December 2019 Egg Exodus

Earlier this month, the Pokémon GO blog announced that the Pokémon species available in eggs would be scrambled on Dec. 16. Silph Researchers around the world eagerly emptied their egg storage in preparation to compile the updated egg pool. What they found: the single largest purge of species from the egg pool ever recorded!

All currently available species can be found on the Silph Road’s egg page, which is constantly kept up-to-date with our latest findings from the field.

Key Findings

The egg shake-up happened around 22:00 UTC on Dec. 16. In the three days since, researchers from around the world have hatched 1,737 eggs (315 from gifts and 1,422 from Pokéstops and Gyms).

• • A staggering 90 species (listed in the appendix below) were removed from eggs. The largest emeggration we’ve ever seen.
  • The Unova starters (Snivy, Tepig, and Oshawott) were moved from 5-km to 2-km eggs.
  • Five species and forms were added to 5-km eggs: Pinsir, Grimer (Kanto form), and Burmy (Plant, Sandy, and Trash Cloaks).
  • No changes were made to Gift eggs.

Parting words

The community has been asking for a reduction of the egg pool for a while, and boy did they get it. The egg pool hasn’t been this small in a long time. Of particular interest are the removal of all baby Pokémon from non-Gift eggs. Furthermore, 4 out of the 6 Pokémon that are also available from the 25-km Adventure Sync Reward Eggs were removed from the normal egg pool, as well as 5 out of the 6 Pokémon also available from the 50-km reward tier. This change significantly reduces the overlap between the Adventure Sync egg pool and the normal egg pool.

It’s possible that this “winter cleaning” was done to open up space for more species, perhaps from the Unova region. Alternatively, these changes might signify a move towards a more frequently rotating, but smaller, egg pool. Only time will tell!

Until next time, we’ll see you on the Road, travelers.

Appendix: removed species

Note that all region-exclusive species remain available.