Pokémon Bank is shutting down, and you’ll need to transfer your Pokémon from past generations before they disappear — when will the app stop working?

The end of an era is approaching for Pokémon fans, as one of the most popular ways to store and transfer Pokémon is coming to an end. In a statement, The Pokémon Company announced that Pokémon Bank is being shut down and recommended that players move all their Pokémon out of the service before it is too late and they disappear.

If you don’t remember, Pokémon Bank launched in 2013 and became the go-to solution for preserving Pokémon in the cloud during the Nintendo 3DS era. Its story will soon come to an end, so it is important that you transfer all your Pokémon to Pokémon HOME or risk losing them.

Pokémon Bank is shutting down — how long will you have to transfer your Pokémon from past generations?

Fans of the franchise know that Pokémon Bank gradually lost support following the arrival of the Switch. The application was no longer available to download in March 2023, when Nintendo shut down the 3DS eShop. Although it was no longer possible to download the app, the service continued operating normally for free.

The Pokémon Company and Nintendo consider Pokémon Bank to have reached the end of its life cycle, so they announced its permanent shutdown. This means that players who still have Pokémon stored in the service will need to migrate them to Pokémon HOME. If they fail to do so in time, they could lose up to 3,000 Pokémon, which is the maximum number of creatures that can be stored in Pokémon Bank.

The service remained active for more than a decade, allowing fans to store Pokémon from older generations of the series, as well as games such as Sun & Moon, Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire, X & Y, Black & White, and Black & White 2.

The Pokémon Bank servers will shut down permanently on February 25, 2027. That is the deadline players have to move all their Pokémon and transfer them to Pokémon HOME, the official service that allows users to store Pokémon from virtually every generation.

Players will simply need to migrate their Pokémon collection to the service for Switch and mobile devices to preserve them long-term. Otherwise, they will be deleted when the servers shut down, and there will be no way to restore them.

“If you have Pokémon stored in Pokémon Bank that you wish to transfer, move them to Pokémon HOME before Pokémon Bank stops working. Please note that Pokémon Bank is no longer available for download,” the companies stated.

Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen ports will finally receive Pokémon HOME support

Not all the news is bad, however, as The Pokémon Company also confirmed a highly anticipated update for fans of the franchise. Following their huge success and controversial launch on Switch and Switch 2, the Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen ports will receive compatibility with Pokémon HOME.

Support will become available to all users of the service starting this October. This will allow players to transfer Pokémon from the ports to other games in the franchise. There will be one limitation, however: once Pokémon are transferred, there will be no way to send them back to FireRed and LeafGreen.

It is worth remembering that Pokémon HOME offers a free plan that allows users to store a limited number of Pokémon. There is also a paid subscription that costs $2.99 USD per month and provides significantly more storage, as well as an option for direct transfers from Pokémon Bank.

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