Pokopia Bubbly Basin DLC: What Is Actually Confirmed

The Pokopia Expansion Pass went on sale back in June, which meant roughly seven weeks of people confidently describing content The Pokemon Company had never put in writing. Part 1, Bubbly Basin, shipped on 5 August 2026, so all of that guessing can now be checked against the actual game. Some of it was right. This post keeps the same hard line it always had between published material and reconstruction — the line has just moved a long way.

I am going to be annoyingly literal about sourcing here, because this is a case where the official material is unusually thin and the fan reconstruction is unusually confident. If you want the broader picture on the base game first, our release date and confirmed features breakdown covers that ground.

The short version

Bubbly Basin is Part 1 of a three-part paid Expansion Pass for Pokemon Pokopia. It adds an underwater town with a 50-entry Pokedex of its own. It released 5 August 2026. Alongside it, a free update went out to everybody that adds a new move called Dive, which is what lets your Ditto get down to the ocean floor in the first place.

That free-versus-paid split is the single most misread thing about this DLC, so it gets its own section below.

What the Expansion Pass actually costs

$34.99, listed on the Nintendo eShop, live since June 9, 2026. That is one purchase covering all three parts as they release. There is no per-part pricing — you cannot buy just Bubbly Basin and skip the rest. Nintendo also lists a bundle that packages the base game with the pass for players who have not bought Pokopia yet.

Thirty-five dollars is a real number for a game that was already a full-price Switch 2 release, and right now you are paying it against one shipped chunk of content plus two parts that amount to a sentence each. That is not a scam — season passes have always worked like this — but it is worth saying out loud rather than pretending the value proposition is settled.

The free update is the part that matters

Here is the bit people keep collapsing into one purchase. Nintendo's own announcement says a free update arriving in August lets players "explore the ocean floor using the new move Dive to plant grass, build structures, and create their own underwater towns alongside Pokemon."

Read that again. Underwater exploration, underwater terraforming, and building your own underwater towns are in the free update. You do not need the Expansion Pass to go under the sea and start laying blocks down there.

What $34.99 buys you in Part 1 is Bubbly Basin specifically — a pre-authored underwater town to develop, plus new furniture, outfits, and Pokemon tied to it.

Worth flagging if you are reading older coverage: the "Version 2.0" label going around before launch did not come from Nintendo, whose announcement wording was just "a free update arriving this August." It turned out to be right — Nintendo's July news article numbered the update Ver. 2.0.0 — but at the time it was a community read, not a published fact.

You have to earn Dive before Bubbly Basin opens

This is the practical gate, and it is confirmed on the official Pokopia expansion page. To reach Bubbly Basin you need two things:

1. Complete the request "Raise the environment level!" in Bleak Beach.
2. Learn the newly added move Dive, which comes from the free update.

The Pokemon.com news post adds that you need both a jump and Surf already in your kit before Dive becomes learnable. So if you have been coasting through the request board and never bothered pushing Bleak Beach's environment level, that is your homework for the next week or two. Our habitat and comfort guide covers how environment level actually moves, and the Ditto transformations guide covers the traversal moves you will need on hand.

The nice thing about this gate is that neither half needs the paid pass: the request is base-game work and Dive comes from the free update. Clear it first and Bubbly Basin opens the moment you buy in, rather than the moment you finish a chore.

What is actually in Bubbly Basin

The official description is still short enough to quote nearly whole: an underwater town where you encounter Pokemon living beneath the sea, find ocean-floor-themed furniture, and get new outfits for Ditto. The storefront copy frames it as "Develop the underwater town of Bubbly Basin and continue enjoying the slow life."

That was the entirety of the first-party written description, which is why the original version of this post refused to name a roster. The game is out now, so the roster is not a reconstruction any more. Serebii's Basin Pokedex documents 50 numbered entries, running from Shellder at #001 to Manaphy at #050 — a separate dex from the base game's, with its own count.

The three species outlets picked out of the June 9 Nintendo Direct trailer were all correct. Mudkip is #014, Corphish is #021, Popplio is #034.

And the Manaphy frame that this post spent a paragraph telling you not to bet on? It was real. Phione is #049 and Manaphy is #050, the last two entries in the Basin dex. Nintendo Life's guide places Manaphy in the Ocean Temple, reached by completing the "Build the Beautiful Building" main request, with Phione turning up via a Starmie Doll from that same request line. Our legendary and mythical guide covers the base game's side of that.

For the record, I would hedge it the same way again. A hunch that turns out right was still a hunch when you paid $34.99 on it.

One counting note, because you will see two numbers in the wild: Game8 describes the Basin dex as 52 Pokemon. It is the same list. Frillish (#028) and Jellicent (#029) each get separate male and female form rows, so counting rows gives 52 where counting dex numbers gives 50.

Bulbapedia describes Bubbly Basin as what remains of Cerulean City after the weather catastrophe that wrecked Pokopia's Kanto. That is a community wiki reading, not publisher text, but it is a tidy fit with the game's premise and with a Cerulean-adjacent underwater zone — file it as very plausible, not as confirmed.

The August 5 date is now first-party, and it shipped

Updated 9 August 2026. This section originally argued the August 5 date was not first-party. It is now, and Bubbly Basin is out.

When this post first went up, every official channel — Nintendo's news post, the Pokopia expansion page, the eShop listing — said only August 2026, and the specific day traced back to Serebii reporting a Japanese TV commercial. Nintendo has since published a news article confirming Part 1 releases 5 August 2026, alongside the free software update, which is officially numbered Ver. 2.0.0. The official Pokopia update page carries the same date.

So the two things this post flagged as unconfirmed are both settled: the day, and the version label.

The bonuses, and the deadline nobody reads

Two purchase bonuses ship with the Expansion Pass, and both have dates on them:

• A recipe for dynamic Ditto print blocks and wallpaper, redeemable in-game as soon as you buy.
• 30 rare Pokemetal ingots, delivered as a code. Buy the pass by August 31, 2027 to get the code, and claim the reward in-game by September 30, 2027.

Those are generous windows, so nobody needs to panic-buy. But the ingots are the kind of thing that quietly expires while a game sits in a backlog. If you own the pass, redeem the code the day it arrives instead of leaving it in an inbox.

Also note the base-game onboarding requirement Nintendo lists: you need roughly 30 minutes of play before workbenches and Mystery Gift are available, so a brand-new save cannot claim bonuses immediately. Our beginner guide covers that first half hour.

Parts 2 and 3 are nearly blank

I will quote what exists in full, because it is not much.

Part 2, late 2026: "additional new features to help develop your Pokemon utopia," plus new crafting recipes. No town, no theme, no date beyond the half-year.

Part 3, 2027: "a new town to explore and rebuild," plus additional features. No name, no theme, no date beyond the year.

That is it. Two thirds of what you are buying is described in eleven words and a shrug. Anyone telling you what Part 2 or Part 3 contains is writing fan fiction with a confident tone.

Buy now or wait

Part 1 is live, so the wait-and-see argument this section used to make is spent. Buy today and you get Bubbly Basin and its dex immediately. The ingot bonus window still runs to August 2027, so nothing is forcing your hand either way.

The honest read: if you are still playing Pokopia daily and an underwater town with its own 50-entry dex capped by Manaphy sounds like your evening, $34.99 is fine. If you drifted off after the first hundred hours, the free Ver. 2.0.0 update lets you dive, terraform and build underwater regardless, which is a real chunk of new play for exactly zero dollars. Try that first. If it does not pull you back, the pass was never going to.

Confirmed vs not confirmed

Confirmed by Nintendo / The Pokemon Company:

• Expansion Pass is $34.99 on the eShop, on sale since June 9, 2026, covering all three parts.
• Part 1 Bubbly Basin released 5 August 2026 — an underwater town with new furniture, outfits, and Pokemon.
• The free Ver. 2.0.0 update shipped the same day. It adds the move Dive, enabling underwater exploration, planting, building, and player-made underwater towns for everyone.
• Access requires completing "Raise the environment level!" in Bleak Beach and learning Dive; Pokemon.com notes jump and Surf as prerequisites for Dive.
• Bonuses: dynamic Ditto print block and wallpaper recipe; 30 rare Pokemetal ingots via code, purchase by August 31, 2027, claim by September 30, 2027.
• Part 2 in late 2026 (new features and crafting recipes); Part 3 in 2027 (a new town).

Documented in the shipped game (not publisher copy, but no longer guesswork):

• The Basin Pokedex is a separate 50-entry dex, #001 Shellder through #050 Manaphy, per Serebii's parsed list.
• Mudkip (#014), Corphish (#021), Popplio (#034), Phione (#049) and Manaphy (#050) are all in it.
• Game8's "52 Pokemon" is the same roster counted by rows, because Frillish (#028) and Jellicent (#029) each list male and female forms separately.

Not confirmed:

• The Cerulean City identity of Bubbly Basin (community wiki reading, not publisher text).
• Anything at all about Part 2 or Part 3 beyond the sentences quoted above.
• Whether the Bubbly Basin demo shown at PokemonXP in San Francisco, August 28-30, differs from the shipping version.

If a post promises you more than those first two lists, it is guessing. That is fine as speculation. It is not fine as a shopping guide.