Pokémon Go Fighting event - Makuhita, Meditite, Medicham, Hariyama, other fighting Pokémon and everything else you need to know

The Pokémon Go Fighting event - known more officially as the Battle Showdown - takes place in the first half of May, and with it comes a host of bonuses for a short time only.

Trainers will encounter increases numbers of select Fighting Pokémon, including Makuhita, Meditite, Medicham and Hariyama, as well as a range of bonuses to Gym and Raid battles - which is something new for these types of events.

When does the Pokémon Go Fighting event end?

The Pokémon Go Fighting event began at 1am PST - that's 9:00pm UK time - on May 1st.

It's set to finish on May 14th, and though a specific time hasn't been mentioned, it'll likely be the same time of 9pm UK time / 1am BST.

Makuhita, Meditite, Medicham, Hariyama and other Pokémon in the Fighting event

One of the main draws for the event is different spawns, and according to Niantic, we can expect to see more "Fighting-type Pokémon" to appear in the wild. Fighting Types you can expect include:

• Meditite and evolution Medicham
• Makuhita and evolution Hariyam
• Mankey (and evolution Primape)
• Machop (and evolutions Machoke and Machamp)
• Hitmonlee, Hitmonchan, Hitmontop

Elsewhere, Tyrogue will hatch from Eggs more often for the duration of the event, while encounters with Combusken (Torchic evolution), Breloom (Shroomish evolution), Primape, Hitmonlee and Hitmonchan will also appear in Raids.

Previous events which has seen different themed Pokémon appear - such as at Halloween and Christmas - saw spawns appear everywhere, not just their natural biomes, and this appears to be the same.

This means rare creatures should appear outside of their usual spawn locations, and so we should be able to find the creature(s) you're looking for before too long.

As well as these rarer creatures, the event is also a great chance to get Candy for some of the more uncommon creatures if you haven't evolved and added them to your Pokedex already.

The Season of Timeless Travels has arrived in Pokémon Go! The Along the Routes event is here, bringing Gift Exchange and the A Route to New Friendships quest with it. During it, take the time to try out Routes and Party Play while you're hunting down rare Pokémon, fighting in the Go Battle League or competing in PokéStop Showcases.

Other bonuses and features in the Pokémon Go Fighting Type event

As well as a change in creature spawns, the event will also offer the following:

• 2x XP for Gym Battles and Raids
• Raid Battles will give out 3000 Stardust and at least 1x Rare Candy for winning
• 2x Gym Badge multiplier, including defending time
• More items dropping from Photo Discs at Gyms
• Chance of Meditite and Makuhita being a Shiny

On that last point - our shiny Pokémon article explains some of the nuance of these very elusive creature types, but early signs suggest it's as rare as other shiny creatures in the game - that's to say, very rare - so don't hold out on catching one anytime soon.

But because of the increased spawns, technically your chances are increased - so hope luck is on your side. These aren't event exclusive, either - so if you don't see a shiny for either during the event, they will still be around. It just might be a little more difficult.

The Fighting event is shaping up to be one of the best 'elemental' themed events to date, even without the introduction of new Shinies.

If you can, spend plenty of time at Gyms. Even if you can only do solo encounters, it's an easy source of extra Stardust, XP and items. If you're performing Raids back-to-back - especially Legendaries - then using a Lucky Egg to double your XP gains is well worth it.