HP. ATK. DEF. GOLD. EXP. Wait... there's no EXP in this game. Uh...

Ahem... So, perhaps you've come here out of morbid curiosity, or perhaps you're here because you're a sick, twisted, hyper-violent murderer who really would destroy an entire world just for the heck of it (as if morals ever meant anything in Terraria, anyway *cough* Guide Voodoo Doll *cough*). Regardless of your motives, this guide will show you how to extract every last copper from a Terraria world, leaving nothing but a hollow, barren wasteland in your wake! While the guide will focus on the monetary value of items, you are obviously free to hang onto whatever you like.

I should note that the farther you are in the game, the easier this will be to do, both in terms of harvesting materials quickly and trivializing enemy encounters. If there are any items mentioned in the guide that you are not familiar with, you can look them up on the Terraria Wiki[terraria.gamepedia.com].

It should also be noted that this guide describes the most thorough way of making money off of a Terraria world, but not necessarily the fastest. If you find yourself accumulating (seemingly) worthless materials while exploring, but you don't want to throw them in the trash, this guide may yet show you how to turn them into cold, hard cash. As for the fastest method of making money, that would probably be the hive method explained in the section on the underground jungle (except for, perhaps, Pumpkin Moon farming).

There will be a lot of purported item values in the guide. For example, Sunplate Blocks (despite having no sell value) will be said to be worth 30 each, because you can craft 5 Sunplate Blocks + 3 torches into a candelabra worth 3. Purchasing the torches costs a total of 1 50 without the discount card, leaving that same amount in profits spread across the five blocks you put in, valuing each at 30. However, we could also have said that the blocks remain worthless and the torches double in value instead, depending on our perspective. When a value is given, it was generally calculated as though the values of the other items remained static in relation to the item being described (if their absolute value was uncertain) or as though the other items were worth their maximum possible crafted value. This is clearly justified when the item in question has no sell value when uncrafted but the other constituents do, but gets a bit more complicated when dealing with more than two items. When dealing with an item that is most valuable in its uncrafted form (or which cannot be used in crafting, but has a base sell value), or an item that is the sole ingredient in its crafting recipe (e.g. ores) then the item values will be exact and unambiguous.

Lastly, all of the technical information pertaining to the maximization of profits has been collected in the reference section at the end of this guide.

DISCLAIMER: The information in this guide was originally based on 1.3.5, and certain sell values have changed since then. While the methods of obtaining salable materials will likely remain the same, the profit margins may change, even to the point where certain crafting combinations are no longer worth pursuing (such as most forms of stained glass after 1.4.3.3). While I will try my best to keep the information here current, it is possible that some things may escape my notice.

I'll now turn this over to a certain world-destroying fiend...

[Malevolent Voice]

If you're going to brutally eviscerate a Terraria world and want to make as much money off of it as possible, there are some things that will make your life a lot easier.

A Powerful Digging Implement: Sure, you could mine out everything of value in the world with a copper pickaxe... if you found a pocket dimension that altered the flow of time dramatically. If you want to get something done this century you'll need to do better than that. Shroomite Digging Claws can't be beaten in terms of digging speed, but they cannot mine Lizahrd bricks, and suffer a -1 range penalty. The Picksaw is slower, but has +1 range and can mine any block, and Luminite Pickaxes are basically this with +4 range instead. The Drill Containment Unit (DCU) may not be as fast as a well modified pair of digging claws with other dig enhancing items*, but this is due to the fact that it has to dig out more blocks at a time than the Digging Claws. The DCU's great range and wide area of effect allow it to excise more blocks in the same time than the claws, even though digging a tunnel may be slower. This[terraria.gamepedia.com] has been mathematically proven. Because we don't require any finesse for our purposes, and because our goal is to remove a large number of blocks, the DCU is ideal. It is almost as though the item were specifically designed for bringers of the apocalypse. Keep in mind that you cannot do anything other than dig while riding the DCU (including drinking potions), necessitating an alternate means of defense. Speaking of which...

*(In addition to the mining potion, the Moon and Sun Stones as well as the Celestial Stone and Shell all grant boosts to mining speed. The set bonus on the miner set increases mining speed as well, but it has atrocious defense, whereas the stones are useful even without the mining bonus)

Strong Minion(s): I'll admit, incinerating those pesky hornets from two walls away with a Solar Eruption never gets old. But, every second you spend slaughtering the local wildlife is a second you aren't spending tearing non-renewable resources from the earth. Not a problem if you're even moderately patient, but it gets a bit more vexing if the DCU is your primary means of transport. The Stardust Dragon is almost too effective for this job, as you will constantly be forced to backtrack to collect the loot, and will soon find your inventory filled. Yes, I just framed mountains of monster loot as though it were a bad thing.

A Loot Finder: I am well aware of the fact that the accessory in question is called a metal detector; I was using a general term. A bunch of Spelunker Potions could work well, but you'll need to keep yourself stocked. You could use Spelunker Glowsticks instead, if that's more your style. Technically, one glowstick can last forever, so long as you don't throw it. Alternatively, you could use the Suspicious Looking Eye light pet to find the treasure. This won't tell you what the loot is, but there's no need to be picky if you're going to tear apart everything anyway. Combining the Eye and metal detector would be even more efficient.

Extra Inventory Space: If you don't already have a piggy bank (preferably a money trough) and a safe, you're probably attempting this too early. A Defender's Forge and Void bag/Vault are also highly recommended. Just make sure to empty them out when you return to your homeworld. Remember that you can use your trash slot to hold an extra item, but you cannot stack that item; anything you put in will overwrite the previous item, even if they can be stacked. The trash slot item will be deleted if you change worlds, so don't put anything too valuable in there. Some items (such as gel and Fallen Stars) can be used as ammo, so you can place them into your ammo slots if they aren't already occupied. One last tip is that if you plan on warping back to base, you can lift the Mirror/Cell Phone out of your inventory to permit another item to take its space, warp back while still holding it out, and then drop an item on the floor near the vendor before you begin selling.

NPC Summoning Items: A King/Queen Statue, two or more pieces of wire, a triggering device, and a wrench. With this you essentially have access to a portable shop on-demand. Wire the device to the statue, trigger it to summon a shopkeeper, offload some junk, pick it back up. You'll probably want wire cutters too, for that matter, or just The Grand Design to cover all of your wire-based needs. For the sake of convenience, you should avoid acquiring a certain bratty half-pint, since he won't buy anything from you. Don't give me that "I'm just trying to survive" excuse, angler! Where do you get the money to pay me for fishing quests, huh? You look like you're doing pretty well to me! As of version 1.4, NPCs become unhappy and thus give less money for sold items when far away from their homes. Thus, a King/Queen statue is impractical. A Potion of Return, or, if you can get one, a Universal Pylon, will work well instead.

A Strong Hammer: Demon/Crimson Altars and Shadow Orbs/Crimson Hearts will be a target of your early looting, so you'll want a good hammer to deal with them. This is unnecessary if using the DCU, as the DCU's destructive power can obliterate Altars and the like on its own. However, some backwalls can be crafted into profitable items, so you may want to bring a hammer anyway.

Assorted Crafting Stations: A good deal of what we'll be harvesting is not most valuable in its raw form. In fact, a number of items have no value at all in their uncrafted states. Details on specific crafting stations will be provided in the upcoming sections, and will be compiled in a reference section towards the end of the guide. Since it would be a pain to carry them all around all of the time, you should build a small base to house some of the more specialized ones in, along with some vendor NPCs. With the new happiness mechanics in 1.4, try to make sure you have at least one NPC at maximum happiness, as this will increase profits by 33%.

Mechanical Boss Summoning Item: This is thoroughly optional, but if you are impatient and want to raid the jungle early, killing a mechanical boss will permit Life Fruit to grow. If you wait long enough, the mechanical bosses will appear of their own accord.

For starters, you have to actually make a world. Small worlds have more compact materials and as such will lead to more profitable harvesting in the short term. Even with a small world it will take quite a while to suck every last bit of life money out of it, so you needn't worry about having to rapidly create worlds. Depending on your objective, you may actually just go for one material and then create a new world. Depending on what that is, a large world may be better. If you intend to suck everything absolutely dry (if only on principle), then a small world might be best. There is no real point in setting it to expert mode as you are probably after the materials generated with the world itself, rather than enemy drops. It's your call.

Before ripping the planet apart wholesale, there are a few things you should do first.

Immediately after entering the world, dig a hole straight down to the Underworld and kill the Wall of Flesh. Don't dig the hole directly under the spawn point, or you will fall into it every time you spawn there. Once this is done, pay the local Crimson/Corruption a visit and obliterate every Altar is sight. The ore veins spawned by the breaking of Altars will have smaller yields if player-made tunnels intersect where they would normally spawn. Thus, by breaking the Altars before doing any serious digging, you will maximize your potential ore gains.




Breaking the Shadow Orbs/Crimson Hearts will give you more free loot, both directly and as boss drops. If you intend to collect large amounts of meteorite, you should wait until between midnight and 4:30 am in-game before breaking a large number of them, as their respective meteors will fall instantly during this time frame. However, there is still a limit to the amount of meteorite that can be present on the surface before additional meteors fail to fall, so you should only allow maybe two meteors to fall consecutively on a small world before harvesting them. As of version 1.4, meteors will only fall after the Eater of Worlds or Brain of Cthulhu has been defeated, so bringing a summoning item and butchering them before breaking any Orbs/Hearts can slightly increase final yields.

The next low hanging fruit is the sky island(s). Since you will not likely make any effort to contain the Corruption/Crimson, you might want to build your base up there to prevent NPCs from moving out. Just be sure to make liberal use of backwalls, as Wyverns will not spawn if you are standing in front of them. Assuming you don't destroy them, sky island homes with furniture can be used as valid housing if you add a light source. While you technically only need to build one NPC house, if you want to re-fight WoF during your travels you'll need at least two, possibly more if the Merchant isn't the second one (as his torches will be important later). Try to place your crafting stations within reach of a vendor NPC so that you can craft and sell the items from the same menu.

The space layer is generally pretty barren, with only a few floating islands occupying it.

(Rain) Cloud Blocks: These make up a significant portion of floating islands, and all of sky lakes. They have no monetary value in any form.

Sunplate Blocks: Floating island houses are composed of these, though they have no sell value on their own. However, with a Sky Mill one can craft them into a variety of salable goods. The most efficient raw item is the table, with a profit of 7.5 per block. However, if you combine them with torches, you can sell the candelabras instead, valuing each Sunplate Block at
30 . A number of block types follow this general principle, as you will soon see.

Skyware Chests: For completeness sake. It's not like you didn't notice this in the middle of the house, did you? The chest itself can be sold for 10.

You probably spawned in this biome. So tranquil. So innocent. It's time to shatter that innocence and- Oh, wait... green slime butchered that bunny two minutes after the game started. So much for innocence...

Wood: I'm sure that if we cut down every single oxygen-producing plant in the entire world, nothing bad will happen. What could possibly go wrong? Who cares? Free money! Wood can be acquired by cutting down common trees with an axe, or by breaking apart living wood trees with a pickaxe. Bonus points go to the DCU for its ability to tear up regular trees with its mining lasers. Wood can be converted into weapon racks at a sawmill for a surprisingly high value of 1 per wood, or just under 10 for a full stack. Or at least that used to be the case until everyone and their dog (and probably the cat, too!) started selling these. The market was flooded with weapon racks, and the resulting economic shockwaves drove their prices down to only 50 per rack. That's 95% devaluation, folks!

You could instead convert them into torches for use in creating candelabras for resale, or make their respective candelabra type (normal wood can be made into the living wood variant). You can also sell any acorns that drop for a measly 2 each.

* (You can convert gel into slime blocks at a Solidifer and make those into candelabras for resale, resulting in much higher profits than selling the gel raw)

Sunflowers: These appear on the surface, often in small clusters, and can be dislodged with a pickaxe. They cannot be used to craft anything, but sell for 40 on their own. Curiously, sunflowers can be replanted after any amount of time and will still be alive. Maybe they were never fully there in the first place... Soulless creeps... Just make sure that a flower master youkai doesn't catch you uprooting them, or you will die a brutal death. But hey, what are the odds of that happening?

Assorted Herbs, Mushrooms, and Dye Plants: While these aren't inherent to the physical structure of the world, there are usually quite a few of them present on world generation. Regular herbs sell for 20 each, and their seeds sell for 16. In some cases, crafting potions from the herbs will be more profitable than selling them raw. See the reference section for more details. Regular mushrooms will sell for 2 50, and are often present in unusually large clusters at world generation. Dye plants sell for 20, the same price as their crafted dye forms. While Strange Plants can also be sold for 20, the dyes you receive for trading them with the Dye Trader are worth far more money than that, so even if your only motive is money, you should still trade them in rather than sell them directly. It is important to note that almost every biome at every depth contains herbs and dye plants, so this advice is not restricted to the purity forest alone.

Dirt: Ever heard the phrase 'dirt cheap'? You can guess what dirt is worth. The only salable item crafted with dirt is the dirt bomb, raising the sell value of the bomb from 60 to 1. That's a whopping 1.6 per dirt block! I hear they sell for a lot overseas, though...

Sticky bombs, crafted from one gel and one bomb, also sell for 1. So yeah.

Clay: You know that red soil that looks irresistibly tasty? Well, resist your urge to eat it, because- what? A weirdo? N-no I'm not! I can't be the only one who thinks this! Well, anyway, clay has no monetary value in raw form, but can be crafted into Pink Vases at a furnace, which when sold lead to a profit of 3.5 per clay block.

Meteorite You know what's tastier than clay? Meteorite bars. The name kind of sounds like candy, and they look like chocolate. You really don't think so? But... oh, I'm getting off-topic here. You've probably already figured out how to effectively mine this stuff, and you probably already know that it can land just about anywhere. So, you just need to craft it into bars... and resist the urge to eat them. Selling the bars gives Meteorite a value of 4 66 per piece. Hmm... the normal meteorite is starting to look like candy too, now. But if it did this to my feet, imagine what it would do to the stomach!

Pots: Pots appear in many different biomes, sometimes differing in appearance and/or loot. Continuing the proud Hylian tradition, smashing random ceramics will get you free stuff. Pots replace some of their drops with more valuable variants upon entering hardmode. Additionally, the amount of money they drop increases by 10% for every unique boss or event you defeat, making it more profitable to take down some easily summoned bosses and events shortly after starting the world in order to increase the pots' value. They can also occasionally spawn coin portals, which will grant you an additional 5-15 . Expert mode unilaterally increases pots' overall payout.

Surface Chests: You didn't forget about these, did you? In addition to often containing money, their other contents can be sold to make a quick buck. The chest itself can be sold for 10.

Enchanted Sword Shrine(s): Strictly speaking, these are not exclusive to purity forests, as I did once find a shrine under natural Crimson. You get one in a small world, three for medium, and four for large. They all tend to be around the same depth, and are never under world spawn. If the sword isn't a dud, you could get an Enchanted Sword or an Arkhalis, which sell for 40 and 80, respectively. But seriously, who would sell these? I guess some people just want to watch the world burn...
I mean metaphorically, we're destroying the world literally.

Living wood tree? More like dead wood tree! ...that wasn't clever at all.

Until the Crimson and co. turn your world into a living nightmare, vanilla underground will be the largest biome. It is important to note that many of the items mentioned here (e.g. ores) can be found elsewhere. Also, even if the place is totally infected, most of the loot will remain untouched.

Stone: Most of the uninfected underground is composed of this stuff, though there's some on the surface, too. They can be crafted into armor statues at a work bench, or text statues at a heavy work bench, resulting in a profit of 1.2 per block. As of version 1.4, gray bricks can be crafter into doors at a rate of 6:1, or 12 stone for 40, which is more profitable than 50 stone for 60 from the statues.However, if you have wire to burn, making active stone blocks is a more profitable alternative.

Assorted Ores:Each world generates with four tiers of regular ore, each more valuable than the last. You might receive the original ores, or their alternates, which are more valuable. Occasionally, you can even find the respective ore of your world's evil biome. Some of these ores should be sold raw, but others appreciate in value when first converted into bars at a furnace. A complete listing of ores and selling methods can be found in the reference section.

Protip:
A simple trick to determine whether or not bars are more profitable than their constituents is to talk to a vendor while standing near a furnace. You can then go to the desired item in the crafting menu and directly compare the total sell price of the base materials with the finished product. You can do something similar with other items, too, such as accessories found in treasure chests. You can compare values for anything if you have the materials onhand, are in the shop menu, and are standing near the required crafting station. Note that this will only tell you if the given combo is profitable; it will not tell you how profitable it is in relation to other possible crafting combinations. In the case of ores either the bar or raw ore is generally the most profitable.

Assorted Gemstones:
Unlike ores, gems are not detected by the metal detector and do not have alternates. They can be found encased in block form, in placed form, or in a background object (shown in that order for Ruby, above, along with dislodged ruby). All gems except amber should be sold in raw form after stained glass sell value was reduced. Amber could also be used in crafting crate potions, which might turn a profit indirectly. You could farm them by planting gemcorns[terraria.wiki.gg], but that's a bit too... sustainable, don't you think?

Silt: Silt is one of three block types that can be converted directly into cash without selling. Simply approach a placed Extractinator, put your cursor over it, and place the silt. This will churn out various items such as ores, gems (including amber), and even just coins. Silt is affected by gravity.

Mechanisms: All of the normal traps found underground can be sold for 20, with the pressure plates selling for 1, the (in)active stone blocks selling for 2, and raw wire selling for 1. Never forget to loot the wire! As you may have noticed, adding a single stone block to wire doubles its value. Please don't sell raw wire.

Underground Chests: These are generally found in underground cabins, jungle shrines, and the like. Like surface chests they contain loot (which is sometimes biome-specific) as well as being salable themselves. Different chests have diferent sell values with gold, ivy, and ice chests being worth 10, and other types being worth only 1. It bears mentioning that some accessories sell best in their base form, but others gain net value when combined at a Tinkerer's Workshop.

Assorted Cabin Decor: Underground cabins contain not only treasure chests, but all sorts of other stuff lying around. Stuff you can sell! Statues can sometimes be found outside of cabins, as well. Just... don't sell the ones[terraria.gamepedia.com] that can be used for farming.

Money: Yes, really. Sometimes you'll find strange looking structures that, when broken with a pickaxe, drop money. These are actually coin piles; don't count on them being arranged neatly enough for this to be obvious. You'll often find these in the little holes with inactive campfires in them.

Hardmode Ores: Low-tier hardmode ores can appear in the underground layer, but mid-tier ores often don't appear until the cavern layer and the third ore won't be seen until just above where lava begins appearing. Speaking of which...

Obsidian: That's right, even liquid isn't safe from us! Naturally formed obsidian can often be found at the depth where water is replaced by lava, as a sufficiently large pool of liquid there will be part water, part lava already. It shouldn't be too hard to drain water from above into lava pools, but make sure not to dig too fast, or you may accidentally fall through and trap yourself in the lava beneath a regenerating layer of obsidian! In pure form, obsidian can be crafted into Obsidian Skulls at a furnace for a minimum value of 2.7 per unit. If you have Hellstone, it would be more profitable to craft Hellstone Bars first.

This place is already drained and dead. What more can we do to it? Quite a lot, actually! Besides, it's not like it rains any less in the desert than in the rainforest. Something isn't right here...

Sand: The entire surface of the biome is composed of this stuff. If the desert in question contains an underground section, this will not be composed of regular sand. If it does not, the normal sand will go almost all the way down. Sand has no monetary value uncrafted, nor does the glass that can be crafted from it at a furnace. However, this glass can be crafted into salable items. Crafting it into mugs, and filling those at a keg will yield ale, which can be sold for a profit of 10 per sand block. Crafting the glass into candelabras at a Glass Kiln will earn you a profit of 15 apiece instead. Crafting them into glass walls will let you make slightly more money if combining them with amber. Alternatively, you could craft them into bottles and use them to create certain potions (e.g. fishing). The nice thing about sand is that it can still be made into glass while infected. The fact that they fall due to gravity can make collecting it easier, allowing you to tear out an entire desert with little effort. World harvesting at its finest!

Cactus: These have some properties in common with wood, but not all of their recipes overlap. They will be dislodged when the sand under them is disturbed, so you don't have to go out of your way to harvest them if you are tearing up the whole desert. As of version 1.4, these need to be manually chopped down to be harvested; a pickaxe with axe functions can get them and the sand without the need to switch tools. The DCU automatically cuts trees, and thus will be largely unaffected by this change. Though you could make candelabras out of them, selling cactus swords is slightly more profitable with a profit of 36 per unit of cactus for an unmodified sword.

Pyramid Loot: Pyramids are very rare, and most worlds don't have any. If you do manage to find one, you can potentially get some rare and valuable items. The bricks of which the pyramid is composed will not earn profit in any form, however. Neither will the Pharaoh vanity set... In terms of money, finding a pyramid isn't as much of a jackpot as you might think, but you probably weren't going to sell the pyramid-exclusive items anyway, were you?

Hardened Sand: While its tooltip does not mention such, hardened sand can be crafted into glass just like regular sand. Unfortunately, the infected variants cannot.

Sandstone: As of version 1.4, Sandstone blocks can be converted into smooth sandstone, and then into sandstone candelabras.

Desert Fossils: Now here's some easy money!
Approach Extractinator -> Insert Desert Fossils -> ??? -> Profit!

Sturdy Fossils: These can be acquired as an Extractinator output when inserting Desert Fossils. They have no monetary value uncrafted, but are worth 2 50 per unit when crafted into bone throwing knives.

Full desert, with upper layer of normal and hardened sand shaved off. The brown is natural backwall.




Surface desert before harvesting (above), and after (right).

This place is really cold. Almost as cold as my tiny, warped heart. But I digress, how can it snow all the time without it piling up? Witchcraft, witchcraft I say!

Snow: Sure, it may be fun to knock off squirrels' heads with snowballs, but that won't earn you any money. Snow has no monetary value in any form.

Boreal Wood: This is functionally identical to regular wood, and can be used as such. Unfortunately, there aren't any Living Boreal Wood trees.

Ice: I'm just saying, how do we know it's the Underground Ice? Because... of all... the ice! There's some ice near the surface as well, but it is more common down below. Like the Sunplate Blocks before them, these too can be crafted into candelabras for a profit of 30 per unit. You'll need an Ice Machine (found in ice chests) to craft them. Unfortunately, infected variants cannot be used in crafting.

Slush: Another free money block just waiting to be fed to the Extractinator!
These are affected by gravity, and like silt, can never output Sturdy Fossils.







Pictured: Snowball fight casual getting rekt

"Making the world bloody..." Oh, you were referring to the Crimson? Of... of course. Look at what has happened to this world. We aren't doing anything wrong. We're just putting this planet out of its misery. It isn't as though I spread the stuff intentionally to make a quick buck...

Shadewood: We can treat this just like regular wood for our purposes.

Viscous Mushroom: These can be found growing naturally on Crimson grass. The base form sells for only 10, but the powder that it can be crafted into yields 1 total. You'll need a potion crafting station to make them; this is actually subject to the Alchemy Table's material conservation, so you can sometimes get Viscous power for nothing if you use one.

Crimstone: Crimstone has no value on its own, but can be crafted into flesh blocks at a meat grinder don't think about that too hard. Flesh blocks can subsequently be crafted into flesh furniture, so you can deck out your house in all of the latest and trendiest serial killer decor. As per usual, the candelabra will earn you the most profit, yielding 15 per Crimstone block. Party Girl, you want to buy a candelabra made out of somebody's intestines!? And I thought I was disturbed... If you don't have a surplus of wire with which to craft active stone blocks for resale, then deliberately spreading the Crimson is the next best way to improve the monetary value of the world's rock. I guess you really can squeeze blood from a stone!


"Making the world evil..." What? We're not making the world evil. We're not making the world anything. We're making it nothing.

Ebonwood: More wood to add to the pile.

Vile Mushroom: These are monetarily identical to Viscous Mushrooms, and can be treated the same for our purposes.

Ebonstone: Unfortunately, ebonstone cannot be crafted into anything of value. Trying to convert it to a profitable form may not be efficient. If using red solution from the Clentaminator, you'll need to hit 167 blocks to recoup the cost of the solution (assuming it is consumed, and was purchased without the Discount Card). The number of blocks you need to hit on average is inversely proportional to your ammo reduction bonus.

But, even if you can't turn a profit, you could still do it just to justify your destruction. Yes, that's what you were planning, wasn't it? I know your type; you're the kind of person who will never stop destroying, even if there's absolutely NO monetary benefit to persevering whatsoever. No matter what, you'll just keep going. Not out of any desire for loot or Gold... but just because you can.
I think we're going to get along just fine...

It looks like those bloodthirsty unicorns and rabid pixies are actually in the right for once.

Pearlwood: More wood. You know the drill. Drax, or the laser drill. The other ones can't cut down trees.

Pearlstone: Lke ebonstone, this can't be made into anything with monetary value. How you choose to deal with this fact is entirely up to you.

Crystal Shards: Money is practically growing on the walls here, and it's yours for the taking. Selling them individually nets a decent sum of 16 per shard, but there is actually a better way. Using the shards to craft Greater Healing Potions and selling those is actually more profitable overall. Bonus points for the Alchemy Table's material conservation effect. Even without that, you'll earn 26 55 per shard using this method. If the crystals start mumbling something about a chosen hero, just ignore them.

Welcome to the jungle! (it gets worse here everyday) The jungle is quite the resilient biome, resisting the infection and fighting back against you with all of its might. It won't survive, though; this just ensures that its death will be slow and painful.

Jungle Grass Seeds These might appear while destroying random vegetation. They won't earn major profits, but if crafted into Green Thread at a loom they can get you 1 33 each.

Rich Mahogany: I can't think of an original way to tell you that this is wood. However, this is not just any wood; it is the wood required to craft Amazon yo-yos, so you'll want to keep some for that purpose. Curiously, these trees will grow back no matter how many times you cut them down. Therefore, cutting down the entire tropical rainforest is a clean, environmentally sustainable way of earning an honest day's pay. I don't know how I feel about this...

Bamboo: As of version 1.4, bamboo also grows naturally in the jungle, in shallow water.


Rich Mahogany: Hey wait a minute, didn't we just talk about this? In addition to the occasional regular tree, there are Living Rich Mahogany trees underground, which can be harvested just like the normal Living Wood Trees, and also tend to contain treasure chests.

Jungle Spores: These glowing orbs are hard to miss, and can yield 1-3 spores when dislodged with a weapon or tool. The spores only sell for 20, but when crafted into a Jungle Hat, their value jumps to 11 25 apiece. If you have other materials to spare, crafting Amazon yo-yos is even more profitable, yielding 39 86 per spore!

Chlorophyte Ore: This stuff will be constantly growing in the jungle throughout your entire expedition (assuming you initiate hardmode immediately. After harvesting all of the Chlorophyte in the area, leave and come back after a little while. Chlorophyte can begin growing spontaneously in mud within the underground jungle, so you don't strictly need to leave pieces behind. By harvesting it repeatedly over time, you will wear down the physical structure of the jungle until it is in total ruin, earning a ton of Chlorophyte in the process. Chlorophyte is more valuable in bar form by far, yielding 15 per unit of ore when sold as a bar. It is even more profitable to combine this with glowing mushrooms to create Shroomite Bars. The mushrooms required to craft one bar are worth 4.5 in their second most valuable form, but add 10 of value to the bar, resulting in a bar that sells for 1.

Special Flowers: Jungle Roses and Nature's Gifts can be found while cutting flowers. The Jungle Rose only sells for 20, but Nature's Gift is can be combined with a Mana Potion to yield a Mana Flower, which sells for 1, vs. 54 50 for the constituent parts. Let's address the elephant in the room: why is nature giving you gifts when you're trying to kill it? Maybe it's a bribe? I guess we'll never know...

Crispy Honey: They aren't common, but I've seen natural ones before. The only thing they can be crafted into of value is a Fishing Potion, which will turn a small profit. I hope you didn't sell all of your Waterleaf already...

Honey Blocks: As of 1.3, these will sometimes be found around natural honey pools outside of hives. You can generate more of them by draining a pool of liquid into a beehive. Note that this may break the larva. Honey Blocks can be crafted into candelabras at a Honey Dispenser, but there is a far more profitable way to use them...

Hive: Now this is some valuable stuff! Unlike most of the items up until this point, we won't be selling it directly, but we won't be selling it's crafting product either. Instead, we'll combine these with Honey Blocks, a stinger, and a Bottled Honey to create the Abeemination. This item summons Queen Bee, who drops 10 on death, along with loot, including Bottled Honey, removing the need to collect more for crafting the summoning item. The Bee Wax dropped by the boss is most profitable if crafted into Bee Headgear, earning a profit of 11 25 per unit, compared to only 20 each if sold raw. A conservative estimate of the value of Hive would be around 2 74 per block, and you'll likely get more than this, especially on expert mode. As a single beehive can contain hundreds of hive blocks, and there can be several beehives even in a small world, you can make a killing (literally) off of these. Honey Blocks can be farmed infinitely via a liquid generator. And if you thought we were done there, you'd be wrong. The hive backwalls can be reverse crafted back into Hive Blocks, making it profitable to break them. Sorry DCU users, but you'll need an actual hammer (or hamaxe) for this. That's right, in order to get all of the money from a hive you'll need to totally erase it.



Resistance is futile.


It is advised to do your boss fighting in an expert or master mode world, not only due to the fact that you will get more loot, but also because the loot will neatly stack into a single inventory slot in the form of treasure bags. Without the bags, you'll find yourself running to a vendor to offload the loot after only a few kills. Stand near a merchant and anvil with the shop menu open for convenient selling.

Plantera's Bulb: You can't sell the bulb, but if you break it and kill Plantera you can sell the loot. This presents a problem, however. Normally, the fact that Plantera's death drastically slows the spread of infection is a good thing, but if you've seeded infection everywhere for your own ends, killing Plantera will hinder your plans.

Lizhard Loot: Even this seemingly impenetrable stronghold is no match for the DCU! If you're using Shroomite Digging Claws, you'll need to whip out a Picksaw or better for this part. The statues, traps, wire, and chest contents can all be sold. As before, creating active stone from the wire is better than selling it raw. The Solar Tablets and Fragments have no direct sell value, but the eclipse they summon can be profitable if you have the time for that kind of farming. Lizarhd Power Cells are best saved for an expert mode world to maximize profit. The Beetle Husks dropped by Golem are best sold raw, being worth 50 each.

Lizarhd Bricks themselves can be crafted into... wait for it... candelabras. As you may have guessed, this results in a profit of 30 per brick. You'll need a Lizahrd Furnace (conveniently found in Lizahrd chests) to do this. Like in the beehives, breaking Lizahrd backwall with a hammer will let you create more bricks with it, though this obviously won't be as profitable as doing so with hive, it can be more convenient due to the fact that you don't have to fight a boss to claim your money. Apparently you need to kill Plantera (or possibly even Golem) in a world before you can break Lihzahrd backwalls.

The Crimson is red
The ocean was blue
But now it's dead;
Drained into Hell (Boo-hoo!)

See? Who says a terracidal maniac can't be poetic?

Sand: Look who's back!

Palm Wood: Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's wood! You blind idiot! This doesn't have any special use, so we can treat it like the other woods. As of version 1.4, these can also be found in deserts.

Coral: Tearing up all of that sand will land you a decent chunk of coral. The stuff sells for 80 on its own, but can be combined with Bottled Water and Waterleaf to increase its relative value to 1 65. As always, using the Alchemy Table will lead to greater profit.

Water Chests: Like the others, you can sell the contents and the chest. Unfortunately, the chest only sells for 1. Combining Water Walking Boots with an Obsidian Skull will lead to better profits, but going to Lava Waders will not. Given how rare the boots are, you may not want to sell them. Flippers become more profitable when combined with a Diving Helmet, and gain more profit still if crafted all the way to Arctic Diving Gear.

Obsidian: Whaaaat? Well of course there's no Obsidian on the surface, but if you drain the ocean (something you might do accidentally while harvesting sand) then you can get tons of it down below. Due to the liquid-duplication mechanic, the ocean will have an essentially infinite volume for a certain period of time, allowing you to harvest as much Obsidian as you want, even in the Underworld. After a while, though, the water will force settle, resulting in a very short period of time in which the Underworld is covered in thirty feet of water. Then it will all evaporate and the ocean will be gone. Now, I have a question for you: what is infinity divided by two? That's right, it's still infinity. How about divided by three, or by five? Do you see where I'm going with this? By putting our drain relatively close to the shore, we can still procure a (temporarily) unlimited amount of water, but when it force settles only the portion of ocean between the drain and the shore will be gone. Using this method, it is possible to drain massive amounts of water into the Underworld multiple times with one ocean. And then of course, we have to drain the other ocean...

Disclaimer: The 1.4 update may have reduced the effectiveness of the infinite water pouring technique.


That little punk is a sound sleeper...

Looting the dungeon is tricky business. Not because the enemies are too strong for you to handle at this point, but because of the massive variety of items available. You'll run out of inventory space not because you have a lot of things, but because you have a lot of different things.

Your Tombstone: You forgot to kill Skeletron, didn't you?

Dungeon Brick: The only salable items that these can be crafted into are their respective treasure chests and sinks. Unfortunately, the value of the iron/lead that goes into crafting those outweighs their sell value, making Dungeon Bricks monetarily worthless. Too bad...

Dungeon Platforms: You're not making any money off of these, either.

Books: You can find these on said platforms and remove them with a pickaxe. Sometimes you'll get the spell book Water Bolt, but it's usually just a regular book. Your best bet is to sell the book itself, which is valued at 75.

Assorted Decorative Items and Mechanisms: Most of these can be sold as-is, but you'll want to make active stone blocks with the wire if you plan on selling it. Some items, such as Hanging Skeletons, have no monetary value in any form.

Locked Chests: In addition to normal loot, these will contain one or more dungeon-specific items. You'll need Golden Keys on hand to open them, but odds are you already have a surplus of keys lying around somewhere. Speaking of keys, don't forget that the Shadow Key can be sold for 1 50. It is profitable to upgrade the Cobalt Shield to an Obsidian Shield before selling, but isn't at all a good idea to go for an Ankh Shield. The other unique items are best sold in their base form. Because the unique items can't stack, this will fill up your inventory quickly as well.

Lesser Potions: Lesser Mana Potions and Lesser Healing Potions can be found on the shelves throughout the dungeon. If you have a surplus of Glowing Mushrooms, crafting Lesser Healing Potions into Healing Potions can turn a small profit. Do I even need to tell you about the Alchemy Table at this point? Hopefully not, since you find said table in the dungeon itself. While crafting Mana Potions looks like it could turn a minute profit due to the Alchemy Table's material conservation, this neglects the fact that Glowing Mushrooms can add more than 10 of value in other recipes, making it more profitable to use them there, instead.

Aside from the occasional ore vein, the only valuables in the Glowing Mushroom biome are the Glowing Mushrooms themselves, and Mushroom Grass Seeds. The seeds can be crafted into Purple Thread, yielding 1 33 per seed, but this can only be done on the console and mobile versions; on PC they must be sold uncrafted, for 30 apiece. The Glowing Mushrooms can be converted into candelabras by the usual method, yielding the usual profit of 30 per mushroom. If you have Chlorophyte, Lesser Healng Potions, or Daybloom and Bottles (Shine Potion) you could use it to upgrade them instead.

Unlike just about every other biome, actually destroying the mushroom biome is not profitable in any way, since it is made of mud. Thus, the only way to earn profits from the biome is to not destroy it. Mushroom houses are profitable to destroy, however, as their walls are treated as Glowing Mushrooms, and their backwalls can be crafted back into mushroom form.

In contrast to the mushroom biome, destroying this one is profitable. In fact, removing every single block is required in order to earn maximum profit. Granite blocks can be farmed by simply killing granite enemies (who drop granite on death), but that isn't what you were planning on doing here, was it?

Granite blocks, like a gazillion other block types, can be crafted into candelabras for a profit of 30 per block. However, you must first craft them into smooth granite blocks at a workbench. Granite houses often contain smooth granite blocks as part of their frame, and smooth granite backwalls within. These can be crafted back into smooth granite blocks after removal with a hammer, but the normal granite backwall outside the houses cannot and will simply break if struck with a hammer. You can still destroy it all if that feels more fulfilling...

Marble is one of the few biomes someone might legitimately want to destroy in a world they care about. Obviously we won't be showing it any mercy.

Just like granite blocks, marble blocks are converted to their smooth form before being turned into candelabras for resale, and just like granite their houses often contain smooth marble blocks and backwalls, with the normal marble walls simply breaking rather than being collectable.

Other than the occasional ore, spider nests generally contain only one thing, and they contain a lot of it: cobwebs. Weapons with long range and wide strikes (such as shotguns or the Solar Eruption) are excellent for harvesting them quickly. They can be crafted into silk at a loom, valuing each cobweb used in this way at ~29. If you need to get rid of excess webs fewer than seven in quantity, they can be made into web rope, resulting in a value of 6 per web.

While not part of the environment, you'll get lots of spider fangs if you linger in a nest during hardmode. These are best crafted into Queen Spider Staffs, yielding 20 83 per fang.

And now, a haiku.

The Hellstone money:
Sparks in ashes call my name,
No lava potions...

Needless to say, I know my way around Hell. I've been there plenty of times, occasionally even while I was alive. Huh? I'm no zombie; people respawn, you know.
This world would be awfully empty if they didn't.

Ash: This stuff is everywhere in the Underworld. Too bad it can't be made into anything of monetary value...

Obsidian Brick: Surprise surprise! We can't craft these into candelabras, or anything else profitable. They look so cool, though...

Hellstone Brick: Don't even bother...

Assorted Decorative Items: Like the dungeon, the Underworld has furniture, paintings, and crafting stations (and breakable pots, oh so many pots). The ruined houses in which these are found do not occur towards to outer edges of the map. Also like the dungeon, these items generally cannot be used in crafting.

Shadow Chests: You did bring a Shadow Key, right? These tend to have more valuable loot than most other chest types, and the chest itself sells for 10. This will hardly matter in comparison to the fact that Shadow Chests can grant you up to 4 in coins alone, and far more with the other loot taken into account.

Wall of Flesh Loot: This isn't part of the environment, but if you have minions with you you'll almost certainly dunk your fair share of guide voodoo dolls. Especially with Stardust Dragon... The loot will earn you extra cash for little effort, but will increase the frequency of required selling if on normal mode. If the dolls don't fall in the lava, you could hoard them for use in an expert mode world. Just be sure to open the treasure bags with a character who hasn't used a Demon Heart; you won't get the Demon Heart if the opener has used one, and they can be sold for 2 each.

Hellstone: Here we are! (about time) Hellstone is the item most synonymous with Hell, and is important to game advancement in late pre-hardmode. Mining it is usually a difficult task, as it releases lava when broken in the Underworld. This problem can be easily averted with the use of Obsidian Skin Potions. Just remember to actually bring some (don't accidentally quick-stack them to a chest, either), and to refresh them as they wear off. Having a Lava Charm or Lava Waders will give you a grace period in which to reapply the potion. The appearance of the lava meter should be sufficient to catch your attention. If you simply tear at whatever Hellstone you see, you'll get a good portion of it, but will ultimately miss some. Spelunker potions and the like can't detect Hellstone. The wiki says that Dangersense potions light up Hellstone, but this doesn't seem to be true, so you'll have to use another method. Hellstone occasionally sparks, which is easily visible within pitch-black ash, giving away the Hellstone's position.
(left is in ash, right is same area excavated)

But wait, there's more! Some blocks exist past the visible boundaries of the world. If you dig downward (especially with a long-range mining implement, such as the DCU) while touching the bottom of the map, you can sometimes excavate additional Hellstone from beyond the traversible boundaries of the world!

Hellstone has no monetary value in raw form, and cannot simply be crafted into bars, either. You'll need one piece of Obsidian to three pieces of Hellstone in order to craft bars from it. When used in this way, Hellstone has a value of 12 40 per piece. Hellstone is very plentiful; the only thing really stopping you is the lava. Using a DCU in conjunction with Obsidian Skin Potions, you can easily collect several stacks of Hellstone in one sitting. Just don't forget that you can't drink potions while riding the DCU!

It won't all come to you at once. You'll slowly build up your wealth. Maybe you'll notice it creeping up on you when you realize that there's more than 1 in your inventory at any given time. Maybe you'll see it when you notice how many of your treasure chests have filled with stuff you didn't want to sell. Eventually, you'll notice, something's changed...
And then, when there's nothing left to loot, nothing left to destroy, you can just take a step back and look at what you've done.
(To see the map in full size, you'll need to click on the link on top of it after opening the thumbnail)
There are quite a few unintentional Easter eggs on that map. I wonder how many you can find...
Together, we harvested the land, and became rich.

Now, we have reached the absolute. There is nothing left for us here. Let us erase this pointless world, and move on to the next.


Or not. It's your world; do whatever you want with it.

Perhaps, the most truly evil act would be to not erase such a fallen land, leaving it forever a symbol of despair and ruin that all might gaze upon with the utmost horror.

Ahem. Now that our narrating berserker has stepped out, I'll give you some additional, more technical details. As promised, I've created a compendium of all the crafting info in this guide.

The following is a table documenting the items mentioned in this guide. The far left column lists item names in alphabetical order. The second column reports the maximum monetary value of the item and the third gives information on any crafting that may be necessary to reach that value. The last column lists crafting stations needed to complete the crafting in question. This list does not include most miscellaneous furniture items or found weapons, accessories, etc, as many of these are not crafting materials in any capacity and some may not even appear in all worlds. An alchemy station refers to a placed bottle, pink vase, or Alchemy Table. The Table's material conservation effect will increase your profits, and so is recommended.

The listed values for some items may exclude ambiguous scenarios, such as when the item in question is used in crafting something but is not the main crafting ingredient. For example, the data on raw Obsidian lists the Obsidian Skull as the best money-maker, however it would be better to combine it with Hellstone to make Hellstone Bars if there is any available. Another example is that sand can earn 15 per unit by crafting into Glass Candelabras, but you'll want to save some glass so that you can convert your gems into stained glass. Or at least you would have prior to 1.4.3.3, when all stained glass sell prices were greatly reduced.

Note that in future updates some of these cash values may change (such as the value of weapon racks changing while this guide was in development). If that happens, I will update the information in the guide to reflect the changes unless I forget... And yes, I've apparently been working on this guide for over a year, but obviously not continuously, as I actually forgot about it for many months until just recently.

Also, I apologize if the reference table does not display correctly. When this guide was initially released, it worked just fine, but for some reason the formatting now seems to be broken now, likely due to factors outside of my control. EDIT : As of this writing, I have managed to fix the formatting. Hopefully it does not break again.