All Pokémon that evolve via trade in Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl

You’ll need help from a friend to get the next form of a few Pokémon.

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, like so many other Pokémon games, is all about collecting the various Pokémon and evolving them in order to fill out your Pokédex. An important part of collecting is trading Pokémon, which is important for a couple of big reasons.

Trading allows you to acquire Pokémon that otherwise aren’t in your version of the game, while it also gives you access to Pokémon that are otherwise extremely difficult or impossible to grab, evolving only when traded. We’ve compiled a list of all the Pokémon that evolve when traded in Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl.

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl: List of Pokémon that evolve when traded

There’s a fair number of Pokémon that evolve when traded, including a handful of some Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl exclusives, further emphasizing the need for trading with a friend. There are two types of Pokémon that evolve when traded, with Pokémon that don’t need to hold a specific item and Pokémon that do.

Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl: Pokémon that evolve when traded without an item

These four are fairly straightforward. Just trade (or be traded) the Pokémon on the right and they’ll evolve into the Pokémon on the left, no items required.

Graveler evolves into Golem
Haunter evolves into Gengar
Kadabra evolves into Alakazam
Machoke evolves into Machamp

Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl: Pokémon that evolve when traded with an item

This is where things get more complicated. For these remaining Pokémon, you’ll need to make sure they are holding a very specific item when traded. Otherwise, they won’t evolve.

Clamperl evolves into to Gorebyss – Deep Sea Scale
Clamperl evolves into Huntail – Deep Sea Tooth
Feebas evolves into Milotic – Prism Scale
Onix evolves into Steelix – Metal Coat
Poliwhirl evolves into Politoed – King’s Stone
Scyther evolves into Scizor – Metal Coat
Seadra evolves into Kingdra – Dragon Scale
Slowpoke evolves into Slowking – King’s Stone
Porygon evolves into Porygon-2 – Upgrade

Evolve and collect!

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl are fairly faithful remakes of the older games, bringing over much of the classic experience. As a result, they can be a bit more obtuse to understand, which is something to consider if you’re pondering buying Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl or Sword and Shield as a holiday gift. If you want the more traditional games however and you’re worried about getting stuck, we recommend consulting our Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl beginners tips and tricks.

Back to Sinnoh

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl

$60 at Amazon (Brilliant Diamond)
$60 at Amazon (Shining Pearl)
$60 at Best Buy (Brilliant Diamond)
$60 at Best Buy (Shining Pearl)

Some trading required

Filling out your National Pokédex won’t be easy, and you’ll need to trade if you want to collect some unique Pokémon forms.