How to Beat Cliff in Pokémon Go: All Cliff Counters

In Pokémon Go, you'll find that to get specific Pokémon, you'll have to defeat the Team GO Rocket grunts and bosses. The leaders (Cliff, Arlo, Sierra, and Giovanni) are often the most difficult, but provide the greatest rewards. In this guide, we will focus on how to defeat Cliff and which counters are best against his new Pokémon.

Quick Notes

• The counters we include aren't synonymous with weaknesses. Sometimes these counters will be mentioned for things other than being the opponent's weakness. Other examples may include their movesets or the fact that they're naturally resistant to their opponent.
• These lists are not ranked from best to worst. While we can provide the best counters to use in any match, there is no guarantee which order they should fall. The effectiveness of each Pokémon largely depends on your play style and battle technique. This being the case, we have instead opted to list the counters alphabetically.
• Best team setup: There are a few Pokémon types that we recommend adding to your team since they do well against many of the Pokémon in Cliff's lineup. It's best to have some combination of the team listed below. Still, if you only have two of them, you should hold fairly well against him.
  • Any Strong Flying Pokémon with Water or Ice attacks.
  • Any Strong Fighting Pokémon
  • Any Strong Ground Pokémon

Related: How to Beat Giovanni in Pokémon Go | All Giovanni Counters - Pro Game Guides

Round 1 Pokémon

The following list has all the options for this gym leader to use as their first Pokémon.

Teddiursa

• Type: Normal
• Weak Against: Fighting
• Resistant Against: Ghost

Round 2 Pokémon

The following list has all the options for this gym leader to use as their second Pokémon.

Electivire

• Type: Electric
• Weak Against: Ground
• Resistant Against: Electric, Flying, Steel

Marowak

• Type: Ground
• Weak Against: Grass, Ice, Water
• Resistant Against: Electric, Poison, Rock
• Notes: Marowak is the odd one out in Cliff's lineup. It does the least damage to Flying, but has no weakness against Flying attacks. The best Pokémon to use are Flying Pokémon with Grass, Ice, or Water attacks.

Related: How to Beat Arlo in Pokémon Go | All Arlo Counters - Pro Game Guides

Omastar

• Type: Rock, Water
• Weak Against: Electric, Fighting, Grass, Ground
• Resistant Against: Fire, Flying, Ice, Normal, Poison
• Notes: Rock and Water are both weak against Grass, so Grass attacks will deal the most damage to Omastar.

Round 3 Pokémon

The following list has all the options for this gym leader to use as their third Pokémon.

Torterra

• Type: Grass, Ground
• Weak Against: Bug, Fire, Flying, Ice
• Resistant Against: Electric, Ground, Rock
• Notes: Grass and Ground are both weak against Ice, so Ice attacks deal massive damage to Torterra. However, only Flying, Bug, and Grass are resistant to Torterra. It's best to use one of those types of Pokémon with the ability to use Ice attacks.

Related: How to Beat Sierra in Pokemon Go | All Sierra Counters - Pro Game Guides

Tyranitar

• Type: Rock, Dark
• Weak Against: Bug, Fairy, Fighting, Grass, Ground, Steel, Water
• Resistant Against: Psychic, Dark, Fire, Flying, Ghost, Normal, Poison
• Notes: Fighting Pokémon do the most damage against Tyranitar. A few of Cliff's other Pokémon are weak against Fighting, too. So you won't want to stray from that type.

Once you've found Cliff, you'll now be ready to take on all his Pokémon! Check back with this page for occasional updates when they update Pokémon Go!