Cross your fingers and catch them all!
In the early days of the anime, Ditto was a little awkward with its shape-shifting. It could perfectly pull off every other detail except the face! It was almost horrific when the Pokémon would turn around and have this blank face, but at least it was easy to tell that it was Ditto. In the games, this little quirk is not present. If you’re searching for a Ditto in Pokémon GO, unfortunately, there’s no way to distinguish one in disguise from just a normal Pokémon. So how in the world do you catch one?
Honestly, you just have to get lucky! That’s a sucky answer, I know. Unfortunately, you won’t know if a Pokémon is a Ditto in disguise until you catch it. Only once it is safely captured in the PokéBall will a little question pop up. Then Ditto’s true form will be revealed. Of all of the Pokémon to catch, that has to be the most exciting then!
These tricky little blobs are pretty rare, and their shiny counterparts are even rarer. Don’t worry though, a shiny Ditto will not be disguised as a shiny Pokémon. You don’t have to be afraid that when you finally catch a shiny you’ve been looking forward to it will turn out to be a blue blob of putty.
Niantic, the team behind Pokémon GO, doe not release an official list of Pokémon each month that are likely to be the shape-shifter. The whole idea is to have the illusion that it could be any of them. However, some sites, such as IGN, have a running list of likely disguises each month based on anecdotal evidence. People catch Ditto and seem to find monthly patterns, which makes sense from a tech standpoint.
You can’t really train Ditto, and it’s useless in battles, so you might as well just enjoy the lottery. Maybe you’ll get lucky, maybe you won’t. If you want more concrete tips on catching Pokémon in the mobile game, we have guides on how to catch Leafeon and Glaceon as well as how to catch Kecleon.
Related: How to Evolve Floette in Pokemon GO on Prima Games
