Pokemon GO: How to Defeat Heatran — Counters, Weaknesses

Heatran is a Legendary Pokemon of the Sinnoh region. Known to live in volcanic caves, it’s love for molten high temperatures is unrivaled. If you’re trying to take down this guy in a 5-Star Raid, use this guide to get as prepared as possible. Here’s how to defeat Heatran in Pokemon GO.

How to Beat Heatran in Pokemon GO

Heatran Attacks

Heatran is a Fire / Steel Pokemon who has two Fast Attacks to chose from, Bug Bite (Bug) and Fire Spin (Fire). It has four Charged Attacks in its pool, however.

• Stone Edge (Rock)
• Iron Head (Steel)
• Fire Blast (Fire)
• Flamethrower (Fire)

If you’re going against Heatran in a Raid, it can pull from any of these attacks for its moveset. If you’re facing off against it in a Gym or in the Battle League, you’ll most likely be facing a Heatran with only Fire attacks, as that gives it the highest DPS.

Heatran Weaknesses

Heatran is especially vulnerable to Ground moves due to Fire and Steel being weak to it. Along with Ground, Fighting and Water attacks will deal extra damage.

While it only has three weaknesses, Heatran has a number of types it’s resistant to.

• Normal
• Flying
• Psychic
• Dragon

Along with normal resistance to the above types, it’s extremely resistant to the following, with moves from those types doing less than 40% of the damage they normally do.

• Poison
• Bug
• Steel
• Grass
• Ice
• Fairy

These are especially weak to Heatran, just from their typing and should be avoided on your battle team.

Heatran Counters

In making my team to take on Heatran, I’m going to want to focus on Ground Pokemon that can take advantage of the Same Type Attack Bonus (STAB) and who’re resistant to Steel and Fire attacks. Swampert, for example, is resistant to Steel, which makes it an ideal Pokemon for this fight and I’ll definitely be bringing it along. Excadrill, on the other hand, is weak to fire, which means it may not get many chances to attack if sent out to face Heatran.

The best counters for Heatran are:

• Therian Landorous: Mud Shot, Earthquake, Earth Power
• Swampert: Mud Shot, Earthquake
• Garchomp: Mud Shot, Earthquake
• Golurk: Mud-Slap- Earth Power
• Mudsdale: Mud-Slap, Earthquake, Bulldoze

Those are the best Pokemon to include in your battle team against Heatran. Each can take advantage of STAB with their attacks and show no weakness to Fire or Steel. If you have to take other Pokemon into the fight, focus on Pokemon who aren’t weak to Fire, as Heatran’s attacks have a higher probability of being that type.

For more Pokemon GO battle guides, check out our full library. We’ve got everything from best Pokemon for battle leagues to how to defeat Shadow Mewtwo during a Shadow Raid, as well as what new items do in PoGO.