The Naive nature raises a Pokémon’s Speed stat by 10% and lowers its Special Defense stat by 10%. It’s one of 25 natures in the Pokémon games, and it’s a popular pick for fast mixed attackers that use both physical and special moves.
Stat Changes: Speed Up, Special Defense Down
Every nature (except five neutral ones) boosts one stat by 10% and reduces another by 10%. Naive specifically increases Speed and decreases Special Defense. HP is never touched by any nature. The boost and reduction are multiplicative, meaning they’re applied as a percentage of the final stat value rather than a flat number. On a Pokémon with high base Speed, that 10% adds up to a meaningful difference in whether you outpace opponents.
You can check which stats are affected by looking at your Pokémon’s stat summary screen. In most games, the boosted stat appears in red text and the lowered stat in blue.
Why Naive Is Popular on Mixed Attackers
Naive is one of two Speed-boosting natures that don’t cut into either Attack or Special Attack (Hasty is the other). This makes both of them ideal for mixed attackers, Pokémon that run both physical and special moves in the same set. A nature like Jolly (+Speed, -Special Attack) or Timid (+Speed, -Attack) would weaken one side of a mixed attacker’s damage output, but Naive avoids that tradeoff entirely.
The choice between Naive and Hasty comes down to which defensive stat you’d rather sacrifice. Naive lowers Special Defense, while Hasty lowers Defense. In competitive play, Naive is generally preferred because most priority moves (quick-strike attacks like Extreme Speed and Shadow Sneak) deal physical damage. Keeping your Defense intact gives you a slightly better chance of surviving those hits. The logic is straightforward: a fast, frail attacker is most vulnerable to priority moves that bypass its Speed advantage, and those moves are overwhelmingly physical.
That said, the “right” choice depends on the specific Pokémon. A useful rule of thumb is to lower whichever defensive stat is already smaller, since natures are percentage-based. Dropping 10% from a base 60 Special Defense costs you only 6 points, while dropping 10% from a base 90 Defense costs 9 points. Some players also consider what types of attacks a Pokémon’s common opponents tend to use.
Pokémon That Benefit From Naive
Any Pokémon that wants maximum Speed without sacrificing offensive coverage on either side of the physical/special split is a candidate. Classic examples include Charizard (especially when you want the flexibility to Mega Evolve into either its X or Y form), Electabuzz, and various legendary or mythical Pokémon with strong mixed movepools like Genesect. In some cases, running Naive on Genesect in competitive formats prevents opposing Genesect from getting a boosted attack off against you, since your Defense stays intact.
Flavor Preferences and Berries
A Pokémon’s nature determines which flavors it likes and dislikes in Pokéblocks, Poffins, and certain berries. Naive Pokémon like Sweet flavors and dislike Bitter ones. This mirrors the stat changes: Sweet corresponds to Speed, and Bitter corresponds to Special Defense.
If you’re making Poffins or feeding berries that have flavor values, Sweet berries like the Pecha Berry, Nanab Berry, and Liechi Berry will be well received. Bitter berries like the Rawst Berry, Hondew Berry, and Salac Berry will cause confusion or be disliked. This mostly matters in contest-related features and certain minigames rather than battling.
How to Get a Naive Pokémon
There are two main ways to get the Naive nature on a Pokémon you want: breeding and mints.
Breeding With an Everstone
If you have a parent Pokémon with the Naive nature, you can pass it down through breeding. Have the Naive parent hold an Everstone in the nursery or day care. In Black 2, White 2, and every game from Generation VI onward, this guarantees the offspring will inherit the Naive nature. In older games (Emerald through Black and White), an Everstone only gave a 50% chance of passing the nature down, and in Generation IV, it didn’t work at all if the parents came from games in different languages.
If both parents hold Everstones, the offspring has an equal chance of inheriting either parent’s nature.
Naive Mints
Starting in Sword and Shield, you can use a Naive Mint to change how a Pokémon’s nature affects its stats. The mint makes the Pokémon’s stats calculate as if it had a Naive nature (+Speed, -Special Defense) regardless of what its actual nature is. One important detail: mints change only the stat effects. The Pokémon’s listed nature, its flavor preferences, and the nature it passes down through breeding all remain unchanged. So if you use a Naive Mint on a Pokémon with an Adamant nature, it will gain Naive stat effects but still pass down Adamant through breeding.