Is your Pokémon GO item bag always full—whether you have 500 slots or 5,000? Don’t worry! This simple guide will help you understand exactly which items to keep, what to delete, and how to manage your inventory efficiently.
Before we begin, if you want to improve your Pokémon performance for Raids or PvP, check out my guide here:
Pokémon GO IV Guide: How to Choose the Best Pokémon for Raids & PvP
📦 Start Here: Expanding Your Item Bag
The quickest—though not always ideal—solution is buying more storage. Each upgrade costs 200 coins. This helps, but good inventory management is the real long-term strategy.
🧪 Potions: What to Keep and What to Delete
Potions can take up a LOT of space. Here’s the optimal strategy:
| Potion Type | Keep or Delete? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Regular Potion (Purple) | ❌ Delete | Very low healing value |
| Super Potion (Orange) | ❌ Delete | Still too weak |
| Hyper Potion (Pink) | ✅ Keep | Good healing, useful for raids |
| Max Potion (Blue) | ✅ Keep | Best healing efficiency |
Recommended Amount:
50–100 total potions depending on your raid activity.
⛑ Revives: How Many Do You Need?
| Revive Type | Recommendation |
|---|---|
| Revive | Keep 20–50 |
| Max Revive | Keep 50+ |
Raids reward revives, so you don’t need to hoard too many.
🔴🔵🟡🟣 Poké Balls: NEVER Delete These
The MOST important rule in Pokémon GO inventory management:
❗ Never delete your Poké Balls — especially not your Master Ball.
Each Poké Ball type has a purpose, and managing them correctly ensures you never miss valuable catches.
🎯 How to Use Each Poké Ball Effectively
- Poké Ball (Red): Perfect for auto-catch devices such as GO Plus / Go-Tcha. Cheap, common, and great for background catching.
- Great Ball (Blue): The best all-around manual throw Poké Ball. Use it for most wild encounters for a reliable catch rate.
- Ultra Ball (Black + Yellow):
Save these for:
• Rare Pokémon
• High-level wild spawns
• Fast-catching during big events (GO Fest, Tour events) - Master Ball (Purple):
Ultra-rare, extremely valuable, and cannot be deleted.
Save it for:
• Galarian birds (low catch rate, high flee rate)
• High-value Shadow Legendaries
• Any extremely rare spawn you cannot risk losing
Tip: If your item bag is full, use Poké Balls — don’t delete them. Catching Pokémon gives XP, Stardust, and candy, making Poké Balls your most valuable long-term resource.
🍓 Berries: What’s Worth Keeping?
| Berry | Keep? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Razz Berry | Optional | Good if you lack Golden Razz |
| Nanab Berry | Optional | Useful for aggressive Pokémon |
| Pinap Berry | ✔ Must Keep | Doubles candy—very valuable |
| Golden Razz | ✔ Must Keep | Best catch rate |
| Silver Pinap | ✔ Must Keep | Catch boost + extra candy |
IMPORTANT: Instead of deleting berries, feed them to Pokémon in gyms to gain Stardust and occasional candy!
⭐ Premium Items: Never Delete These
These premium items are extremely valuable and should never be deleted. They play a big role during events, raids, XP grinding, and rare Pokémon encounters.
🎒 All 6 Premium Trainer Boosts
- Incense: Attracts more Pokémon to your location. Great for events and casual play.
- Daily Adventure Incense: A free daily incense with a 15-minute timer. Can spawn extremely rare Pokémon like Galarian Birds. Never delete this.
- Star Piece: Boosts Stardust gains by 50%. Use during Community Days, Spotlight Hours, or Rocket events.
- Lucky Egg: Doubles XP for 30 minutes. Best during mass-evolutions, friendship boosts, and big grind events.
- Coin Bag (Gimmighoul): Summons roaming Gimmighoul for 30 minutes. Requires a Pokémon Scarlet/Violet connection or special Research.
- Mystery Box (Meltan): Spawns Meltan, which can only be obtained through special transfers. Essential for building strong Melmetal in PvP and raids.
Tip: Save these items for bonus events, Community Days, and large global events like GO Fest or Tour events to get the maximum value out of them.
📦 Other Items: What to Keep & How to Use Them
This category includes some of the most important items in Pokémon GO. Here’s a simple guide to understand what each one does and whether you should keep it.
🍬 Rare Candy & Rare Candy XL
Rare Candy: Converts into candy for any Pokémon. Best used on:
- Mythicals (Mew, Celebi, Zarude, Zygarde)
- Top Legendaries (Mewtwo, Groudon, Rayquaza)
- Ultra-rare Pokémon like Larvesta or Salandit
Avoid using Rare Candy on common Pokémon (like Gible or Bagon) since events make them easy to farm later.
Rare Candy XL: Only use when you have enough (296) to fully max a Pokémon. Save these for:
- High-IV Legendaries
- Mythicals with extremely hard-to-get XLs (e.g., Zygarde)
Tip: Never commit Rare Candy XL early—you may catch a better IV later.
🧩 Mysterious Component
You receive these from defeating Team GO Rocket Grunts. When you collect 6, they automatically form a Rocket Radar.
Don’t delete these. Just use them by fighting Rocket Leaders whenever possible.
🚀 Super Rocket Radar
Very rare item. Used to encounter Giovanni and rescue a Shadow Legendary Pokémon.
- Never delete a Super Rocket Radar
- Save them for good Shadow Legendaries
🔮 Purified Gems
These are used during Shadow Raids to weaken enraged Shadow Bosses.
- Keep if you raid in cities or participate in Shadow Raids regularly
- Okay to delete if you never do Shadow Raids or live in rural areas
🥚 Egg Incubators
- Infinite Egg Incubator (∞): You always have one. Cannot be deleted.
- Egg Incubator (Blue): 3-use incubator. Worth using but not deleting.
- Super Incubator (Purple): Hatches eggs faster. Use during big egg events.
Important: Incubators do not take item bag storage, so they don’t affect your bag space.
These items may seem random, but they are some of the most important tools for powering up strong Pokémon, battling Rocket Leaders, and completing egg-focused events.
🎫 Raid & Battle Passes: What to Keep
These passes are essential for Raids, Battle League, and premium in-game activities. None of them should ever be deleted unless you absolutely must clear space.
📌 All Pass Types Explained
- Raid Pass (Orange): Used for in-person raids. You receive one free per day from spinning a gym.
- Premium Battle Pass (Green): Can be used for: • Raiding • Premium track in GO Battle League Do not delete these — they are highly valuable.
- Remote Raid Pass (Blue): Allows remote participation in raids. Rare now, so always keep them.
- GO Battle League Timed Research Pass (Green Ticket): Used to access special Battle League Timed Research. This also should never be deleted.
Tip: Try to use excess Premium Battle Passes during events with strong legendary raids. It prevents storage overflow and gives great rewards.
📍 Lures & Key Items: Simple and Essential
Lure Modules are straightforward items in Pokémon GO. They don’t require much explanation, but here is the quick breakdown:
✨ Lure Modules
- Regular Lure Module: Attracts more Pokémon to a PokéStop.
- Mossy Lure Module: Required for specific evolutions like Leafeon. Also attracts Grass- and Bug-type Pokémon.
- Magnetic Lure Module: Needed for evolutions such as Magnezone. Also attracts Electric-, Steel-, and Rock-type Pokémon.
Tip: If you have too many Lures, simply use them at local PokéStops instead of deleting them.
🔑 Key Items
- Camera: Used for taking snapshots; required for certain research tasks. Cannot be deleted.
- Zygarde Cube: Holds Zygarde Cells and Cores needed to assemble Zygarde forms. Also cannot be deleted.
Since Key Items do not take any space in your item bag, you never need to worry about deleting or managing them.
⚡ TMs (Technical Machines): What to Keep & How Many
TMs allow you to change your Pokémon’s moves. Some are common, while others are extremely rare and should always be saved. Here’s a clear breakdown:
| TM Type | Keep / Delete? | Recommended Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Fast TM | Keep | 30–50 |
| Charged TM | Keep | 60–100 |
| Elite Fast TM | Never Delete | Save All |
| Elite Charged TM | Never Delete | Save All |
Notes
- Fast TM – Used to change a Pokémon’s fast move.
- Charged TM – Needed more often because Pokémon have multiple charged moves.
- Elite Fast TM – Unlocks legacy/exclusive fast moves. Very rare.
- Elite Charged TM – The most valuable TM, used for powerful legacy charged moves.
Tip: If your storage is full, use a few regular TMs on random Pokémon instead of deleting them. But never delete Elite TMs.
⚙ Evolution Items: What to Keep & Recommended Amounts
Most evolution items in Pokémon GO are rarely needed, so you don’t have to store large amounts of them. Here is a simple guide showing what each item does and how many you should keep.
| Item | Keep / Delete? | Recommended Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Sun Stone | Keep | 5–10 |
| King’s Rock | Keep | 5–10 |
| Metal Coat | Keep | 5–10 |
| Dragon Scale | Keep | 5–10 |
| Upgrade | Keep | 5–10 |
| Sinnoh Stone | Keep | 20–30 |
| Unova Stone | Keep | 20–30 |
| Gimmighoul Coins | Cannot Delete | Store Freely |
Notes
- Sun Stone – Used for certain Grass-type evolutions (Bellossom).
- King’s Rock – Required for Slowking and Politoed.
- Metal Coat – Used for Scizor and Steelix.
- Dragon Scale – Required for Kingdra.
- Upgrade – Evolves Porygon into Porygon2.
- Sinnoh Stone – Used frequently for many Gen 4 evolutions.
- Unova Stone – Used for several Gen 5 evolutions.
- Gimmighoul Coins – Used to evolve Gimmighoul into Gholdengo and do not take bag space.
Tip: Evolution items often return through events or Special Research, so there’s no need to hoard large amounts. Keeping 5–10 of each basic item and 20–30 of Sinnoh / Unova Stones is more than enough.
🏆 Final Tips to Maximize Your Storage
- Use items instead of deleting them when possible
- Feed berries to gyms for rewards
- Catch Pokémon instead of deleting Poké Balls
- Spend TMs on bad move Pokémon before deleting
- Save Rare Candy for rare or legendary Pokémon only
Keeping your inventory clean helps you catch more Pokémon, earn more Stardust, and enjoy the game without interruptions.
📌 Want to Improve Your Pokémon Team?
Check out my full guide: Pokémon GO IV Guide: How to Choose the Best Pokémon for Raids & PvP
Have suggestions or tips of your own? Drop them in the comments!