Can’t trade in Pokemon Go? Here’s why trading is currently disabled

Many Pokemon Go players are realizing they can’t trade right now after Niantic disabled trading completely. But why is this happening? We’re here to explain.

Just like in the mainline games, trading is an important part of the Pokemon Go experience. Not only is it fun, but it also helps Trainers fill out their Pokedex by obtaining rare species or getting trade evolutions.

However, it seems that trading is currently disabled in Pokemon Go for all players, as the trade button that usually lets you swap creatures with your friends isn’t showing up on the menu.

Let’s look into why this is happening.

Can’t trade in Pokemon Go? Here’s why…

On the evening of Wednesday, January 19, Niantic took to Twitter to explain that the ability to trade in Pokemon Go will be ‘temporarily disabled’ due to an issue, although they didn’t say what the ‘issue’ was.

“Trainers, trading is currently unavailable as we investigate an issue,” they wrote. “We apologize for the inconvenience, and will continue to update here. Thank you for your patience.”

There’s currently no timeframe for trading to return to Pokemon Go, but Niantic have promised an update will be provided on their Twitter account, so keep an eye out for more information soon.

Why is trading disabled in Pokemon Go?

Although Niantic haven’t given an official reason why trading is currently disabled in Pokemon Go, some players have shared a potential cause for the issue on social media – and it involves Lucky Trades.

Over on the Silph Road subreddit (a popular community for Pokemon Go players), user AndKrem revealed that they recently made 100 Lucky Trades with a friend, which is clearly the result of a bug of some kind.

Pokemon usually only have a small chance of becoming Lucky when traded with a friend. Lucky Pokemon are very desirable as they require less Stardust to power them up and they will always have good IVs.

• Read More: These are the rarest species in Pokemon Go

Considering trading in Pokemon Go was disabled by Niantic just a couple of hours after this post was shared on Reddit, it does seem likely that this is the reason behind their decision.

As we said before, it’s now just a waiting game until the feature is returned. Hopefully, there will be some kind of reward for the trading downtime, such as an increase in trading distance.