Z-A glitch found to duplicate shiny Pokemon

A brand new method has been discovered in Pokemon Legends: Z-A that lets players clone shiny Pokemon, which is done by taking advantage of a glitch. This works presently, but note that there’s a strong chance that it will be patched out sometime soon.

Austin John Plays shared those findings in a new video today. It’s recommended to not keep both if you plan on using Pokemon Home – meaning you hold on to one, and trade the other. That’s because if you trade one away and keep one, they are not treated as clones. Pokemon Home has a clone check system.

Below are the steps for the Shiny Pokemon duplication glitch in Pokemon Legends: Z-A:

Pokemon Legends: Z-A clone glitch steps

1. Get the Shiny Pokemon to aggro you and lead it far away
2. Move it away until the point that it immediately drops aggro, which is when the Pokemon enters its return to spawn location in the programming; it does a straight line back to where it started
3. Save the game; this saves the current location of that Pokemon, but doesn’t save the return to original location
4. Turn the game off, then back on
5. You will see the Shiny Pokemon when you boot back up; need to go outside of the complete spawn/despawn distance
6. Save the game, quit, and load back up
7. You should see the Shiny Pokemon right when you start back up, and if you return to the original location from the beginning, a copy should be there as well

These Pokemon should be exactly the same. That means they carry the exact same Nature, IVs, stats, and more.

If this sounds complicated, the good news is that Austin John Plays shows a fully example of the glitch in action. You can check it out here.

Pokemon Legends: Z-A is out on both Nintendo Switch 2 and Switch. This week, it was announced that the game has sold 5.8 million copies worldwide.