How to get shiny Rayquaza in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet

Shiny Rayquaza, in all its black and gold glory, is making its rounds in many Pokémon games, and Pokémon Scarlet and Violet is no exception. This extremely rare beast will be available via five-star Tera Raids from Dec. 20 until Jan. 5, so make sure you grab one of these bad boys before they go away.

The last time shiny Rayquaza was distributed outside of Japan was in 2015 as part of a promotion with Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. You can shiny hunt Rayquaza in just about any game it appears in, except Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire (though we suppose that’s why they had the distribution event). You also cannot shiny hunt Rayquaza regularly in Scarlet and Violet, which brings us here. Luckily, nabbing a black and gold buddy from a Tera Raid will be significantly easier than testing your luck and soft resetting your games to find one of these.

Below, we explain how to get shiny Rayquaza in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet and explain the best counters you’ll want to use to take it on.

From Dec. 20, 2024, until Jan. 5, 2025, shiny Rayquaza will appear in Tera Raid dens. Note that even though you can participate in this fight multiple times, you can only catch one shiny Rayquaza from it. After you catch your first one, you won’t get the prompt to try to catch it again upon victory.

To be able to participate in these raids, you’ll need to have met the following requirements:

Once you got all that squared away, you can seek out Rayquaza at a raid den or via the online portal.

If you have Nintendo Switch Online and you can do these battles with other trainers, you won’t need to beat the story — you should be able to join other players’ Rayquaza raid dens.

Below, we detail builds to take in against Rayquaza that should work out decently. Of course, your mileage may vary, as there’s a bit of RNG when it comes to Rayquaza using specific attacks and whatnot. Don’t be surprised if it takes you a couple tries. (Rayquaza’s Hurricane attack can confuse your Pokémon, which… can be annoying, to say the least.)

This is the OG raid setup, which comes in handy here, as Azumarill will be fully immune to Rayquaza’s dragon-type attacks. You’ll max out Azumarill’s attack with Belly Drum and then use Play Rough to dish out some serious damage. Getting the set up properly can take a couple tries, since Belly Drum cuts Azumarill’s health, you risk getting knocked out.

This is a bit of a safer set-up. You can dish out lots of damage using Hyper Beam with the Pixilate and using Draining Kiss to regain your HP if it gets too low. Just like Azumarill, Sylveon will be immune to a good number of Rayquaza’s attacks.

All of that said, your mileage may vary, and if you have other built fairy-type Pokémon suitable for raiding, there’s no harm in bringing them in for a spin. Rayquaza hits hard, but since it’s not at seven-star difficulty, you should be able to take it down with some patience and fairy-type moves.