A blockbuster followed by big reveals

The Pokemon video game slate has been busy heading into and through 2026. Pokemon Legends: Z-A, released October 16, 2025, on Switch and Switch 2, sold 5.8 million copies worldwide in its first week, with roughly half of those on the Switch 2. It set the stage for a year of major announcements about where the series goes next.

Reception was more mixed than the sales suggest. Critics landed around a 78 on Metacritic, generally favorable, while the user score dipped much lower amid complaints about repetitive gameplay and being confined to a single city in Lumiose.

Expanding Z-A and revealing Gen 10

The year's game news covered both new content and the future of the franchise:

Z-A's Mega Dimension DLC, priced at $29.99, delivered its main story content in December 2025, adding around 19 new Mega Evolutions plus the Mythical Pokemon Hoopa and a new antagonist group.
At the February 2026 Pokemon Presents, Generation 10 was revealed as Pokemon Winds and Waves, a new mainline pair set in a tropical, water-focused region with underwater exploration.
Winds and Waves is reported as a Switch 2 title targeting 2027, so it is not a 2026 release.
The life-sim spin-off Pokemon Pokopia launched on Switch on March 5, 2026.

Champions enters the arena

The most significant 2026 game launch is Pokemon Champions, a free-to-play competitive battler released April 8, 2026, on Switch and Switch 2, with a mobile version planned later in the year. It is a cross-platform, turn-based competitive title launching with 186 species, Pokemon HOME compatibility for importing from Scarlet and Violet, and support for Mega Evolution.

Champions matters because it formalizes competitive Pokemon as its own dedicated product rather than a mode buried inside a mainline game. By making ranked and tournament battling free-to-play and cross-platform, The Pokemon Company lowers the barrier for aspiring competitors and gives the scene a purpose-built home. It becomes an official title of organized play and features at the 2026 World Championships, cementing its role at the heart of competitive Pokemon.

Taken together, 2026 shows a franchise firing on multiple fronts. Legends Z-A proved the appetite for ambitious mainline experiments, even as its reception highlighted areas to improve. The Winds and Waves reveal gives fans a clear next mainline destination, albeit one that waits until 2027 on Switch 2. And Champions, alongside spin-offs like Pokopia, broadens the ecosystem beyond the core adventures. For a series turning 30, the games side of Pokemon looks as active and varied as ever, balancing blockbuster releases with bold experiments and a renewed competitive focus.