Planet Production Planner
Pick a planet and a recipe, get the machine count in the building that actually runs it — and, more usefully, a list of every input that has to arrive by rocket.
Data matches game version 2.1.12, updated 2026-08-20.
Which planet is actually self-sufficient
Counting how many of each planet's speciality recipes need at least one input from off-world gives a clearer picture of what a base there costs than any guide's description does:
| Planet | Speciality building | Speed | Recipes | Need imports |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vulcanus | foundry | 4 | 20 | 9 (45%) |
| Fulgora | electromagnetic plant | 2 | 11 | 11 (100%) |
| Gleba | biochamber | 2 | 23 | 3 (13%) |
| Aquilo | cryogenic plant | 2 | 15 | 13 (87%) |
Gleba is the closest to standing on its own: only 13% of its speciality recipes need anything shipped in, because its chains start from things it grows or mines locally. Fulgora sits at the other end at 100% — it processes what it finds, but almost every finished product also wants materials from elsewhere. That difference decides how much rocket capacity a base needs long before any ratio does.
Why speciality buildings change the answer
The foundry runs at speed 4, against 1.25 for a tier 3 assembler. A planner that quietly assumes an assembler overstates the machine count by more than three times. The buildings also carry more module slots — the cryogenic plant has 8 — which changes what module choices are worth making.
Spoilage: the constraint with no equivalent elsewhere
Several Gleba materials decay on a timer, and a plan that ignores it will look correct and fail in practice. Shelf lives, shortest first:
| Item | Shelf life | Becomes |
|---|---|---|
| copper bacteria | 1 min | copper ore |
| iron bacteria | 1 min | iron ore |
| yumako mash | 3 min | spoilage |
| jelly | 4 min | spoilage |
| nutrients | 5 min | spoilage |
| pentapod egg | 15 min | disappears |
| captive biter spawner | 30 min | disappears |
| biter egg | 30 min | disappears |
The one-minute items are the ones that catch people out. At those timescales, belt length between production and consumption is a real design constraint rather than a cosmetic one, and buffering — normally good practice — actively destroys throughput.
Applies when…
- Machine counts cover the speciality building for that recipe category. Recipes without a speciality category fall back to a tier 3 assembler.
- The local-versus-import split is based on what each planet's own recipes and resources can produce. It does not account for what you happen to have stockpiled there.
- Import lists are one level deep: they name the inputs this recipe needs from elsewhere, not the full chain behind each of those inputs.
- Spoilage timers assume items are held at normal conditions. Time spent on belts, in buffers and in machine input slots all counts against the shelf life.
- Figures are for normal quality equipment and no productivity modules.
Related
- How planet-specific production works
- Production Ratio Calculator — for standard Nauvis chains