RS3 Herblore Guide: Potion Route From 1 to 120

Herblore in RuneScape 3 is trained by making potions: you mix a clean herb into a vial of water, add a secondary ingredient, and move up to better potions as you level, finishing with extreme potions, overloads and bombs on the way to 120. It is one of the most expensive skills in the game, so the real skill in any rs3 herblore guide is cutting the cost per level without slowing down. The route below uses experience values and methods checked as of November 2026.

We checked the potion route, experience values and boosts against the RuneScape Wiki's Herblore, Herblore training and Herb pages and its Fort Forinthry article in November 2026.

How Herblore Works

Potion making has two steps. First you add a clean herb to a vial of water, or coconut milk for some mid-level potions, to make an unfinished potion, which gives 1 experience. Then you add the secondary ingredient to finish it, which is where nearly all the experience comes from. Herblore's maximum level is 120, and you no longer need a quest to start: the wiki notes that the old Druidic Ritual requirement was removed in January 2012.

Herbs usually arrive grimy and must be cleaned before use, and each herb needs a minimum Herblore level to clean. The wiki lists ranarr at 25, toadflax at 30, irit at 40, avantoe at 48, kwuarm at 54, snapdragon at 59, cadantine at 65, lantadyme at 67, dwarf weed at 70, torstol at 75 and fellstalk at 91. Cleaning gives a little experience of its own, so buying grimy herbs and cleaning them yourself is a small bonus rather than a waste of time.

A portable well is the best place to mix. It supplies free water and vials, gives 10 percent extra Herblore experience and a 5 percent chance to make an extra potion, which the Brooch of the Gods raises to 10 percent. Decanting is free at several spots: Bob Barter at the Grand Exchange, Rhobert Dail at the Tower of Voices, the Max Guild in Prifddinas, and Granny Rowan at Fort Forinthry once you have built the tier 1 Botanist's Workbench. Our Fort Forinthry guide explains how to unlock that building and what its higher tiers add.

Levels 1 to 19: Let Quests Do the Work

The wiki's training guide suggests skipping the very first levels of potion making by completing four quests: Druidic Ritual, Jungle Potion, Recruitment Drive and The Dig Site. Together they take you to around level 19 without buying a single herb. They are short, low-requirement quests, and they open up other content too, so there is little reason to skip them.

Keep in mind that quest experience is not doubled during Double XP events. If you are saving Herblore for the November 2026 event, finish these quests beforehand and use the doubled hours on potions instead.

The Potion Route From Level 3 to 88

Once the quests are done, the standard route moves through a series of potions, each giving more experience than the last. The wiki's table lists how many of each potion it takes to reach the next stop on the route.

Herblore potion route (RuneScape Wiki, checked November 2026)

Potion	XP each	Make until level	Potions needed
Attack potion	25	12	25
Strength potion	40	26	144
Energy potion	67.5	38	322
Prayer potion	87.5	55	1,557
Super strength	125	63	1,616
Super restore	142.5	72	3,724
Super ranging potion	162.5	81	7,961
Saradomin brew	180	88	12,184

Two things stand out. First, the potion counts grow quickly: you make about 25 attack potions early on but over 12,000 Saradomin brews later. Second, the potions on this route are ones other players buy. Prayer potions, super restores and brews are staples for bossing, so you can usually sell them to recover part of the cost, which is not true of every training method.

The wiki also notes an unusual alternative. Harralander tar, from level 44, gives 72.5 experience for every 15 tars and reaches roughly 140,000 experience per hour, and the guide calls tar the fastest method at any level from 19 onward after Lunar Diplomacy. Tar is mostly useful to players who want speed and are happy to make an item with a smaller market.

Extremes, Overloads and Levels Beyond 99

From 88 the route switches to extreme potions. Extreme attack opens at 88 for 220 experience, extreme strength at 89 for 230, extreme defence at 90 for 240, extreme magic at 91 for 250, extreme ranging at 92 for 260 and extreme necromancy at 93 for 265. The wiki recommends brewing the highest extreme available for the best experience per hour.

Overloads open at 96. With a portable well, each overload gives 1,100 experience, and the wiki's method of making 3,000 overloads is enough to reach 99, at an estimated cost of about 205.6 million coins. Players who go on to the Herblore master cape can batch-create overloads, and make elder overloads five at a time and supreme overloads four at a time.

Past 99, the route moves to bombs and Powerburst of feats:

• Poison bombs, 950 experience each, to level 101.
• Sticky bombs, 1,000 each, to 107.
• Vulnerability bombs, 1,100 each, to 118.
• Powerburst of feats, 1,600 each, to 120.

Combination potions are another high-level path. After Plague's End, the wiki lists them at over 350,000 experience per hour with constant focus, and the Herby Werby minigame gives bonus experience that rises from 150 percent at 85 Herblore to 300 percent at 115.

Cutting the Cost of Every Level

Herblore's price tag is what stops most players, and the cheapest experience comes from stacking small savings.

• Grow your own herbs. Herb runs are the most direct way to cut ingredient costs, and our RS3 Farming guide lists every herb patch and the level to plant each herb.
• Herbicide. It costs 34,000 Dungeoneering tokens or 500 Slayer points and doubles cleaning experience while you are in combat. Our Dungeoneering guide covers how tokens are earned after the 2026 remaster.
• Botanist's amulet. It gives a 5 percent chance for a 4-dose potion, with 5 charges.
• Modified botanist's mask. A 5 percent chance to double potions, with requirements of 50 Herblore and 75 Agility and Thieving.
• Scroll of cleansing. A 10 percent chance to save secondary ingredients, listed at 49 Herblore and 49 Dungeoneering.

The wiki's profit table also shows that some potions sell for more than they cost, such as the aggression potion at level 82, while others like super restores run at a loss at their level. Checking Grand Exchange prices before buying a batch is worth the minute it takes.

Mistakes That Make Herblore Cost More

Most of the gold lost in Herblore is lost to small habits rather than bad methods. These are the ones we see most often.

• Mixing away from a portable well. Every potion made at a bank chest instead of a well gives up the 10 percent experience bonus and the chance of a free extra potion. Over thousands of brews that is a lot of herbs.
• Buying the wrong form of ingredients. Grimy herbs, clean herbs and unfinished potions all trade at different prices. Compare all three before buying a batch, because the cheapest route changes as prices move.
• Training on a potion nobody buys. The route in the table above uses potions that bossers consume constantly. Brewing something obscure because it gives slightly more experience can leave you with a bank full of stock you sell at a loss.
• Skipping the early quests. Druidic Ritual, Jungle Potion, Recruitment Drive and The Dig Site cover the first stretch for free.
• Forgetting the gear. The botanist's amulet, modified botanist's mask and scroll of cleansing each look minor, but they stack across every action you take.

Fixing these costs nothing and pays back immediately, which is more than can be said for most upgrades in the skill.

Timing Your Herblore Around Double XP

The single biggest saving of the year is Double XP. Potions give twice the experience during the event, which roughly halves the gold cost per level for every potion you make under the timer. The November 2026 event runs from 6 to 16 November with 48 hours of doubled time, and our Double XP planning guide explains how to fit Herblore into those hours alongside other skills.

The most efficient way to use it is to buy or grow herbs and secondaries before the event, clean grimy herbs in advance if you like, and spend the doubled hours only on finishing potions. Unfinished potions give just 1 experience each, so making them outside the timer costs you almost nothing. If you are planning to fund a long Herblore push through bossing supplies, our money making guide covers methods that pay for the herbs.

Skipping the Expensive Climb

High Herblore is a requirement for overloads, which many bossers want, and the gold needed to get there is significant. Some players looking for an account that already has it check the listings on our RuneScape 3 page, which third-party sellers post and which change daily. Jagex's Terms and Conditions say plainly that accounts may not be sold, bought or shared, that real-world trading is not allowed, and that Jagex owns all rights in every account.

On your own account, quests to 19, a sellable potion route to 88, and careful use of Double XP will keep the cost of each level as low as it can be.

Frequently Asked Questions