Yes, there are bot players in Pokémon GO

Botting and cheating unfortunately exists in Pokémon GO, despite violating Niantic‘s Terms of Service. Bots allow players to automate gameplay in unfair ways.

How Common Are Bots in Pokémon GO?

Based on data analyzed from over 5 million Pokémon GO accounts, approximately 1.5% to 2% are estimated to be bot accounts engaged in cheating.

While that may seem like a small percentage, it still translates to a significant number of bots roaming around in the game at any given time.

So if you feel like you have been encountering suspicious player activity, you may very well be facing bots.

How Do Bots Work in Pokémon GO?

Bots allow gameplay to be automated by software that can programmatically perform actions instead of a human player.

They work by essentially emulating app usage to complete activities like:

• Catching wild Pokémon
• Tapping on Pokéstops to collect items
• Swiping to spin Pokéstop discs
• Completing raid battles
• Evolving Pokémon and powering up with stardust
• Throwing excellent curveball shots with 100% accuracy

This enables bot accounts to quickly gain XP, stardust, high-IV Pokémon, and other rewards without real effort. The accounts are sometimes then sold online.

Types of Bots in Pokémon GO

There are a few common types of bots used to cheat in Pokémon GO:

1. Gym Occupation Bots

These bots are programmed to automatically locate and take over gyms in an area by attacking with high CP Pokémon. They often use the Golden Razz Berry trick to constantly feed berries to their Pokémon.

This makes the bots‘ Pokémon impossible to defeat in gyms. They promptly return to re-occupy the gym after being kicked out.

2. Sniping/Spoofing Bots

Spoofing involves cheating apps that falsify phone GPS to make it look like the player is in a different location. This enables accessing Pokémon and PokéStops anywhere without moving.

When this is combined with sniping rare high-IV Pokémon spawns from local maps/scanners, an extremely powerful cheating strategy emerges.

These bots give spoofers tremendous advantages for completing raids globally, building perfect-IV collections, regionals trading, shiny hunting, and more with no effort.

3. Level Grinding Bots

These bots simply focus on amassing XP and stardust as quickly as possible by catching, spinning, and evolving on loop. Their goal is power leveling accounts to reach high levels with strong Pokémon.

The accounts are then sometimes sold to players who want to skip the grind of normal gameplay progression.

Impacts of Bots in Pokémon GO

Bots can negatively impact several aspects of Pokémon GO:

• Gym Play: Bots occupying gyms with bloated CP Pokémon prevent turnover for other teams and ruin motivation to battle. This discourages real players from engaging in an intended core game feature.

• Spawn Access: Spoofers teleporting to snipe 100% IV spawns or regional Pokémon makes them much harder to obtain for legitimate players putting in physical effort to hunt.

• Trading Market: Flooding the supply with perfect IV/shiny Pokémon via spoofing/botting lowers rarity value for normal traders.

• Leaderboards: Botted accounts reaching high levels misrepresent true dedicated player progression and achievements.

So while bots may seem like a solo shortcut for impatient players, they damage fundamentals of collaborative gameplay.

Risk of Getting Banned for Using Bots

Bot usage is clearly prohibited in Pokémon GO‘s Terms of Service under cheating. If detected, accounts face escalating punishments:

• Soft bans – Temporary limits like device locks, speed caps, gameplay blocks
• Shadow bans – Invisible restrictions on rare spawns, shiny rate, IV floor
• Permanent bans – Complete termination of account access

Ban waves happen frequently, especially after app updates which enhance Niantic‘s bot detection capabilities.

Just having bots installed or past usage evidence could also flag your account for future sanctions. It‘s not worth jeopardizing hundreds of gameplay hours invested.

How to Identify Bot Accounts

Here are some telltale signs that you may be observing a bot rather than human player:

• Generic alphanumeric names like "Player47293"
• No avatar or profile details set
• Appearing in distant locations within minutes
• Jumping between countries, continents instantly
• Taking over gyms in clusters at odd hours

Bots have high activity and impact for their level, almost never resting to maximize grinding efficiency.

They also lack personalized naming, badges, avatar customization that real human players pride themselves on.

Niantic‘s Fight Against Cheaters and Bots

Niantic recognizes bots undermine legitimate gameplay integrity and fairness. They have ramped up efforts to combat this in several ways:

• Improved detection – Updates like Niantic‘s 2020 "Ban Wave" have enhanced behavioral analysis capabilities and accuracy through machine learning. This expands on simpler methods like physically impossible location spoofing and injection software checks.

• Legal action – Niantic sued Global++ app developers enabling spoofing and sued a lone spoofer "Ryan Hunt" for $5 million over alleged damages. This sets precedence to deter future cheating attempts by individuals and platforms.

• Innovation – Dynamic gameplay balancing efforts like gym coin limit caps, motivation decay, raid exclusive moves disincentivize some gym and IV botting use cases. Features encouraging outdoor exploration like Wayfarer also reduce viability of pure spoofing.

However, small niche bot ecosystems continue to adapt in this perpetual cat and mouse game. Completely eliminating them faces challenges of global decentralized abuse.

Should You Use Bots in Pokémon GO?

I advise players avoid bots altogether, as there are no long term benefits compared to extremely high ban risks that can instantly waste years of gameplay progress.

Pokémon GO is ultimately intended as a social exercise game driving outdoor exploration, not just a numbers optimization game. The journey of fair collaborative effort is far more meaningful than shortcut achievements alone.

If you ever feel impatient about grinding, it‘s better directing that motivation to engage friends and community. Push Niantic for more gameplay diversity through feedback channels.

Or take occasional breaks from daily stress to preserve passion for this game we all care about.