Pokemon GO Solstice Horizons has become the major talk in the community, primarily due to the nighttime spawn issue. The event offers a Collection Challenge featuring several Pocket Monsters that spawn at different times of the day. Amid the previous Remote Raid criticisms, this new issue might look like another sore thumb, but there is more to it.

The Pokemon GO Solstice Horizons Collection Challenge has a day and night section. But many players report that nighttime encounters aren’t spawning, unlike the daytime. Completing the Solstice Horizons Collection Challenge rewards the players with Stardust and Fomantis encounters. While many consider it a bug, there is much more to the in-game day and night cycle than what meets the eye.

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Pokemon GO Solstice Horizons: When to Catch the Nighttime Spawns in Collection Challenge

Solstice Horizons in Pokemon GO
Solstice Horizons Pokemon GO

The Solstice Horizons event features a unique collection challenge for everyone to participate in. Pokemon GO trainers can encounter distinct Pokemon according to the time of the day cycle. The collection challenge has two parts; Daytime Collection Challenge and Nighttime Collection Challenge. That means different Pokemon spawns during the day, and different ones spawn at night.

Many Pokemon GO players find it hard to catch the monsters at nighttime; many may feel like the nighttime spawn mechanism has a bug, but it’s working just fine. The real-time and the in-game nighttime aren’t synced perfectly; there is a significant gap between those two. The game considers it night only after a few hours of the real-time sunset.

Many try searching for the nighttime monsters without understanding Pokemon GO’s day and night cycle. The Niantic developers have made it challenging for players to encounter the nighttime spawns if the game doesn’t align with the real-time hours. Especially for players living in high latitude areas, such areas only see a few hours of nighttime and, some months, none.

Solstice Horizons Field Research in Pokemon GO
Solstice Horizons Field Research Pokemon GO

Pokemon GO shifts to nighttime 2 hours after sunset and returns to daytime 2 hours after sunrise. The game has almost a 2-hour lag between the real-time sunset and nighttime.

Sunset and sunrise trigger the game map’s visual night/day mode; the game uses local sunrise and sunset times for spawns and map visuals. Depending on their geographical location, players may experience limited nighttime hours. It may become easier to capture nighttime Pokemon approximately two hours after sunrise.

Pokemon GO is available for Android and iOS.

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