Palworld automation is not Factorio. There are no belts feeding ore into furnaces. What you automate is the work: Pals mine, chop, water, smelt, cook and haul on their own, and you queue large batches when you pass by. Done well, you leave with empty chests and come back to stacks of ingots, boards, flour and cake.
This guide is about the production side: which Pal to put on each job in 1.0, the four chains worth building, and how to arrange transport, storage and bases around them. For the base itself (base levels, layout, beds, sanity and raids), see the Base Building Guide. Numbers below are from paldb's v1.0.5 data and the Palworld wiki.
What to automate first
| Order | Chain | Key stations (technology level) | Work you need |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stone and wood | Stone Pit, Logging Site (7) | Mining, Lumbering |
| 2 | Ore to Ingots | Primitive Furnace (10), Ore Mining Site (24) | Mining, Kindling |
| 3 | Paldium and Fiber | Crusher (8) | Watering |
| 4 | Crops to Flour and food | Wheat Plantation and Mill (15), Cooking Pot (17) | Planting, Watering, Gathering, Kindling |
| 5 | Wood to Wooden Boards and Nails | Workbench, then Production Assembly Line (29) | Handiwork, power |
| 6 | Cake | Ranch (5) plus the food chain | Farming, Kindling |
| 7 | Refined Ingots, then Pal Metal Ingots | Improved Furnace (34), Coal Mine (37), Electric Furnace (44) | Mining, Kindling, Generating Electricity |
The order follows what each chain unlocks. Ingots feed almost every later building, the Crusher turns spare stone into Paldium Fragments for spheres, and cake only matters once the Breeding Farm is open.
The best worker Pal for each work suitability
In 1.0, suitability runs from 1 to 10 and every Pal's values were rebalanced, so tier lists that stop at level 4 are out of date. The table gives the highest level in paldb's v1.0.5 data, a practical pick you can realistically put to work, and an early stand-in. Levels shown are each Pal's base level before any boosts.
| Work | Highest in 1.0 data | Practical pick | Early stand-in | Runs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kindling | Renjishi 8 | Jormuntide Ignis 7 (only skill), Blazehowl 5 | Foxparks 1 | Furnaces, Cooking Pot, kitchens |
| Watering | Shaolong 8 | Jormuntide 7 (only skill), Whalaska 5, Azurobe 4 | Pengullet 1, Teafant 1 | Crusher, Mill, plantations |
| Planting | Dandilord 8 | Lyleen 7, Broncherry 5 (only skill) | Tanzee 1, Lifmunk 1 | Plantations |
| Generating Electricity | Orserk 8 | Orserk 8, Dynamoff 6, Grizzbolt 5 | Jolthog 1, Sparkit 1 | Power Generators |
| Handiwork | Solenne 8 | Anubis 6, Lyleen 5 | Cattiva 1 | Workbenches, assembly lines |
| Gathering | Jetragon 8 | Lyleen 6, Verdash 5 | Chikipi 1, Cattiva 1 | Harvesting plantations |
| Lumbering | Celesdir Noct 8 | Celesdir 7, Wumpo 5 | Eikthyrdeer 2 | Logging Site |
| Mining | Aegidron 8 | Astegon 7, Anubis 6, Digtoise 4 (only skill) | Depresso 1, Rushoar 1 | Stone Pit, ore, coal and quartz sites |
| Medicine Production | Silvance 8 | Lyleen Noct 7, Lyleen 5 | Lifmunk 1 | Medicine workbenches, Clinic |
| Cooling | Bastigor 8 | Whalaska 6, Foxcicle 4, Reindrix 3 | Pengullet 1 | Refrigerator, Cold Food Box |
| Transporting | Knocklem 7 | Knocklem 7, Dualith 6, Anubis 4 | Lamball, Cattiva | Carrying output to storage |
| Farming | Depends on the product | Mozzarina (Milk), Chikipi (Eggs), Beegarde (Honey) | Lamball (Wool) | Ranch |
Two things the table does not show:
- Single-skill Pals stay put. Jormuntide Ignis, Jormuntide, Broncherry and Digtoise have exactly one work suitability, so they never drift to another job. On a busy chain that is worth more than a higher level on a Pal with five skills.
- Food cost scales with size. Orserk, Shaolong, Dandilord, Solenne, Silvance, Bastigor and Aegidron all have a food amount of 9 in paldb's data. Five of them empty a Feed Box far faster than five mid-game workers.
Levels can be raised. The Pal Essence Condenser raises one suitability per star at stars 1 to 3 and all of them by one at star 4, Applied handbooks add more, and in 1.0 a Pal also gains a suitability level each time it ranks up. The Farmhand and Ranch Master passives add +1 and +2 Farming. Some partner skills boost a whole base: Wumpo raises the Transporting level of every other base Pal by 1 (it does not stack).
Why suitability level matters more than headcount
paldb lists how long one Pal takes to finish each recipe at every suitability level. For cake (2,000 workload) the times are:
| Kindling level | Time per cake (paldb) | Compared with level 1 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 h 6 min 40 s | 1x |
| 3 | 23 min 48 s | about 2.8x faster |
| 5 | 8 min 20 s | 8x faster |
| 7 | 3 min 1 s | about 22x faster |
| 10 | 38 s | about 105x faster |
Every recipe scales the same way: an Ingot takes 20 seconds at level 1 and under 1 second at level 7. This is why one Jormuntide Ignis on a furnace beats a handful of Foxparks, and why the old advice to "add more Pals" stops working after the early game. Station speed then multiplies on top:
| Speed source | Bonus | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Furnaces | Improved +50%, Electric +200%, Gigantic +350%, Ancient +1000% | The Ancient Furnace needs Kindling 6 and Cooling 6 |
| Kitchens | Cooking Pot +50%, Electric Kitchen +200%, Large-Scale Stone Oven +350%, Ancient Kitchen +500% | The Ancient Kitchen needs Kindling 6 and Handiwork 6 |
| Assembly lines | Production Assembly Line +100%, II +300%, Advanced Workshop +500% | All need power |
| Work passives | Remarkable Craftsmanship +75%, Artisan +50%, Work Slave +30% (Attack -30%), Serious +20%, Lucky +20% | Only affect the Pal that has them |
| Booster structures | +20% each, one per base counts | Large Toolbox (Handiwork), Flame Cauldron (Kindling), Silo (Planting), Flower Bed (Gathering), Stump and Axe (Lumbering), Snowman (Cooling), Electric Pylon (electricity) |
| Pal Labor Research Laboratory | Several work-speed steps per category | Technology level 19. Research applies to all bases and also unlocks the booster structures |
For the passives that matter on workers and how to breed them on, see the Breeding Guide. Stamina-type passives help too: Workaholic (SAN drops 15% slower) and Heart of the Immovable King (20% slower) keep a worker on the job longer, and Insomnia lets a Pal keep working at night.
The production chains
Ore to Ingots
| Step | Station (technology level) | Recipe | Work |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ore | Ore nodes inside the base, or an Ore Mining Site (24), Ore Mining Site II (39) | Produces Ore | Mining |
| Ingot | Primitive Furnace (10) and every later furnace | 2 Ore = 1 Ingot | Kindling |
| Nail | Primitive Workbench or Production Assembly Line | 1 Ingot = 5 Nails | Handiwork |
| Coal | Coal nodes or a Coal Mine (37) | Produces Coal | Mining |
| Refined Ingot | Improved Furnace (34) or better | 2 Ore + 2 Coal = 1 Refined Ingot | Kindling |
| Pal Metal Ingot | Electric Furnace (44, uses power) or better | 4 Ore + 1 Pure Quartz + 2 Paldium Fragments = 1 Pal Metal Ingot | Kindling, power |
The Ore Mining Site can be built anywhere inside a base, so from technology level 24 you no longer need a base on top of an ore deposit. Coal Mines (37), Sulfur Mines (46) and Pure Quartz Quarries (52) work the same way. Put your best Mining Pal on the site, a single-skill Kindling Pal on the furnace, and a chest between them.
Paldium Fragments come from the Crusher (technology level 8, Watering): 5 Stone make 1 Paldium Fragment. A Stone Pit plus a Crusher with one Watering Pal keeps sphere production fed without you ever mining Paldium by hand.
Wood to Wooden Boards
Palworld has no separate plank item: the Wooden Board is the plank, and many mid-game buildings need it (the Mill, the Cooking Pot and the Production Assembly Line among them).
| Step | Station | Recipe | Work |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wood | Logging Site (7), up to 3 workers | Produces Wood | Lumbering |
| Fiber | Crusher (8) | 1 Wood = 2 Fiber | Watering |
| Wooden Board | Workbench or Production Assembly Line (from technology level 15) | 10 Wood + 5 Fiber + 1 Nail = 1 Wooden Board | Handiwork |
| Charcoal | Any furnace | 2 Wood = 1 Charcoal | Kindling |
| Hardwood | Logging Site II (43) | Produces Hardwood | Lumbering |
A single board needs a Nail, so this chain depends on the ingot chain. Run both in the same base, or move Nails over in bulk.
Crops to Flour and food
| Step | Station | Recipe or timing | Work |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red Berries | Berry Plantation (5) | About 180 s to grow | Planting, Watering, Gathering |
| Wheat | Wheat Plantation (15) | About 270 s to grow, around 10 Wheat per harvest | Planting, Watering, Gathering |
| Flour | Mill (15) | 3 Wheat = 1 Flour | Watering |
| Cooked food | Cooking Pot (17), Electric Kitchen (41), Large-Scale Stone Oven (49) | Recipe dependent | Kindling |
Each plantation needs three kinds of work, so a farm base wants at least one Planting, one Watering and one Gathering Pal. In 1.0, harvest yield scales with the Gathering level, which makes a high-Gathering Pal such as Lyleen worth more on a farm than older guides suggest. A Silo adds +20% planting speed for the whole base.
The cake chain
Cake is the one chain that uses everything above. One cake (Cooking Pot or better, Kindling) takes:
| Ingredient | Per cake | Per 10 cakes | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flour | 5 | 50 (150 Wheat) | Wheat Plantation, Mill |
| Red Berries | 8 | 80 | Berry Plantation |
| Milk | 7 | 70 | Mozzarina at a Ranch |
| Egg | 8 | 80 | Chikipi at a Ranch |
| Honey | 2 | 20 | Beegarde at a Ranch |
A Ranch holds up to 4 Pals. Honey is the bottleneck in practice: per the wiki, every Ranch product can be bought from Wandering Merchants except Honey, so a Beegarde is the one Pal this chain cannot do without. Cake itself is slow (2,000 workload), so the Kindling Pal on the kitchen matters more here than anywhere else: see the table above.
For how cake is used at the Breeding Farm, see the Breeding Guide.
Power
Electric stations stop the moment power runs out. A Power Generator (26) takes one Generating Electricity Pal and a Large Power Generator (50) takes two. paldb lists these consumption rates per second, which shows what drains a grid:
| Station | Power per second |
|---|---|
| Electric Kitchen | 50 |
| Production Assembly Line | 200 |
| Production Assembly Line II | 400 |
| Electric Furnace | 500 |
| Crude Oil Extractor | 2000 |
| High-Pressure Crude Oil Extractor | 3000 |
Keep the hungry stations (oil and late furnaces) in a base with a Large Power Generator and an Electric Pylon (+20% generation speed), and keep cheap ones like the Electric Kitchen where the food is.
Transport and storage
Transporting is the most misunderstood job:
- Transporting Pals carry output and dropped items to storage. They do not load furnaces or assembly lines. Materials for a batch are taken when you queue it, so queue big batches.
- Level means capacity. A higher Transporting level lets a Pal carry more per trip, and in 1.0 it also makes the Pal collect nearby dropped items of the same type from a wider area in one go.
- Speed differs a lot. paldb lists a transport speed for each Pal. Anubis (480), Vanwyrm (475), Quivern (470) and Helzephyr (450) move quickly while carrying; Wumpo (150) and Warsect (110) are slow despite high levels. Wumpo still earns its place through its +1 Transporting partner skill for the whole base.
| Storage rule | Why |
|---|---|
| A chest beside every producer | The trip from station to chest is the work a hauler repeats all day |
| One material per chest, named | 1.0 lets you name chests and auto-deposit matching items, so you can find and empty them quickly |
| A Refrigerator (38) for food, staffed by a Cooling Pal | Food stored there spoils more slowly; the Cold Food Box (51) does the same for Pal food |
| A Guild Chest (41) in each base | Its contents are shared across every base it is placed in, which is the cleanest way to move Nails, Ingots or Flour between specialised bases |
For chest placement relative to beds and the Feed Box, see the layout section of the Base Building Guide.
Splitting four bases by role
1.0 gives you up to four bases (base levels 8, 15 and 25 unlock the extra ones). Specialised bases beat four bases that each do a little of everything, because a Pal can only work stations inside its own base and every extra job type is something it can drift to.
| Base | What goes there | Who works it |
|---|---|---|
| Production hub | Furnaces, assembly lines, workbenches, generators, the main storage | Kindling, Handiwork, Generating Electricity, Transporting |
| Mining base | Ore, Coal, Sulfur and Pure Quartz sites, a furnace, a Crusher | Mining, Kindling, Watering, Transporting |
| Farm and cake base | Plantations, Mill, Ranch, kitchen, Refrigerator, Breeding Farm | Planting, Watering, Gathering, Farming, Kindling, Cooling |
| Fourth base | Oil, or a second farm, or overflow production | Whatever your bottleneck is |
Since mining sites can be built anywhere, place the mining base for convenience: 1.0 increased Pure Quartz in snowy regions, so a snowy mining base gives you natural quartz on top of the quarry. Crude Oil Extractors (50) still need an oil field; the High-Pressure Crude Oil Extractor (51) works on open ground anywhere but uses 3,000 power per second, so it belongs in a base with plenty of generators.
Monitoring Stand and work priority
When a Pal has several suitabilities, the game decides its next job from an internal priority list (defence and construction first, generating electricity and kindling above most other work). The full order is in the Base Building Guide. For chains, three Monitoring Stand features matter:
-
1
Switch off work types the base does not need
On a farm base, switch off Mining and Handiwork so your Lyleen stays on the crops. On a mining base, switch off Planting so nobody wanders off to a stray berry patch.
-
2
Fix key Pals to key stations
The stand can permanently assign a Pal to a facility. Fix your best Kindling Pal to the furnace or kitchen and your Electricity Pal to the generator, so the bottleneck station is never unstaffed. In 1.0 you can set this even while the Pal is asleep.
-
3
Upgrade the stand
The High Quality and Ancient Monitoring Stands keep the same controls and also reduce SAN loss for every Pal at the base, which matters on a busy production hub.
Common mistakes
| Mistake | What happens | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Expecting Pals to load stations | Furnaces sit idle next to full ore chests | Queue large batches; haulers only empty stations into chests |
| Many low-level workers instead of one specialist | A level 1 worker takes about 22 times as long as a level 7 one | Replace the bottleneck worker first, usually Kindling or Handiwork |
| Using pre-1.0 tier lists | Old lists cap suitability at 4 and use pre-rebalance values | Check levels against 1.0 data |
| No Watering Pal on the mining base | The Crusher stops, so Paldium and Fiber stop | One Watering Pal per Crusher and Mill |
| No Beegarde | Cake stalls on Honey, the one Ranch product merchants do not sell | Keep a Beegarde at the Ranch on the farm base |
| Slow haulers on a long base | Output piles up on the ground | Use fast carriers such as Anubis or Vanwyrm, and put chests next to producers |
| Electric stations without spare power | Assembly lines and furnaces stop mid-batch | Add a generator and an Electric Pylon before adding the next electric station |
| Every base doing everything | Pals drift between unrelated jobs | One role per base, enforced with the Monitoring Stand |
Related guides
- Base Building Guide — base levels, layout, sanity and raids in 1.0
- Breeding Guide — breeding Anubis and stacking work passives
- Strongest Pal Tier List — which of these workers also fight well
- Beginner Guide — the first 20 levels and the early workers
- Palworld Review — whether the long-term loop is for you
★Honest Take: satisfying, but more management than automation
Watching a well-staffed base turn stone into Paldium and wheat into cake while you are off fighting is one of Palworld's best feelings, and 1.0 made it better: suitability up to 10 makes a good worker feel genuinely valuable, chests can be named and filled with one auto-deposit, and mining sites free you from building on ore. The limits are real, though. You still queue every batch by hand, Pals never feed one station from another, the game hides both the work priority and how much a suitability level speeds things up, and the strongest workers eat so much that your farm has to grow with them. Treat it as managing a workforce rather than building a factory, put specialists on the bottleneck stations, and it pays off.
