You must have Pokémon Go open in the background to use the Poké Ball Plus. You don’t have to be actively playing the game, however. Instead, the device uses a series of lights to alert players to what’s going on in the game.
Poké Ball Plus with yellow lightThe Pokémon Company/Nintendo
These are the lights to look for and what they mean when it comes to catching a Pokémon:
  • Three green lights: already owned nearby Pokémon; press the top button to capture
  • Three yellow lights: new nearby Pokémon; press the top button to capture
  • Up to three white lights: wild battle in progress
  • Three red lights: Pokémon ran away
  • Multi-colored lights: Pokémon captured
These lights show up for PokéStops:
  • Two blue lights: spin a nearby PokéStop
  • One red light: unable to spin
  • Multi-colored lights: items collected from PokéStop

MUTING THE POKÉ BALL PLUS

You can’t mute the Poké Ball Plus’ sounds or disable its vibrations when playing Let’s Go!, but you can mute it when it’s connected to Pokémon Go. To do this, you have to hold the top button and control stick button at the same time. It will vibrate to indicate that the action was successful. Follow these same steps again to unmute it.