builder, which only offers Champions-legal moves.
Troubleshooting: ineligible Pokemon, error 400, transfer not working
A Pokemon cannot be selected for Champions in HOME. Not every species and form is in Champions, and a Pokemon that is not in the game cannot visit it. Ineligibility comes from the Champions side, and there is no workaround in HOME — check again after Champions updates in case the species has been added.
Error 400. Error 400 is HOME's generic communication error: the connection between HOME and the server failed partway through. Steps that commonly resolve HOME connection errors:
- Retry later, outside peak hours — many cases are pure server congestion.
- Stabilize your connection: switch between Wi-Fi and mobile data, try a different network, and disable any VPN.
- Update Pokemon HOME to the latest version; on mobile, clearing the app cache or reinstalling can help.
- If a Pokemon appears stuck in the "visiting" state after all of the above, stop retrying and contact Pokemon Support rather than forcing repeated transfers.
Transfer option not appearing at all. Confirm you are starting from HOME, not from inside Champions, and that both HOME and Champions are updated. The connection only appears in HOME's game link menu.
FAQ
Do shiny Pokemon transfer to Pokemon Champions?
Yes. Shiny status carries over fully — a shiny Pokemon in HOME is shiny in Champions, in battle and on your team screen. Since Champions replaces EVs and IVs with SP, shininess and ability are among the main reasons to transfer one specific Pokemon instead of another.
Do you need Pokemon HOME Premium for Pokemon Champions?
No. The Champions connection works on the free Basic plan. Premium mainly matters for storage — 6,000 slots versus 30 on the free plan — and for legacy features like Pokemon Bank transfers. The IV judge function is irrelevant here, since Champions does not use IVs.
Does transferring to Champions permanently change my Pokemon?
No. Champions uses a visit system. Your Pokemon's real IVs, EV spread, ribbons, and marks are preserved in HOME and restored when the visit ends. Champions ignores training values while the Pokemon is a guest; it never overwrites main-series data.
Why does my transferred Pokemon have different stats in Champions?
Champions recalculates stats with its own formula: HP = Base + SP + 75, and other stats = floor((Base + SP + 20) × nature). IVs are not part of the formula, and your EVs are replaced by an unspent 66-SP budget, so numbers will not match Scarlet/Violet until you allocate SP.