Highlights

• Neutral natures like Bashful and Serious offer no benefit and should be avoided in competitive battles as they don't provide a stat boost.
• Adamant is ideal for slow physical attackers, like Dragonite, as it raises Attack and lowers Special Attack, maximizing their offensive potential.
• Timid is perfect for fast special attackers, such as Iron Moth and Walking Wake, as it raises Speed and lowers Attack, allowing them to strike first against other threats.

Natures are an oft-overlooked aspect of playing Pokemon, at least in a casual playthrough. It's a different story with competitive battling, though; having the right nature is a bit of a make-or-break situation that determines how well Pokemon can play certain roles.

Natures raise one stat and lower another, and it's important not only to know what each nature raises and lowers but which ones are more compatible with certain competitive roles. Knowing how they function in conjunction with certain Pokemon helps, so with every entry, alongside explaining the significance of the nature in question, an example will be given of a Pokemon that's at its best with said nature.

Updated October 27th, 2023 by Doruk Kaptan: With each new generation, the competitive scene of Pokemon is shaken up, and new strategies are devised. However, no matter how unique the generation or the gimmick is, team roles and natures are as important as ever.

These roles can be made very specific or be talked about in broader terms. Regardless of definitions, different Pokemon excel at different tasks, and it's always been that way. Picking the right nature for your Pokemon is, therefore, integral to allowing a team member to do their job better.

10 Natures That Are Rarely Useful: Neutral Natures

You can use them, but there are better options

While every nature is technically equal in its role of raising and lowering a stat, some are better than others from a practical standpoint. There are certain ones that provide much less functional use than others. In fact, this bunch doesn't provide a benefit at all.

Exhibit A of basically unusable natures would be the ones that raise and lower the same stat, a.k.a. neutral natures: Bashful, Docile, Hardy, Quirky, and Serious. No matter what kind of Pokemon you're building out, you're missing out on a potential stat boost, and it's generally much better to optimize select stats than be totally all-around.

9 Slow Physical Attacker: Adamant

Slow, steady, and strong

Adamant raises the Pokemon's Attack stat and lowers the Special Attack stat, and that's a perfect nature for a meta where you're usually expected to stick to one category of attack anyway. Physically offensive Pokemon could also have a Jolly nature to increase Speed instead of Attack, which can be crucial in moving first.

Adamant is the way to go for most wall breakers, who are usually faster than the walls they're trying to break. A great example of this is Dragonite in Generation Nine. Your primary strategy is to Terastalize into a Normal-type and spam Extreme Speed after a Dragon Dance. As the move is priority, your Speed won't matter at all, so why bother boosting it? Another great example would be Kingambit with the Swords Dance, Sucker Punch combo.

8 Slow Special Attacker: Modest

Your Ursaluna and Hatterene that can benefit from Trick Room

Modest is the polar opposite of Adamant, in that it raises Special Attack and lowers Attack. That fulfills the same role in terms of functionality: making sure your Pokemon's attacks hit as hard as possible. As stated, this works great with wall breakers, albeit on the special side this time.

Sometimes, you might be so slow that you don't care about going fast, as it's unlikely, barring Trick Room. Ursaluna-Bloodmoon fits that bill perfectly. If you're going to move last regardless, why not boost your damage output, at least? Another such Pokemon in Generation Nine would be Armarouge.

7 Fast Physical Attacker: Jolly

Great for setups to annoy your opponent

As alluded to, if you're more inclined to give your physical attacker a jolt of Speed, a Jolly nature (+Speed, -Sp. Atk) is the way to go. Giving the right Pokemon the Jolly nature can give it a little Speed boost that could ensure you outspeed most other Pokemon around the same speed tier. For example, the great sweepers Iron Valiant, Great Tusk, and Ogerpon all appreciate this nature.

However, it's not just purely offensive Pokemon that benefit from a Jolly nature. Certain types of utility Pokemon, such as hazard setters and suicide leads, could benefit from a Jolly nature, ensuring that they're able to annoy the opponent with Stealth Rock, Encore, Taunt, Parting Shot, and more before their opponent gets to knock them out. Cinderace and Crobat would be prime examples of these.

6 Fast Special Attacker: Timid

Perfect for straightforward sweepers

The special variant of Jolly, Timid, raises Speed and lowers Attack. When given to a decently fast special attacking Pokemon, that little extra Speed can prove to be game-changing. Case in point: Iron Moth and Walking Wake are two amazing special sweepers that need the added speed from Timid to go first against other premier threats in the format.

While it's best for more straightforward sweepers, Timid could work on a wall breaker set, though you'd want to reserve it for the mid-to-high Speed Pokemon rather than the slower tanks that benefit from a Modest Nature.

5 Physical Tank: Impish & Bold

Build a great defense, but don't forget your other stats

Unlike its relationship with offensive stats, where you should optimize one offensive stat most of the time, nature's relationship with defensive stats can kind of work both ways. You could choose to bolster one particular defensive stat to the best of its ability or improve the lesser one to make the Pokemon a more all-around tank. Regardless, if you're looking for a dedicated physical tank, either Impish or Bold will work for you, reducing Special Attack and Attack, respectively.

For example, Toxapex almost always prefers Bold to boost its great Defense further, and it never really uses physical moves, so the lowered stat is also inconsequential. The flip side is Impish; the preferred nature of Garganacl, for example, still boosts Defense but doesn't hurt physical damage output. Just be careful and choose which offensive stat is more important on your tank.

4 Special Tank: Careful & Calm

Boost your defenses while lowering your offensive stats

Of course, there's also the special side of things: Careful and Calm raise Special Defense, reducing Special Attack and Attack, respectively. The main idea is the same: you want to boost your defenses while lowering the offensive stat that's irrelevant to your tank.

A good example here is Empoleon, who's respectably bulky on the special side and almost never deals physical damage; therefore, Calm. Everyone's favorite memeable Pokemon Clodsire is the other side of the coin, with nothing to do with its Special Attack, and happy to gain a boost to its special bulk.

3 Mixed Attacker: Defense-Lowering Natures

Be sure to increase your necessary stats in turn, such as your speed or attack

When it comes to the unwritten rule of only optimizing one attacking stat, mixed attackers are the exception. They're somewhat rare, considering a Pokemon would need both good Attack and Special Attack to reasonably pull one off. That said, if you're honing in on two sides of a Pokemon's offensive potential, it would have to sacrifice some of its defensive potential, which can be a bit risky.

Natures that raise an attacking stat (Lonely, Naughty, Mild, Rash) would be nice for improving one of the attacking stats, though natures that improve Speed (Hasty, Naive) work too. On the contrary, natures that raise one defensive stat and lower the other (Gentle, Lax) generally aren't worth the trouble. Note that you're lowering defenses, so it's best to put these natures on an already frail Pokemon to maximize its damage output, at the very least. Dragapult is the most recent example of a Pokemon pulling this niche off.

2 Walls And Pivots: Relaxed & Sassy

Glimmora and Corviknight are great examples of defensive walls

These two natures are pretty weird and are rarely used. They raise a defensive stat, Defense, and Special Defense, respectively, while dropping Speed. It makes sense, as it's the walls that really have the least use for a good Speed stat. However, where these two natures see the most use, in particular, is with pivots: Pokemon that take a hit, then switch out.

Pokemon like that really don't have a use for a Speed stat, since a move like Teleport always moves last, and even if you're using a move like U-Turn or Flip Turn instead, it's best to just take the hit before a weaker, less defensive Pokemon does. Glimmora, Corviknight, and Galarian Slowking are some of the best modern examples of this.

1 Trick Room Attackers: Brave & Quiet

A gimmick, but a solid one

These are two more Speed-dropping natures, this time raising an offensive stat: Attack for Brave and Special Attack for Quiet. While these are even rarer than sets with Relaxed or Sassy, they might be more fun to work with when you're using a certain type of team: a Trick Room team. The lower your Speed stat in a regular setting, the higher it is in Trick Room, so your nature is essentially raising two stats if you can get it set up.

Torkoal, Hatterene, Dondozo, and Ursaluna are all amazing options for such a role. Trick Room may be gimmicky, but it's totally worth giving a shot. An honorable mention goes to Gyro Ball users, who benefit doubly from a lower Speed thanks to Gyro Ball being stronger the slower the user.

Next: Pokemon: The Legendary Trios, Ranked Weakest To Strongest