Every Pokémon Generation, Ranked From Worst To Best

Pokemon Generations key art

The Pokémon series is over 25 years old, having first launched on the Game Boy in 1996 with Pokémon Red and Green — which was eventually turned into Red and Blue in the West with an enhanced version a few years later. That first generation of Pokémon video games kicked off the most successful franchise in the world, with dozens of games, multiple anime, and over 20 movies.

Since that first generation of Pokémon games, there have been 21 main series games and almost 50 spinoff games, spread across nine distinct generations — loosely defined by the introduction of a new region and starts in a main series game. But not every generation is created equal, and some are clearly above others.

That’s why we’ve decided to rank every Pokémon generation, from worst to best. Our rankings will take into account both main series and spinoff games, but not anime, movies, or TCG — that’s just too complicated. We’ll also consider the Pokémon themselves, but that’s a little less important.

Here’s our definitive ranking of every Pokémon generation.

Generation 2

Make no mistake: Pokémon’s second generation is not bad. None of the generations on this list are. Some are just weaker than others, and that pretty much sums up generation 2. Gold and Silver are fine enough games, though they have some problems with level scaling and Pokémon availability, and the inclusion of Kanto doesn’t add enough to the experience to make it worthwhile. Crystal is a better game, to be sure, but it adds barely nothing to the experience beyond a few extra cutscenes with Suicune — hardly worth a standalone release. Stadium 2 is the best of the stadium games, but that’s pretty much all gen 2 has going for it.

Generation 6

The biggest problem with generation 6 isn’t that it’s bad, it’s that it had so much potential and played it safe. The first fully 3D generation of Pokémon, generation 6 launched with X and Y, two good but ultimately unexciting games, and ended with Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. Those latter two games are excellent remakes of Ruby and Sapphire, but were missing some of the fan-favorite Emerald features. Not the biggest issue for me, I don’t love the Battle Frontier, but it left the generation feeling a bit flat. It did, at least, have a bunch of spinoffs and side games, like the excellent Super Mystery Dungeon, but most of them came and went without much fanfare.

Generation 1

Ah generation 1, the games that started it all. Credit where credit is due: Pokémon Red and Blue turned Pokémon into a global phenomenon overnight, followed it up with the anime-inspired Pokémon Yellow, and had some of the best spinoff games of the franchise. Trading Card Game, Snap, Pinball, and Stadium are all a blast to play, and really set the scene for future spinoffs to take the ball and run with it. The only thing holding back the first generation is how much of a pain they are to actually play today, with slow movement and battles, glitches galore, and straight up broken mechanics. There are better ways to explore Kanto, too, which we’ll get to later in the list.

Generation 9

Gen 9 is the newest generation of Pokémon games, and we’ll be honest — it’s not gotten off to a great start. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet were fantastic in their ideas, but dropped the ball in execution, with buggy, ugly, ill-performing games. A frequent saying among GLHF staff is that Scarlet and Violet would easily be the best games in the series, if not for all the things that make them bad. It was a bold step forward in game design, truly evolving the traditional formula for the first time in decades, and it’s only the technical issues that hold it back. If we can get these kinds of games without the bugs, performance issues, and half-baked graphics, the Pokémon series will be in very good shape.

Generation 7

Sun and Moon are often seen as the first part of a shift towards storytelling rather than gameplay in the main series Pokémon games — though we’d argue the seeds of that were sown in Gen 5. Still, that shift, with long, unskippable cutscenes and plenty of dialogue, has been contentious among fans. Looking back on gen 7 though, there’s a lot to like here. Sun and Moon were lovely little games, Ultra Sun and Moon were even better (although the story took a hit), and Let’s Go Pikachu and Eevee were very different, but very charming, remakes of the first generation games. It’s fair to say that gen 7 as a whole was a bit of a celebration of the series as a whole, and while it didn’t exactly hit for everybody, it was an earnest effort to bring in fans from across the spectrum for one big hurrah.

Generation 4

There will be many who disagree with generation 4 being in fourth place, and we absolutely respect that. It was a fantastic generation, filled with the wonderful Diamond and Pearl, the even better Platinum, gen 2 remakes in HeartGold and SoulSilver, and the best Mystery Dungeon games in the series. It was truly a fantastic generation, but… it could have been better. HeartGold and SoulSilver were the biggest contributors to this — they failed to fix many of the problems inherent to Gold, Silver, and Crystal, and that’s kind of just a bummer. The Pokémon introduced in Sinnoh also aren’t much to write home about, there are a few fantastic designs, but a bunch of really middling Pokémon that aren’t all that exciting.

Generation 5

As we mentioned earlier, gen 5 sowed the seeds of the storytelling focus that would become a mainstay of the series in following generations. Most fans typically agree that Black and White – along with their sequels Black 2 and White 2 – have some of the best stories in the entire franchise, with gorgeous writing, incredible character work, and some genuinely shocking twists and turns. Black and White took a bold move in only including brand-new Pokémon before the credits rolled, and Black and White 2 took just as bold a step in being an actual sequel to a game before it. While generation 5 was a little bit lacking in the spinoff department, it did at least have Conquest, which was a surprisingly fun addition to the universe that we wish had become a long-running series in its own right.

Generation 8

Okay, okay, hear me out, right? Yes, Sword and Shield are a little bit lacking in a lot of areas. The main story is very strangely uneven, the routes and caves are often straight pathways with little in them, and none of it is really difficult at all. It was massively improved with its two DLC expansions, and followed up by extremely by-the-book gen 4 remakes, but the real shining gem of this generation was Legends: Arceus. Legends was an experiment, of sorts, taking an existing region, putting a spin on it, and trying out some changes to just about every aspect of the Pokémon experience. Not every change was great, but it was the biggest departure for the Pokémon series to date, and it very quickly became a fan-favorite. If we’re lucky, Game Freak will pick from the best of Scarlet, Violet, and Legends to craft its 10th generation.

Generation 3

Generation 3 has just about everything you could ever want. Ruby and Sapphire are some of the best base games in the series, but not content with just that, Game Freak went and twisted it all up for Emerald, easily the biggest,most expansive, and most exciting “third game” prior to gen 8. And then you’ve got the amazing spinoffs: Mystery Dungeon, Ranger, Colosseum, XD: Gale of Darkness, and heck, even Pinball: Ruby and Sapphire. And that’s before you get to FireRed and LeafGreen, easily the best way to experience Kanto to date. Every part of this generation is fantastic, and there really isn’t anything that holds it back. As the late, great Tina Turner would say, it's simply the best.