Updated Warframe Farming Guide (Comprehensive)

Learn how to farm resources effectively in Warframe in this complete guide. From which Loot Frame to choose to which Companion is best for farming, find out the best way to get Tellurium, Argon Crystals, Orokin Cells, and other rare resources. Plus, discover general Warframe farming tips whether you’re targeting Endo, Credits, or Relics alongside discussion of whether Steel Path is worth it for farming and the importance of Resource Boosters.

There’s definitely a right and a wrong way to farm in Warframe. Locking in the correct approach will make looting rare resources much easier.

We’re going to cover everything to know to farm like a pro in this guide, from which Warframes are best for farming to which Companion you should slot.

We’ll even go over how to stack boosters for 4x drop rates and determine whether Steel Path is worth it for farming.

Just be clear right from the outset, this guide mainly applies to farming rare resources like:

• Argon Crystals
• Tellurium
• Neurodes
• etc.

Slightly different rules apply to farming:

• Endo
• Affinity
• Credits
• Relics
• Certain other items

If you follow the steps laid out in this guide, though, you’ll get plenty of those other currencies and resources, too.

At a glance:

• Farming rare resources in Warframe is easy with the right approach.
• Start by choosing an effective loot frame, such as:
  • Nekros
  • Khora
  • Atlas
  • Hydroid
• If you choose Nekros, remember to dismember enemies with Slash or Gore.
• From there, run a Survival mission that drops the resource you’re looking for.
• Don’t break and open containers if the resource you’re looking for only comes from enemy kills.
• Run with a Smeeta Kavat or Panzer Vulpaphyla Companion.
  • Make sure to slot the mod Resourceful Retriever for a chance at double drops.
• Avoid Steel Path unless you’re able to take down enemies at least half as fast as you can on normal difficulty.
• Stack boosters by running a Resource Booster and a Drop Chance Booster at the same time.

What is the best loot frame for resource farming?

There are four Warframes the community considers to be the best for farming. The first — and the one I personally consider to be the best — is Nekros (or if you want to buff him up a bit, Nekros Prime.)

That’s because Nekros has a built-in ability called Desecrate. This causes slain enemies to have a 54% chance to drop extra loot.

Descrate is simply part of Nekros’ toolkit. You activate it at the beginning of a mission and forget about it.

There are also ways you can boost Desecrate — mainly the augment mod Despoil, which consumes health instead of energy whenever Desecrate procs.

You have a much larger health pool than you do for energy. With enough corpses around, you could easily run out of energy without Despoil.

But if you run Desecrate on Nekros and combine it with Despoil, you have an absolutely excellent, almost AFK loot frame that takes very little work to set up.

And, you can make Desecrate even more powerful with an additional tip we’ll get to in a moment.

Is Khora a good loot frame?

One of the other frames the community also considers to be good for farming is Khora. That’s because there’s an augment mod for Strangledome, her fourth ability, called Pilfering Strangledome.

This causes enemies that are held in Strangledome to have a 65% chance of dropping extra loot.

However, this loot boost only applies when you’re using Strangledome. It isn’t an essentially passive ability like with Nekros’ Desecrate.

But what’s really excellent is when you get a Khora and a Nekros on the same squad, because these abilities do overlap.

On her own, Khora only has one ability that helps with farming, and you need the augment mod to make it work at all — unlike with Nekros where Desecrate is an inherent ability that just gains some added utility with Despoil.

Is Atlas a good loot frame?

The Warframe community considers Atlas to be a reasonably good loot frame because of his augment mod, Ore Gaze, which applies to his third ability, Petrify.

Petrify fossilizes enemies in front of you. And with Ore Gaze, petrified enemies have a 25% chance to drop extra loot.

Now, that’s a much smaller increase as compared to Khora or Nekros.

Also, Atlas and Khora do not get along. You cannot Petrify and Strangledome enemies at the same time. Ore Gaze does synergize with Nekros’ Desecrate, though.

Is Hydroid a good loot frame?

Yes, Hydroid is a highly effective loot frame due to his augment mod Pilfering Swarm, which augments Tentacle Swarm to provide a 100% chance for affected enemies to drop double loot.

The fact that Tentacle Swarm pulls enemies up into the air and wiggles them around, however, is a point of annoyance among the community. Plus — like Khora and Atlas — Hyrdoid is reliant on having enough energy reserves for his loot boost powers to take effect.

Which loot frame should I choose?

Nekros, Khora, Atlas, and Hydroid are your main options as far as loot frames go. But if you had to choose just one, I would definitely go with Nekros.

He boosts your loot the most substantially, and it’s a much easier process where you just turn Desecrate on — and with Despoil, it consumes your health instead of energy. It never goes away.

Khora, Atlas, and Hydroid are mid-tier alternatives at best.

I will put out a Nekros farming build guide soon, but really all that matters is you have Despoil combined with Stretch or Primed Stretch plus Overextended to increase the range of Despoil.

Past that point, you might want to invest in Vitality or Umbral Vitality to make Nekros a little bit more survivable on higher level missions — and Equilibrium to keep your health up.

This mod makes energy orbs give you health as well.

Even unoptimized, Nekros is a beast for looting with just a few core mods.

How does slash damage work with Nekros’ Desecrate?

Desecrate does not just apply to bodies — it applies to body parts as well. One of the cool things about Slash damage is that it cuts enemies in half. It literally dismembers them.

And for each dismembered piece of a corpse, Desecrate will try to pull extra loot out of it at that 54% chance.

So, whenever you are farming with Nekros (or you have a Nekros on your team), always use weapons with Slash damage.

Basically, any bladed melee works, like the Kronen Prime I’m using. But there’s also a crazy trick to make all weapons do the equivalent of Slash damage.

What is the Amalgam Ripkas True Steel trick?

You can transform the low-tier Warframe melee weapons called Ripkas into enemy-dismembering stat sticks with a special mod called Amalgam Ripkas True Steel.

This mod doesn’t actually make Slash damage apply to your other weapons, but it does give them a 100% chance to Gore — which does the same thing as Slash.

Gore dismembers enemies. It tears them apart.

So with Amalgam Ripkas True Steel, not only are your Ripkas guaranteed to Gore, but every other weapon you’ve equipped will Gore as well.

That means you can combine the Acceltra Prime or any fast room-clearing weapon with Ripkas modded with Amalgam Ripkas True Steel, and that will make your room-clearing primary do the equivalent of Slash damage, tearing corpses apart for Nekros to Desecrate.

Personally, I find an actual Slash weapon to be more fun — running through enemies, tearing them apart. But especially if you’re squishy or you want to do damage from a distance, I really recommend the Amalgam Ripkas True Steel hack.

It opens up a whole new world of possibilities.

Is it better to farm solo or with a squad in Warframe?

With an ideal combination of loot frames and excellent communication, farming as a team in Warframe can be highly effective due to the increased enemy spawn rates additional players provide.

However, solo play is also valid — and sometimes better — because in solo Survival, for instance, you can just camp in a dead end and have all the enemies go to you.

Also, you never know who you’re going to get in a pickup group. Not to be mean, but sometimes other players can be so bad or so new that they work to the detriment of your squad.

I do generally farm in a squad for higher enemy spawn rates and also for the chance a squad mate may have a Resource Drop Chance Booster, but there are pros and cons to each approach.

I recommend you try farming both in a squad and solo to see which one you like best.

Is Survival the best mission type for farming in Warframe?

Yes, Survival is generally considered to be the best mission type for farming in Warframe. There are a few reasons for this:

1. Survival is an endless mission type, meaning it does not have a designated end point. You can just keep farming till you have what you need.
2. Spawn rates scale over time. The longer you play, the more enemies there are.
   • Defense is also reasonably good for farming, but compared to Defense, there is no downtime in Survival — just constant enemy slaying.
   • In Defense, sometimes there will be one enemy stowed away in some random location at the end of a round that you have to hunt down.
3. Another big benefit of Survival (on solo) is you can go to a dead end area and all the enemies will come straight at you. You don’t even have to move. Just stay in one spot slaying. You can only do that in survival.
4. Also, in Survival (as compared to Defense), there is no mission failure risk. Sure, you can run out of life support, but all that does is gradually whittle away your health.
   • In Defense, especially in high-level missions, if you stop paying attention for just a few seconds, the object or operative you’re supposed to be defending can die, thus failing the entire mission.

Should I break and open containers when farming?

Whether or not it’s worth it to break containers and open storage lockers in Warframe depends on the specific resource you’re trying to farm.

Some rare resources — like Tellurium, for instance — only drop from enemy kills. So, smashing breakable containers and opening lockers will have absolutely no effect.

Others though, like Argon Crystals, can drop from containers. So if you’re farming that resource, you should definitely smash.

Also, there’s a rare chance in any mission for either Cyan or Amber Ayatan Stars to drop from containers. So, even if you’re farming a resource that only comes from enemy kills, it can be worth it to break and enter just to get Stars and the other resources that come out of those containers — like credits and the low-tier resources associated with your map.

If you do intend to loot containers, you’re going to want to run either Limbo or Xaku.

• Limbo’s fourth ability, Cataclysm, breaks containers in a wide radius.
• With Xaku, it’s also his fourth ability, The Vast Untime.

These are not really good farming frames overall. They’re just good for breaking containers. And neither of these abilities — either Cataclysm or The Vast Untime — actually opens storage lockers.

So in the end, their utility is kind of limited. From a farming perspective, Xaku and Limbo are only useful for getting low-tier resources that come from containers and from lockers.

Even for low-tier resources, Nekros will still probably edge out in terms of utility.

What is the best Companion for farming in Warframe?

For the longest time, the Smeeta Kavat was the undisputed best farming Companion. That’s because the Smeeta-specific mod Charm had a chance of doubling your resource drops. It was still kind of finicky, but it was definitely worth it.

But then with a recent change to Companions, Digital Extremes (the devs at Warframe) made it possible for any Beast Companion to offer this effect with the mod Resourceful Retriever, which gives Beast Companions an 18% chance to double resource pickups.

So, with the Panzer Vulpaphyla being considerably stronger than the Smeeta Kavat, it’s now a matter of serious debate which one is better for farming:

• The Panzer is the best overall Beast Companion.
  • It has powerful room clearing abilities.
  • It can’t die.
  • It’s really strong.
• However, the barrier to entry for getting a Panzer is much higher.
  • You have to go through this whole rigamarole — hunting them with your Tranq Rifle, gilding them, etc.
• Getting a Smeeta is much easier, and if you’re going to use Platinum, it’s also much cheaper.
• And, even though Charm was changed, it does still have a chance to give you a rare resource from the map you’re farming.
  • This effect only has a 10% chance to activate every time charm activates, ultimately taking the chance of getting this rare resource down to only 4%.
  • But, some would argue that extra 4% does make the Smeeta better than the Panzer for farming.
    • I mean, it’s not 0% after all.
• Especially if you don’t already have a Panzer, the headache of getting one — combined with the ease of getting a Smeeta —can make the Smeeta the better option.

If you choose a Smeeta, all you really need to know in terms of a build is that you’ll definitely want to slot Charm.

Put on Animal Instinct for better loot radar. Throw on Tek Enhance to increase the duration of Charm — this can rarely lead to doubling that rare resource drop rate if Charm overlaps with itself.

You also definitely want Resourceful Retriever. Whichever Beast Companion you choose, this is absolutely essential.

And then, of course, also slot Fetch. This mod allows your Companion to grab drops for you.

TL;DR: Panzer is probably better in the end, but Smeeta still has its advantages — mainly that it’s easier to get. And also, Charm is still useful, even if it isn’t the essential farming mod it once was.

Is Steel Path worth it for farming?

Steel Path gives you +100% resource drop chance, which at first glance seems to make this Warframe difficulty modifier the obvious option for farming. However, Steel Path is much harder:

• Enemies go up in level by 100.
• Also, their health and shields are increased by 250%.

All that equates to the time-to-kill (TTK) for each enemy increasing substantially. Doing some basic math, this is all you need to know:

• When you’re in Steel Path, if your time to kill goes down more than 50% compared to your time to kill on normal difficulty, it won’t be worth it.
• The only way you can make Steel Path worth it is if you kill enemies at more than half the speed that you usually kill them on normal difficulty.
• Otherwise, that +100% resource drop chance will be wasted.
• Say you only kill enemies at 30% your usual speed on Steel Path:
  • You’ll actually have a lower resource drop chance than if you were farming on normal — even with that +100% buff.

Generally, I do not find Steel Path to be worth it for farming. The benefits do not outweigh the detractors.

If you have a perfectly optimized loot frame, maybe Steel Path will be worth it for you. To be perfectly honest, though, farming Steel Path is probably worth it for any but the most elite players.

Try to keep track of your TTK. If enemies take any more than twice as long to kill, realize Steel Path is not worth it, and go back to normal difficulty.

Which boosters help with farming in Warframe?

Two types of boosters apply to farming in Warframe:

• Resource Drop Chance Booster (Blue)
  • Doubles the drop chance for any resource.
    • Tellurium, for instance has a 0.2% chance to drop under normal conditions.
    • With this booster, that chance goes up to 0.4%.
• Resource Booster (Orange)
  • This booster doubles the number of resources you get when you pick them up.
    • If you’d normally pick up one Argon Crystal, for instance, you will get two with this booster.

These two boosters stack. When combined, these two boosters give you the equivalent of a 4x drop chance:

• Twice the drop chance from the Drop Chance Booster,
• Double the drops themselves from the Resource Booster,
• Ultimately giving you a 300% or 4x chance.

You may notice these boosters pretty spendy in the Warframe market. That’s why I generally just go to a busy instance of a relay and beg. I’ll be honest, beg.

Can you get Drop Chance Boosters as Blessings in Warframe?

Yes, players at MR30 or higher can give out Drop Chance Boosters as Blessings at Relays. Some people have basically done everything else in the game and just hang out in Relays, giving these Blessings out to players who are not as far along in their journeys.

Before you start farming (if you don’t want to spend a whole bunch of Platinum), go to a busy instance of a Relay, go to Relay Chat, and say:

“Hey, could I get a resource drop chance, please?”

You can say this however you want. You can be kind of silly about it. You can be really direct. Just try to be polite. That’ll probably increase your chances of getting what you want. That’s generally how life works.

But yeah, this is a crapshoot. You never know if there’s anyone there who can even give the booster, and they might just ignore you.

At the same time, I’ve found that 5-10 minutes just lurking a Relay begging is better than dropping all your Platinum on overpriced resource boosters.

Can you get Double Resource Boosters as Blessings in Warframe?

No, 2x Resource Boosters are not available as Blessings at Relays in Warframe. Unlike Drop Chance Boosters, Resource Boosters cannot be offered as blessings by MR30+ players and must be purchased in the Warframe Market or received as login rewards instead.

Are farming boosters shared with your squad in Warframe?

Drop Chance Boosters are shared between entire squads in Warframe, but Resource Boosters are not. If you do purchase a Resource Booster or receive it as a login reward, it will only apply to you — not the rest of your team.

Conclusion

That pretty much covers it.

I spent a considerable amount of time researching and making sure that I covered everything important in this guide. But even with all that, I’m sure I missed something.

So, if there is anything I missed, please do leave it in the comments.

Also, keep in mind that I did purposefully leave out how to get each specific resource and omitted full build guides for the sake of brevity, but I am going to come out with build guides for loot frames, loot Companions, and dedicated guides for each popular resource.

I already have a guide on how to get Tellurium, but I’m talking about:

• Argon Crystals
• Neurodes
• etc.

And then also the resources, items, and currencies to which the rules I’ve covered here only generally apply, like:

• Credits
• Endo
• Relics
• etc.

You get plenty of Endo by running Survival, but there are definitely more optimized ways to get it. Same goes for Credits and Relics.

If there is anything you’d like me to cover, please do leave that in the comments. Keep in mind I am still at the beginning stages of what will end up being a comprehensive series on how to farm everything you could ever want to farm in Warframe.

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