Herblore training

See also: Calculators#Herblore

This guide will show you ways to train Herblore from 1 to 99. It is worth noting that the cost is determined by the amount of money lost after selling the potions. For players growing their own herbs and gathering their own resources, these losses represent the difference between what you would have made selling your raw materials and what you will make selling the finished potions. Net losses or gains will vary slightly as prices fluctuate between the date of purchase of the raw materials and the date of sale of the finished potions; some potions may sell rather slowly. Always bear in mind that updates, new quests, or other game changes can suddenly and dramatically alter the economics of base resources and finished potions, even so far as rendering resources briefly unavailable or making potions briefly unsellable; be patient and be prepared to change strategies as needed. (See the entry on the Super energy potion as an example.)

Note: The number and cost of the potions you need may vary slightly depending on whether you clean the herb or buy it clean. It's also possible to conserve vials by decanting three-dose potions into four-dose potions occasionally.

Note: With the skill learnt from the scroll of cleansing (requires level 49 Herblore and Dungeoneering), there is an 10% chance of saving a herb or secondary item when making potions (as well as a 12.5% chance to make the potion faster). Hence there is a substantial amount of money that can be saved from levelling, at the cost of 20,000 Dungeoneering tokens.

The factory outfit from the Flash Powder Factory is also helpful. Wearing 3 parts of the outfit will give a chance of making a 4-dose potion from an unfinished potion rather than a 3-dose potion, increasing resale value. Wearing all 5 parts will give experience from making unfinished potions, the same amount of experience as would have been gained if the herb was being cleaned. The outfit requires 50 Herblore and 75 Agility and Thieving, and the full set costs 12,000 Brianpoints.

Chaos druids are one of the best money makers in regards to herblore with a hourly income ranging between 100k-300k per hour if you're planning to sell the loot, also cleaning the herbs with the required herblore level will give you additional experience, and also extra income. The best location of chaos druids are. Edgeville Dungeon, Taverley Dungeon, Yanille Agility dungeon, Chaos Druid Tower, Edgeville Dungeon resource dungeon (Dungeoneering level of 10 required)

Levels

Level 1 to 3

Do the Druidic Ritual quest. The experience toward Herblore given as one of the quest rewards will get you to a Herblore level of 3.

Level 3 to 9

It is recommended to do the Jungle Potion quest in order to go straight to level 9.

Level 9 to 13

You can complete Recruitment Drive to get from level 9 to 13.

Level 13 to 19

You can complete The Dig Site to get from level 13 to 19. 25 Thieving and 10 Agility are also required

Level 9 to 12

It is best to do this if you don't have the requirements for The Dig Site

Make attack potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean guam
• Eye of newt

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 25 experience each. It will take 25 Attack potions to get level 12.

Some people choose to use Chaos druids to lessen their costs of herblore. They provide plenty of guam Herbs.

Additionally to save some cash, combine the potions together so you make 4 doses, instead of 3, to save money on buying vials.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange, clean herbs are used, and all potions sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −7,950

or -12.72 coins per experience point.

Level 12 to 26

Make Strength potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean tarromin
• Limpwurt root

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

To lessen the cost, kill Hill giants (Level 28) for their fairly common limpwurt drop or grow Limpwurt (farming) in a patch in the Wilderness specifically for Limpwurts. There's also a resource dungeon with Limpwurt spawns (needs at least level 20 Dungeoneering to enter). The safest, cheapest, quickest, way to obtain Limpwurt roots, is to grow them in a flower patch; which yields 3 roots per seed.

An alternative to this is to kill Hobgoblins. They have a more likely chance to drop Limpwurt roots. They can be found west of the Crafting Guild or in Rellekka where the Rock crabs are.

These give 50 experience each. It will take 144 Strength potions to get level 26.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −42,912

or -5.96 coins per experience point.

Level 15 to 38+

Make Serum 207s. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean tarromin
• Ashes

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 50 experience each. It will take 560 Serum 207s to get level 38.

Note that Serum 207s can only be made during or after the Shades of Mort'ton quest, are untradeable and can not be noted.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −194,320

or -6.94 coins per experience point.

Level 21 to 26

(also requires Herbicide)

This method is not advised as getting Herbicide requires 34,000 tokens, which at the optimal ratio would put you at level 62 Dungeoneering. The approximate cost using of using the tokens to gain Herbicide using Chaotic repairs means you would be spending 3,060,000 gp (approx. value of dungeoneering tokens). Granted you do have Herbicide but that is generally a reward purchased much later in your dungeoneering career.

Kills chaos druids with Herbicide (set to erode Harralander, Tarromin, Marrentill, and Guam) in your inventory.

There is no profit made or lost in this method as the herbicide converts herb drops into double experience you would have received if you had cleaned them. It should be noted, that while you aren't spending any money, you are losing in opportunity, as selling the herbs would obviously be more profitable.

Level 26 to 38

Make energy potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean harralander
• Chocolate dust

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 67.5 experience each. It will take 322 Energy potions to get level 38.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −167,440

or -7.7 coins per experience point.

Level 36 to 52

Make combat potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean harralander
• Goat horn dust

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 84 experience each. It will take 1,177 Combat potions to get level 52. Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −928,653

or -9.39 coins per experience point.

Depending on the current price of Harralander, Ranarr, Prayer potions and Combat potions, this method can sometimes be more cost efficient than making prayer potions.

Level 38 to 52

Make prayer potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean ranarr
• Snape grass

Clean the herb if it's grimy (grimy may be more or less expensive than clean), use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 87.5 experience each. It will take 1,066 Prayer potions to get level 52.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −796,302

or -8.54 coins per experience point.

This cost can be significantly reduced by combining the Prayer Potion(3)'s into Prayer Potion(4). By referencing the price of each dosage regards to Prayer Potions, the latter usually offers a higher price per dosage in the Grand Exchange thus saving you money.

Level 40 to 52/further level 99

Make summoning potions. Items needed:

• Spirit weed potion (unf)
• Cockatrice egg

These give 92 experience each. It will take 940 Summoning potions to get level 52. This method cost one of the least per exp and can be use as an alternatives cheaper method to train herblore further.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and herb on them, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −1,247,378

or -14.11 coins per experience point.

Provided the player wishes to get to level 99 by making summoning potion. It will take 141274 Summoning potions to get to level 99.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and herb on them, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −183,373,652

or -14.11 coins per experience point.

to get to level 99. However it will take a much longer time than making other potions as summoning potion only gives you 92 exp each whereas other potions that requires higher level gives much more exp at the expenses of higher cost. The prices of spirit weed unf, clean spirit weed, grimy spirit weed and cockatrice egg differ variously from time to time. This is because herbing this potion is not a popular method as most people usually prefer the quick and extravagant method using the normal herbs. This result in low demand for raw ingredients and as a result when the result surge down to complete no demand, many sellers tend to set the price way below guide price in hope of selling it faster which in actual it does not. Because a product can never be sold regardless of price in times when there is completely no demand. Instead this only allow herblore trainers to their advantage as ingredients are purchased at a cheaper rate when they are in demand for the raw ingredients. Same goes to Summoning potion as the seller's proposition when buying the item. When herblore trainers(buyer) decide to purchase a big quantity of raw ingredients, since there is very little supplies to the raw ingredient. The supply may not meets the demand resulting the price to surge up 20%. This is the time, herblore Summoning potion method should be avoided if it cost more than other methods. The prices of all the item involved in the making of summoning potion various from -20% to +20% from the guideprice and purchasing of raw ingredients and selling of Summoning potions may take some hours sometimes, while at other times, one can sell it at +20% instantly.

Level 45 to 52

Make super attack potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean irit
• Eye of newt

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 100 experience each. It will take 622 Super attack potions to get to level 52.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −643,148

or -10.34 coins per experience point.

Level 52 to 63

Make super energy potions*. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean avantoe
• Mort myre fungus

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 117.5 experience each. It will take 2,085 Super energy potions to get level 63.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used**, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −2,319,570

or -9.47 coins per experience point.

* With the run energy update, super energy potions crashed and briefly became unsellable. However, after the 7 October 2009 Herblore update, super energy potions rocketed: as of 20 December 2009 super energy potion (4) had a Grand Exchange price of 5,374 gp, over 2500 coins more than their price before the run energy update.

Level 63 to 72

Make super restores. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean snapdragon
• Red spiders' eggs

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 142.5 experience each. It will take 3,724 Super restores to get level 72.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange, and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −5,567,380

or -10.49 coins per experience point.

Level 72 to 81

Make ranging potions. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean dwarf weed
• wine of zamorak.

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 162.5 experience each. It will take 4,245 ranging potions to get level 81.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  

or coins per experience point.

Level 81 to 84

Make saradomin brews. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean toadflax
• crushed bird nest.

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 172.5 experience each. It will take 9,363 saradomin brews to get level 84.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  

or coins per experience point.

Level 84 to 99

Make recover specials. Items needed:

• Super energy (3)
• Papaya fruit

Use the papaya on the super energy potion.

These give 200 experience each. It will take 50,416 Recover specials to get level 99.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −129,064,960 coins

or -12.8 coins per experience point.

• Be aware that all potions requiring level 84 or above apart from prayer renewals, cannot be traded, therefore making it unable to receive any sort of resale value. However, these potions generally give high experience, and are usually made for their effects rather than the experience (with the exception of recover specials and possibly super antifires).

Level 85 to 99

Make super antifires. Items needed:

• Antifire (3)
• Phoenix feathers

Use the phoenix feather on the antifire.

These give 210 experience each. It will take 46,552 Super antifires to reach level 99.

Assuming you buy the antifire potions on the Grand Exchange, you will spend (-):

  −183,740,744 coins

or -18.8 coins per experience point.

Please note that while this is one of the cheapest and fastest ways to train Herblore, it requires the use of an untradeable ingredient (phoenix feathers), which must be collected by hand. Therefore players must factor in the time spent collecting large quantities of phoenix feathers and weigh this against the amount saved by using this method.

Level 88 to 99

Make Extreme Attacks. Items needed:

• Clean Avantoe
• Super attack (3)

Use the Clean Avantoe on the super attack potion (3).

Extreme attack potions give 220 experience each. It will take 39,313 extreme attacks to reach 99. It will take 2,076 extreme attacks to reach 89.

Money Needed (To Level 89):

  

Money Needed (To Level 99):

  

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −136,337,484 coins

or -15.76 coins per experience point.

It is possible to get 100k Herblore experience in merely 15 minutes, giving a potential 400k exp per hour!

This method is currently faster and cheaper than making recover specials. However the price of avantoe may vary greatly on the grand exchange but due to recent updates this may not be the case in future. Due extreme attacks are not only faster experience than recover specials, extreme attacks are widely regarded as more useful when compared to recover specials, the vast amount produced can be spent efficiently on training attack, defence or strength as well as against boss monsters such as Graardor where extreme attacks are commonly used. This makes Extreme attacks a much more attractive option for players training herblore if prices are lower or not significantly higher than other alternatives such as recover special. Extreme strengths and Defence potions can be made instead of extreme attacks at higher levels but may be more expensive. This may also be a more attractive method of training if you have bought the scroll of cleansing reward from Dungeoneering, as it gives the player a chance of saving most of the potion cost in the form of avantoes.

Level 89 to 99

Extreme strength potions are generally more expensive than extreme attack or recover special potions. However, players may choose to make them over these potions at times that they are cheaper to make or because of the more useful strength boost it provides for boss monsters.

Make Extreme strengths. Items needed:

• Clean dwarf weed
• Super strength (3)

Use the Clean dwarf weed on the super strength potion (3).

Extreme strength potions give 230 experience each. It will take 35,618 extreme strengths to reach 99. It will take 2,192 extreme strengths to reach 90.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

  −351,407,188 coins

or -42.9 coins per experience point.

Level 91 to 99

Make Extreme magics. Items needed:

• Ground mud runes
• Magic potion (3)

Use the Ground mud runes on the Magic potion (3).

Extreme magic potions give 250 experience each. It will take 28,527 Extreme magics to reach 99.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):

   coins

or coins per experience point.

Extreme magics are one of the fastest and cheapest methods for training herblore at high levels, if you can acquire the resources, and are able to have the patience to grind down the mud runes.

Methods

Slow and (sometimes) cheap

After Shades of Mort'ton (minimum Herblore level: 15), make Serum 207. Items needed:

• Vial of water
• Clean tarromin
• Ashes

Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.

These give 50 experience each and are therefore a slow training method compared to the higher-level alternatives. If you make the Tarromin unfinished potions and add the ashes you can reach around 50k xp an hour. You can make a maximum of around 150k experience an hour if you buy Tarromin unfinished potions and add the ashes. They cannot be sold, but the cheap secondary ingredient makes them cost-effective compared to other potions, depending on the current price for Tarromin and the economic situation surrounding the other potions. There are usually plenty of ashes to be had free on the grounds around the Grand Exchange since it is a popular spot to practice Firemaking. However, with the release of Bonfires, there are fewer ashes on the ground.

Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend -6.94 coins per experience point.

Serum 207 cannot be withdrawn from the bank as a note, and it can be very time-consuming to drop them or to empty the vials to reuse them. The serum cannot be sold, but it can be alchemied. While not worth the runes to do this, players who can have the Explorer's ring can use its low-alchemy ability on the serum and earn enough coins to purchase new vials to replace the ones lost when the serum is alchemized.

Alternatively, the serum can be used on the afflicted townspeople of Mort'ton to temporarily cure them. As thanks, they will give a reward of either coins, vials (with or without water), logs, or grimy tarromin. Most of these can then be used to make even more serum. This can continue indefinitely, as only one dose is used on a villager at a time. It should be noted that using Serum 208 often yields better/more rewards.

Herb cleaning

Cleaning grimy herbs can (depending on what level is required to clean the herb and the differences between grimy and clean herb prices) be fairly good experience rates at a very modest cost or even some profit. This method, however, invariably requires mouse keys to be effective (which can allow you to clean up to 15k herbs per hour, potentially resulting in exp rates of up to and even exceeding 200k/h) which means it requires a comparatively large amount of concentration and skill compared to just making potions (the player would have to hover his mouse rapidly over the herbs in his inventory while constantly hitting the 5 and + key on his numpad).

Some downsides to this method are the fact that you need to know how mouse keys work and how to work with them somewhat fluently, as well as having a fairly large cashpile to buy a stack of grimy herbs with. The gp/xp rates themselves depend purely on Grand Exchange prices, which fluctuate heavily. If the prices are in your favour, profit can exceed 1.5m/h. Nonetheless, it is a viable option for all slightly well-off players who wish to conserve (and possibly even make a little) money while getting decent experience/hour rates.

Potion Selector

This table recommends potions to create by herblore level. To be included in this table, a potion must not be too expensive, its secondary ingredient must be readily available on the Grand Exchange, and the potion must have medium or high demand (see Calculators/Potions).

This table does not include columns for the loss made by buying all items on the Grand Exchange.

Herblore Level	Buying all ingredients on Grand Exchange			Growing your own herbs
	Goal: Herblore XP			Goal: Herblore XP			Goal: Profit
	Potion	XP	Cost/XP	Farming Level	Herb	Potion	Farming Level	Herb	Potion
5-12	Antipoison	37.5	-26.88	14	Marrentill	Antipoison	No profitable herbs
12-26	Strength potion	50	-5.96	19	Tarromin	Strength potion	19	Tarromin	Strength potion (value: 617 coins per 3-dose potion)
26-34	File:Energy potion.pngEnergy potion	67.5	-7.7	26	Harralander	File:Energy potion.pngEnergy potion
34-36	Agility potion	80	-37.79	38	Toadflax	Agility potion
36-38	Combat potion	84	-9.39	26	Harralander	Combat potion
38-45	File:Prayer potion.pngPrayer potion	87.5	-8.54	32	Ranarr	File:Prayer potion.pngPrayer potion	32	Ranarr	File:Prayer potion.pngPrayer potion (value: 3045 coins per 3-dose potion)
45-48	Super attack	100	-10.34	44	Irit	Super attack
48-55	Super anti-poison potion	106.3	-21.18	44	Irit	Super anti-poison potion
55-57	Super strength	125	-11.58	56	Kwuarm	Super strength	56	Kwuarm	Super strength (value: 2340 coins per 3-dose potion)

Notice that summoning potion is not included in this list due to the difficulty in obtaining the materials on the Grand Exchange.

Training tips

• It's possible to train Herblore with Slayer for many of the creatures you slay may drop many different herbs each time you kill something, but might take a long time to get the herbs you require.
• Herblore can also be trained by using herbicide, acquired for 34,000 Dungeoneering tokens from Dungeoneering. Herbicide destroys the herb drop but gives double the xp you would get for cleaning it. Some good monsters to kill are abberant spectres, with 60 slayer, chaos druids, and turoths, with 55 slayer. This is quite a slow way to train the skill, but is free, if you would not usually pick up the herbs.
• Herblore can be a very expensive skill since the ingredients usually cost more than the finished product. However, collecting the secondary ingredient yourself, or farming the herbs can greatly reduce the cost.
• The Chaos Druid Tower is one of the places high levelled thieves use to train their herblore. It is a good idea to clean herbs and occasionally make Prayer potions and Fishing potions, bank and repeat this process until you earn 2-3k XP. After that, make the majority potions that require second ingredients.
• Often people use another free method of training herblore: they simply enter a solo dungeon , go through a few rooms , gather some money and find some farming patches. Then they alternately grow herbs, make potions and high alch/sell the potions for some gp. Although this is slow exp , it is free of cost , with exp rates varying from 25k-40k per hour , depending on the players herblore and farming level.
• An option for 78-81 is to continue with ranging potions.
• Vials are an important part of Herblore training. The General store in East Ardougne sells 6 Vial of water packs for 500 coins each. They can also be made using the Crafting skill and then filling it with water from a fountain, however this will take much longer. The general store in Shilo Village sells 20 vials of water packs, totalling 1000 vials of water. Get there quickly by using Karamja gloves 3, provided you have done the hard tasks of the Karamja Diary. There are also 6 water filled and 6 empty vial packs available from Sigmund the Merchant in Rellekka. Buy another 20 packs of water filled and empties from Jossik in the lighthouse. Jossik also has 10 greenman ales in stock. All together you can buy 2600 water filled vials a day and 2300 empty vials not counting the vials sold in single quantities.
• A virtually free, but very slow and therefore generally not recommended method to train Herblore is by making Magic essence potions. The ingredients are untradeable and relatively slow to obtain. Fairytale II - Cure a Queen is required, as is 57 Herblore. You gain 130 xp per potion.
• Training Herblore up to level 99 this way will cost a total of    assuming all ingredients are purchased from the Grand Exchange and the method above is used.
• It is suggested to do Jungle Potion as soon as herblore is accessed. That way, you can jump from level 3 to level 9.
• Another way is to buy (unf) potions on the Grand Exchange, this will save a lot of time, but cost more coins.