You’d be forgiven if you thought that once you’ve caught one copy of a Pokémon, you’re all set. But in Pokémon Go, the point is to catch as many of each as you can and every Pokémon possible — for good reason. The only way to power up and evolve your Pokémon is by feeding them candies and stardust, which are collected by catching Pokémon, hatching Pokémon, and by transferring them to Professor Willow. Be careful, though. Transferring them is not reversible; you won’t be able to get transferred Pokémon back. Only deposit the weaker extras of the same Pokémon, and hold on to the strongest one.

Evolving your Pokémon with candies: Evolving your Pokémon is one of the main goals of the game, but it takes effort. In order to evolve, say, an Eevee, you will need 50 Eevee candies. Every Eevee you catch nets you three candies, and transferring them grants you another per transferred Pokémon. So, for each extra Eevee you catch and transfer, you get four candies, meaning you’ll need to catch about 13 Eevees in total to evolve just one.

Different Pokémon evolutions require different amounts of candies. Evolving a Ghastly to Haunter, for example, only requires 25 Ghastly candies, whereas evolving a Haunter to a Gengar will require another 100 Ghastly candies. Candies only come in basic Pokémon varieties, and are rewarded for catching any Pokémon in a particular evolutionary chain. If you want to evolve a Magikarp to a Gyarados, you’ll need a whopping 400 Magikarp candies. While catching so many copies of the same Pokémon may sound tedious at first, it becomes addictive, especially when you consider that evolving your Pokémon greatly increases their CP and HP, or Hit Points, making them more effective in battle.

Powering up a Pokémon with stardust: Powering up a Pokémon requires fewer candies — typically just one or two — but also requires stardust, which you can earn by catching Pokémon and by claiming Gyms. The higher you increase a Pokémon ‘s power, the more stardust each upgrade will require. Like evolving, powering up increases the HP and CP of your Pokémon, but at a slower rate. The half-circle meter that rests above your Pokémon shows how far along it is to reaching its full potential, but it is relative to your current level. As a general rule of thumb, try to hold off on powering up your Pokémon too much before they’re fully-evolved, as evolving is a better use of your candies. You’re also more likely to find higher CP Pokémon the higher your level, and the more you play. So powering them up doesn’t add too much value in the early stages of the game.

Lucky Eggs: Lucky Eggs are in-game items that you receive after hitting level 9, or you can purchase them in the shop. They double the amount of experience points you collect in a span of 30 minutes. One trick you can use to level up quicker is to hold onto every type of Pokémon you catch. Then, activate a Lucky Egg and begin evolving your common Pokémon. While doing this, you should also try to activate a Lure Module or Incense to catch as many Pokémon as you can — that also doubles the amount of experience points you get. Fighting a friendly or enemy gym helps, too. Doing all this will maximize the amount of points you can get, and it’s all doubled thanks to the Lucky Egg.