
Is Paras Good in Crystal Playthrough?
National Park Bug Catching Contest gives Paras its earliest catch in Crystal. The line exists entirely for MoveSpore at level 27, which is the only 100% accurate sleep move in the game. Everything else about Parasect is bad, but that one move earns its spot in the box.
Paras trades roughly evenly with Falkner's team.
Paras trades roughly evenly with Bugsy's team.
Paras trades roughly evenly with Whitney's team.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Morty's team.
Chuck's typing presses Parasect's defenses.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Jasmine's team.
Parasect has the type edge here and should clean up Pryce's team.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Clair's team.
Parasect has the type edge here and should clean up Lt. Surge's team.
Parasect has the type edge here and should clean up Sabrina's team.
Parasect has the type edge here and should clean up Erika's team.
Janine's team hits Parasect's weaknesses hard.
Parasect has the type edge here and should clean up Misty's team.
Parasect resists most of Brock's coverage and hits back hard.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Blaine's team.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Blue's team.
Parasect has the type edge here and should clean up Will's team.
Koga's team hits Parasect's weaknesses hard.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Bruno's team.
Parasect trades roughly evenly with Karen's team.
Lance's team hits Parasect's weaknesses hard.
Catchable
Catch Paras in Ilex Forest (walking, Lv 6, rare).
Recommended Moves
- STARTING (Lv 6)
- LV 6NormalScratchPower 40Accuracy 100%PP 35
- After Falkner
- HM01NormalCutPower 50Accuracy 95%PP 30Ilex Forest
- After Bugsy
- TM28GroundDigPower 60Accuracy 100%PP 10National Park
- LV 31NormalSlashPower 70Accuracy 100%PP 20
- After Jasmine
- TM36PoisonSludge BombPower 90Accuracy 100%PP 10Gift from an officer in the Route 43 gate
- TM10NormalHidden PowerPower 60Accuracy 100%PP 15Gift from a fisherman in a house at Lake of Rage
- After Clair
- TM22GrassSolar BeamPower 180Accuracy 100%PP 10Route 27
- LV 43GrassGiga DrainPower 90Accuracy 100%PP 5
Evolve Paras to Parasect
Paras evolves into Parasect at Level 24. Your Paras should hit Level 24 before you reach Morty, at typical leveling pace.
Recommended Moves
- After Falkner
- HM01NormalCutPower 50Accuracy 95%PP 30Ilex Forest
- After Bugsy
- TM28GroundDigPower 60Accuracy 100%PP 10National Park
- After Jasmine
- TM36PoisonSludge BombPower 90Accuracy 100%PP 10Gift from an officer in the Route 43 gate
- TM10NormalHidden PowerPower 60Accuracy 100%PP 15Gift from a fisherman in a house at Lake of Rage
- LV 37NormalSlashPower 70Accuracy 100%PP 20
- After Clair
- TM22GrassSolar BeamPower 180Accuracy 100%PP 10Route 27
- After Lt. Surge
- TM15NormalHyper BeamPower 150Accuracy 90%PP 5Celadon Game Corner prize (7500 coins)
- LV 55GrassGiga DrainPower 90Accuracy 100%PP 5
How to Get Paras in Crystal
Three quiet spots hold Paras, uncommon in National Park and Mt. Moon and rare in Ilex Forest. None are generous, so expect to dig for one.
Wild Paras may be holding when caught:
3 locations to catch Paras
Encountered via tall grass encounters
Where To Catch Paras in C
Paras is the chain's first catch. You'll find walking encounters from Lv. 6-52 across 5 total spots in the chain.
Step 2Catch or Evolve into Parasector evolve from Paras (Step 1)
To plan your throws, open the Crystal catch rate calculator with Paras preloaded.
How to Get Shiny Paras in Crystal
Paras pops up in Kanto's Mt. Moon and in National Park at any hour, with a rare Ilex Forest spawn on the side; the caves and park both roll encounters quickly. Compare Shiny Paras odds across every game
Crystal Shiny Paras Calculator
2 MethodsThe best route is Breed w/ Shiny Parent, about 1 in 64 on each try.
Full Odds: Walk through grass, surf, or fish. Every encounter is its own independent shiny roll.
Breed w/ Shiny Parent: Eggs inherit stats from a shiny parent, so about 1 in 64 hatch shiny. A shiny Ditto helps every egg, and any other shiny parent (the red Gyarados works) helps only eggs of the opposite gender.
How many you have done, or plan to do.
| Chance | Encounters | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 10%lucky few | 7-- | -- |
| 25%one in four | 19-- | -- |
| 50%coin flip | 45-- | -- |
| 90%very likely | 147-- | -- |
Time assumes -- at your pace and does not change your shiny odds.
How is this calculated?
Every encounter has the same shiny chance, the Shiny Odds Per Try shown above. Each one is a separate roll that does not care how many you have already done, so the more you hunt, the higher your overall chance of at least one shiny. The formula below turns your odds and your number of tries into that combined chance.
chance after N tries = 1 − (1 − p)^N, where p = 1 / odds per try
Example at 1 in 8,192 (classic full odds): about 864 encounters for a 10 percent chance, 5,678 for 50 percent, and 18,862 for 90 percent.
The table above flips that around: it shows how many encounters it takes to reach a 10, 25, 50, and 90 percent chance at your current odds. Turning on boosts like the Shiny Charm, sandwiches, or chains improves your odds, so the encounter numbers drop.
These are estimates, not promises. Most games have no pity counter, meaning no guaranteed shiny no matter how many you hunt, so even Very Likely is not guaranteed: some hunters find one early, others go well past that point.
For time estimates and charm math, open the Crystal shiny odds calculator with Paras already selected.
Paras Weakness
Type-wise, Paras takes extra damage from Fire, Flying, Ice, Poison, Bug, and Rock. Watch out for Fire and Flying attacks, those deal 4x damage. 5 resistances help offset the weaknesses.
| Damage | Types |
|---|---|
| 4x (Critical) | Fire, Flying |
| 2x (Weak) | Ice, Poison, Bug, Rock |
| 0.5x (Resist) | Water, Electric, Fighting |
| 0.25x (Resist) | Grass, Ground |
- Dark and Steel types added — Fairy does not exist yet
- Moves are Physical or Special based on type, not per move
- Special stat split into Sp.Atk and Sp.Def
What is Paras Weak Against
FragileBest Pokemon Against Paras
Magby Fire | C | |
Obtain MethodRoute 34 Gift Available Moves Moves
Damage vs Paras View Magby builds →Ember 4x107-129%KO Smog 2x19-24% | ||
Cyndaquil Fire | D | |
Obtain MethodNew Bark Town Gift | ||
Spearow Normal | C | |
Pidgey Normal | D | |
Butterfree Bug | C | |
Hoothoot Normal | D | |
Smoochum IcePsychic | C | |
Obtain MethodRoute 34 Gift | ||
Geodude RockGround | C | |
Beedrill BugPoison | C | |
Zubat Poison | D | |
Venonat BugPoison | D | |
Onix RockGround | C | |
Ekans Poison | D | |
Spinarak BugPoison | D | |
Paras Evolutions
One evolution ahead. Paras grows into Parasect through a straightforward two-stage chain. A decent partner pool for breeding via two egg groups. Eggs take an average time to hatch. Evolving adds up to 120 stat points total. View every chain in the Evolution Chart.
How to Evolve
Breeding
Breed Paras easily with 23 breeding partners from the Bug and Grass egg groups. Pass egg moves like Counter, False Swipe, Flail and 4 more to offspring.
C Paras Best Moveset
Guaranteed sleep from MoveSpore at 100%% accuracy on a frame too frail to survive much after using it. 4x Fire weakness compounds the fragility. The sleep itself justifies a slot, everything else is borrowed time.
Best Build
Utility Moveset
- Spore
- Solar Beam
- Growth
- Sludge Bomb
Moves List
Breeding's the move. Counter and False Swipe give Paras options it can't learn any other way, and Normal and Ground coverage and more already covers a decent range on top of Solar Beam and Leech Life. The egg moves push it further.
How to Read the Moves Table
Tabs
- Level-Up
- Learned by leveling up.
- TM
- Taught by a Technical Machine.
- Egg
- Inherited via breeding.
- Tutor
- NPC tutor (cost: items, BP, money).
- Reminder
- An NPC reteaches any move this Pokemon could have learned by leveling up.
- Transfer
- Carried over from an older game using Pokemon HOME.
- Event
- Given out through Mystery Gift events.
Visual Signals
CAT (Category)
How the move deals damage and which stats it uses.
A small dot on the icon's corner marks the move as contact.
Tier (S to D)
Each move's competitive rank in RankedBoost's system. TM, Egg, and Tutor sort by tier by default (best first). On Level-Up, click the Tier header to do the same.
PWR (Power)
Base damage. Numbers shown in a type color include STAB (base × 1.5). Hover any colored number to see the math.
— means no power (status moves) or variable power.
Sorting & Filter
Click any column header to sort. Level-Up opens with Lv 1 at the top. TM, Egg, and Tutor open with the highest-tier moves at the top.
Search filters by move name or type. The Filter button limits the list to STAB, Physical, Special, or Status moves.
Level-Up Moves
TM Moves
19 of 24 TMs are obtainable before the Elite Four
Egg Moves
Tutor Moves
Base Stats
The tochukaso growing on this POKéMON’s back orders it to extract juice from tree trunks.
Paras Crystal Guide
Yes. Wild Paras in Crystal can hold Tiny Mushroom (23%) or Big Mushroom (2%). Use Thief (TM46) or Covet to swipe the held item without affecting your catch chance. Quickest way to farm rare items like Tiny Mushroom.
For Crystal, you can run Paras through the first few routes without issues. 285 BST won't carry you far though. Get it to Parasect as fast as you can.
Game Availability
One of the original 151, Paras has appeared in 19 games: most mainline games. From Red & Blue through the latest titles, it's rarely been left out of a regional Pokedex.
Click a game to view version-specific details
- Gen 1RBDebut

Red & Blue - Gen 1Y
Yellow - Gen 2GS

Gold & Silver - Gen 2C
Crystal - Gen 3RS

Ruby & Sapphire - Gen 3E
Emerald - Gen 3FRLG

FireRed & LeafGreen - Gen 4DP

Diamond & Pearl - Gen 4Pt
Platinum - Gen 4HGSS

HeartGold & SoulSilver - Gen 5BW

Black & White - Gen 5B2W2

Black 2 & White 2 - Gen 6XY

X & Y - Gen 6ORAS

Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire - Gen 7SM

Sun & Moon - Gen 7USUM

Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon - Gen 7Let's Go

Let's Go Pikachu & Eevee - Gen 8SwSh

Sword & Shield - Gen 8BDSP

Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl - Gen 8PLA
Legends: Arceus - Gen 9SV

Scarlet & Violet - Gen 9LZA
Legends: Z-A - Gen 10WW

Winds & Waves
Explore
Where to go next after Paras.
