Alchemy Factory Beginner Guide: First Two Days

The ladder the tutorial does not spell out

Alchemy Factory opens with a scripted tutorial and then hands you a mailbox. What it does not say is that the main quests are a strict ladder and every rung unlocks the next research tier. Playing them in order is faster than exploring.

  1. Buy three logs and the starter plot. Research the Table Saw (press Z for the research menu), place it, and feed it logs. Holding left click on a machine inserts a whole stack; E opens its inventory.
  2. Research grinders and the conveyor belt. One Table Saw makes about 30 planks a minute; a grinder eats 10 planks a minute and returns 10 large wooden gears. Three grinders per saw is the first ratio in the game.
  3. Turn in 20 large wooden gears. The quest text says collect 10; the turn-in wants 20. This unlocks tier 2, flax seed and limestone.
  4. Get 50 linen rope. Flax goes through three grinders (20 per minute each) into fibre, a processor turns 60 fibre a minute into thread, and a second processor turns thread into rope. Processors can be placed touching each other; a blue glow means they are connected. Rope unlocks tier 3, iron ore, sage seeds and the catapult research.
  5. Make 100 Healing Potions. Three grinders for sage powder, three for flax, two assemblers at five potions a minute. The reward is 18,000 copper coins, red currant seeds, Portal Sigils and the Automatic Cashier. Buy the cashier the moment you can afford it.

What to research, and what not to

Every customer arrives with a shopping list drawn from everything you have unlocked in the current tier and all previous tiers. Each item they find is a point of goodwill; each item they wanted and could not find costs one. A player with 200 hours summarised it on a tips video: “make sure that you only unlock one thing at a time and you put that item in your shop before you unlock the next thing.”

So research in quest order, get each product onto a shelf, and only then move on. This also keeps mailbox quests answerable, because random quests are drawn from the same list.

Since Version 1.0 that rule has a second half. The Reputation meter those customers used to move was replaced by Shop Recognition licences bought from the shopkeeper in the middle of town; see the Shop Recognition guide before you wonder why nobody buys your diamonds.

Day two: the three belts every floor needs

Once the Automatic Cashier is installed, coins leave the counter on a belt. Send that belt into a Bank Portal (one Portal Sigil plus wood) and set it to output the coin size you want; a stack of one silver was enough to feed a whole starter factory in one player’s run. From there:

  • Money belt to your purchase portals, so raw materials arrive without you walking to the merchant.
  • Fuel belt to your Stone Furnace. Planks work for now; a furnace keeps burning fuel even with nothing on it, so do not feed it until you have a smelter to put on top. The fuel page has the numbers for later tiers.
  • Fertiliser belt once nurseries arrive. The same tips video’s rule: “every one of your floors should have money and fertiliser and fuel on it.”

Small things that cost new players hours

  • T transforms almost everything. It flips a processor’s output side, turns a candle into a wall candle, reverses a bridge, switches full floors to quarter floors, and changes a storage box’s form.
  • Lifts are placed bottom first. Align the bottom, hold left click, drag the top to the height you want, press R while holding to rotate the top, then release.
  • Right click held deletes, middle click copies. Both arrived with the Early Access build.
  • The Workbench is next to your bed in a 1.0 save and costs 50 planks. Its upgrades (inventory, gloves for faster restocking, the Building Tool, the Potion Belt that shortens the sleep timer) are where non-production devices unlock since 1.0.
  • Look at a plant to see its time to maturity. Flax is used by rope and by Healing Potions, so plant more of it than feels reasonable.
  • Check the mailbox daily. A carpenter’s quest paid 600 coins and a random quest 1,142 on day two in the guide this section follows; the tutorial’s own closing message says the same thing.

Where to go from here

Sources: the official Alchemy Factory FAQ (13 December 2025); MonkeyNutz Gaming, “Everything You Need To Know To Get Started In Alchemy Factory!” (11 December 2025, transcript); Timm Plays Games, “50 tips for alchemy factory” (5 January 2026, transcript); Steam Discussions launch-week threads on the Workbench.

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