For almost two years, Niantic has actively escalated remote raids by Pokémon Go. In an effort to get users to play the game outdoors, the company has implemented several restrictions on this feature, including a daily limit and a much higher cost of tickets. These changes don’t seem to be going anywhere, but Niantic added a new quality of life improvement to ranged raiding with very little fanfare, and it’s actually a big deal. In a major change, participation in Raids is now shared through the player’s friends list, allowing friends to join Raids remotely without receiving an invite.

Prior to this change, players were limited to sending five invitations to friends, who could then use a Remote Raid pass to participate (local players could join without restrictions). Choosing five players to join can often cause headaches if there is no prior planning; you don’t know who will be able to step in, and sometimes you realize after the fact that you should have sent an invitation to someone else instead. Following this new change, players will be able to see if their friends are participating in a raid and participate in it without receiving an invitation. A Remote Raid pass will still be required, but this should open things up considerably, potentially making it much easier to find enough players.

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The friends list in Pokémon Go allows players to rearrange it based on things like friendship level and whether or not they can receive a gift. As a result of this change, there is now an option to group friends by “In a Raid”, which shows the number in parentheses. This number indicates how many friends are currently participating in raids. It should be noted that these are not limited to raids that can be witnessed remotely; it will also list friends who are participating in raids that you can’t participate in without being there in person, like Shadow Raids. Players will still need to keep an eye on their friends lists to see which raids they can join, as they won’t receive push notifications like they do when they receive a real invite.

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Niantic has not said anything about this change of Pokémon Go on the game’s official website or on social networks. It’s unclear why, but it’s great to see the company improving the Remote Raid feature like this. It may not be as nice as lowering the price of Remote Passes or lifting the daily limit, but it’s a big change that will improve the game. After almost two years of frustration with the nerfed the Remote Raid feature, it looks like the community has a change to actually get excited about.

What do you think of this change? Pokémon Go? Do you think this will make remote raids easier to complete? Share your thoughts with me directly on Twitter at @Marcdachampon Bluesky at @Marcdachampor on Instagram at @Dachampgaming!