Steven is a Canadian video game and tech writer for Screen Rant, trusted for writing expert reviews, features, and industry insights since 2022.
There wouldn't be much of a point to the massive amount of items there are to discover and loot in ARC Raiders if you didn't have a use for them, which is exactly where your workbenches shine. While you can buy a lot of items from traders in ARC Raiders, countless others can only be reliably obtained through workbenches and blueprint crafting.
Aside from Scrappy and the base Workbench that can't be upgraded, every workbench is also locked behind an initial material requirement, which you'll want to rush to obtain as soon as you can, before selling any breaking down any goods. Thankfully, ARC Raiders also includes an item tracker that can be manually enabled for each workbench in your stash, with the tracker and popup persisting for quests, items, and workbench upgrades during your raids. Every Material Needed To Upgrade Scrappy Granting you a marginal amount of loot for each of the six base crafting materials, it's a good idea to make a habit of checking back in with Scrappy the rooster in between each raid and interactions with other players. While the rewards are minimal at first, upgrading Scrappy is well worth the early investment, with the rewards slowly adding up during your playtime while helping you craft other upgrade materials. Unlike most materials in ARC Raiders, the plants needed for Scrappy's upgrades aren't ones you'll come across often without explicitly going out of your way to obtain them. Requiring plenty of fruit and vegetables from across each map, I would recommend checking our guide on Scrappy's material locations for a more precise look at where the best locations for each item can be found. Every Material Needed To Upgrade The Gunsmith Allowing you to craft powerful weapons and attachments, the Gunsmith is your best friend when it comes to facing off against deadly ARC enemies and any aggressive Raiders. Given that some of the later workbench upgrades will require you to take down massive ARC like Bastions or Sentinels, it's not a bad idea to focus the Gunsmith in the early game. Thankfully, the ARC materials required for the Gunsmith aren't too challenging to get a hold of, with Wasps and Sentinel being some of the weaker ARC enemies in the game to actually take down. Aside from these, the Gunsmith's biggest material hurdle for me was Rusted Gears, which I would recommend playing a night-raid on maps like Blue Gate for an increased chance of higher value industrial loot. Every Material Needed To Upgrade The Medical Lab Being your bread and butter for surviving in the deadly post-apocalyptic world of ARC Raiders, the Medical Lab lets you access powerful healing items, restoring a much greater amount of health and even instantly recovering your HP without waiting. You'll be able to find most of the materials required to upgrade the medical bench in specifically marked spots around the map, but several buildings and areas have tucked-away pharmacies that can offer a massive boon of supplies, while having a much lower risk of encountering other players or having already been looted. Quests from Lance are also a good way to supplement your medical supplies in the meantime, or even show you locations for hidden medical spawns. Every Material Needed To Upgrade The Gear Bench If you want to keep your looting and fighting efficiency as high as possible, Augments and shields from the Gear Bench make a game-changing difference in how you play. From granting you access to stronger defenses & utility items, greater carrying capacity, and drastically increasing your inventory space, each jump to higher-level Augments is more than worth the investment. Given that many of the Gear Bench upgrades can be broken down or found in several locations, you'll likely get slowed down by the stronger ARC requirements compared to other workbenches. Being identified by their dark, heavily armored appearance, the back thrusters of a Hornet are their weakest spot, which are easier to attack while dodging out of the way of their charged taser shot. Being one of the deadliest ARCs available in the game, I would also recommend only taking down Bastions with friends or by teaming up with other players, although powerful explosives can make much quicker work of these large automatons. Every Material Needed To Upgrade The Explosives Station Speaking of explosives, the Explosives Station makes fighting ARC Raiders dangerous AI a much more feasible task than simply shooting at them. With different grenades able to easily bypass armor, attach to flying enemies, or even lure them away to avoid a fight entirely, the explosives station with the proper blueprints is a potent asset to have at your disposal. The first hurdle to upgrading the Explosives Station is the requirement to obtain Synthesized Fuel, which is incredibly rare to find by looting alone. Thankfully, you can also obtain these rare materials by purchasing them directly from Celeste, or breaking down Wolfpack grenades which provide x2 Synthesized Fuel per salvage. The next hurdle to finishing the upgrade of the Explosives Station comes from having to take down Rocketeers, which can quickly wipe out unprepared or underleveled Raider squads. To take these down, you'll absolutely want to have reliable cover and buildings before attempting a fight, while targeting their thrusters and using the previously unlocked sticky explosives to bring them down to the ground for you to loot faster. Every Material Needed To Upgrade The Refiner While The Refiner doesn't offer too many exciting recipes on its own, its ability to craft necessary components for other workbenches and recipes can save you hours of unnecessary looting in the long run. On top of being a great tool to repurpose unnecessary components, having a steady stream of weapon parts and refined materials more than makes up for its initial investment. The first few challenges you'll face when upgrading The Refiner are from Toasters and Fireball Burners, with the former being found exclusively as a rare drop from residential looting areas. While it can take some time to obtain all three toasters, playing on night maps can increase the chance, while Fireball Burners can be slowly obtained from Fireball ARC enemies patrolling the interiors of lootable locations. To finalize your refinery and gain access to all of its potential recipes, you'll also need to take down some massive Bombardiers for their valuable ARC materials. While these enemies seem like one of the most intimidating, taking out a Bombardier's Spotters beforehand and making heavy use of powerful gadgets like Wolf Packs or Snap Grenades can get these behemoths low enough for you to take down with a few well-placed shots from Heavy Ammo weapons like the Anvil or Ferro. Every Material Needed To Upgrade The Utility Station While the Utility Station might seem like one of the weakest workstations in ARC Raiders with the least variety, it has the underrated potential of crafting some incredibly powerful options later on. On top of luring grenades, the Utility Station can also let you craft Hatch Keys to quickly and safely get out of a raid, on top of a rechargeable Photoelectric Cloak that completely conceals yourself from ARC enemies for a limited time when held. The Photoelectric Cloak also emits a loud beeping sound when used, making you more obvious to enemy players despite being undetectable by ARC. Aside from requiring a handful of Electrical and Technological gear, there isn't too much standing between you and a fully upgraded Utility Station, but the final Bison Drivers can be somewhat of a pain to come across, let alone defeat. Obtained from the much more aggressive and armored variant of Leapers, the Bison can be identified by the protrusions from its legs and by frequently holding its larger head higher than the lower-level Leapers. Given that these enemies can quickly close any distance with their long legs, having a closer range but powerful weapons, and making consistent use of cover can save you and your squadmates' lives on more than one occasion. Once you've unlocked all the workbench upgrades that ARC Raiders has to offer, you'll have a much greater advantage at surviving anything the game has to throw at you, but it doesn't stop there. With over 60 blueprints out there for you to find, the true potential of your crafting stations in ARC Raiders will only grow over time as you collect and learn more powerful recipes. 9/10 ARC Raiders 10 stars 9 stars 8 stars 7 stars 6 stars 5 stars 4 stars 3 stars 2 stars 1 star Like Follow Followed Extraction Shooter Third-Person Shooter Survival Systems OpenCritic Reviews Top Critic Avg: 93/100 Critics Rec: 89% Released October 30, 2025 ESRB Teen / Violence, Blood Developer Embark Studios Publisher Embark Studios Engine Unreal Engine 5 7 Images Close
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