Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl: How to Stop Evolution

In Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, whenever Pokémon meet certain requirements or use special items, they can evolve into their next form. This is nothing new, however, you might want to consider preventing your Pokémon from evolving for whatever reason, and this is where we've stepped in to help.

In this guide, we explain why you might want to prevent a Pokémon evolving, and how to stop evolution in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl.

Read More: Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl: How To Unlock the National Pokedex

Why Stop a Pokémon Evolving?

There are a handful of reasons that a player may wish to prevent their Pokémon from evolving in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. They are as follows:

Prevent Unwanted Evolutions

You may want to prevent a Pokémon from evolving, simply because they're going to evolve into the form you aren't after. A good example of this would be Eevee's many evolution forms; they may begin to evolve into Espeon, but you're actually wanting a Glaceon.

In cases like this, you may choose to prevent evolution until you have the means of evolving that Pokémon into the form you want.

Learn New Moves at a Lower Level

This is perhaps one of the main reasons that most players will choose to prevent their Pokémon from evolving. Essentially, if a Pokémon has not evolved, the level at which they learn new moves will be lower than that of if they had evolved. Once a Pokémon evolves, that move will either require a higher level to be learnt, or they may lose the ability to learn that particular move whatsoever.

Learn Moves Exclusive to Earlier Stages of Evolution

Again, another popular reason for preventing evolution is that some moves are exclusive to Pokémon in earlier stages. These moves simply cannot be learnt after that Pokémon has evolved, thus, if you have specific moves in mind for your dream party, you may want to keep that Pokémon in their original form for a while before evolving them.

How to Stop a Pokémon Evolving

Luckily enough, preventing your Pokémon from evolving is easy enough. There are two ways to go about this in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl:

Press 'B' To Cancel an Evolution

This one is as simple as it sounds! Whenever your Pokémon begins to evolve and the shiny evolution screen pops up, press 'B' to prevent the evolution from happening.

Do note, however, that every single time that particular Pokémon levels up from that point onwards, the evolution process will begin again and need to be cancelled again. If this gets annoying for you, the next option is to do the below!

Hold Everstone

The Everstone is an item that can be held by your Pokémon. When placed as their held item, the Pokémon will be prevented from evolving the entire time that they're holding it.

Everstone is a rare item, but it can be found by exploring and digging in the Grand Underground. If you reach the Diglett bonus too, there is a four-minute period in which your chance of finding rarer items is higher. So, play online, attain that bonus, and get digging! Sooner or later, you'll get your hands on it, as well as a bunch of other goodies.

Another way of acquiring Everstone is by catching Geodudes. There is a chance that a Geodude in the wild may be holding the Everstone as you capture them. However, the Diglett bonus in the Grand Underground is certainly your best bet.

That's all there is to stopping evolution in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. We recommend taking a look at our evolution guide to judge exactly what your Pokémon may evolve into! Meanwhile, if you find yourself needing a break from catching Pokémon and digging, you should take a stroll around Amity Square or participate in a Super Contest Show!