Terraria’s combat is heavily reliant on buffs and the most consistent source of this is through the best Terraria potions. Using potions enables you to gain temporary abilities that turn the tide of battle completely. These liquid concoctions can also allow you to do various things, like teleport from point A to point B or even turn the world’s gravity on its head.
Best Terraria Potions for Combat and Exploration
Finding the best set of potions to have with you for specific scenarios can help you with both your combat and exploration. We’ve decided to rank the best Terraria potions in both fields collectively since you may want to have most of these with you at all times anyway.
So without further ado, here’s our ranking of the best potions in the game.
Recovery Potions
- Includes both Health and Mana potions
The very basic RPGs will always have both health and mana potions for instant recovery. This allows you to keep yourself alive and kicking whenever things get dire. In terms of survivability, these are the best Terraria potions you should always have.
While healing potions are craftable and can be farmed for bosses, a great beginner tip would be to either get Bottled Honey (crafted with a Bottle while submerged in Honey) or a Honeyfin (fished in Honey). Bottled Honey heals a significant amount while giving you a regeneration debuff and the Honeyfin is the strongest healing item (120hp heal) before you reach hardmode.
Obsidian Skin Potion
- Saves you from getting burned
The Obsidian Skin Potion is a very useful potion for starting in the game. This potion will allow you to step on fire blocks, like the fallen Meteorite, and also allows you to swim in lava for a short period. This makes it especially easy to farm Hellstone once you have access to a pickaxe that can mine it.
This potion, while useful, will be rendered obsolete once you gain access to the Lava Charm which in part is an ingredient of the Terraspark Boots. This drops the usefulness of this potion down, making other potions higher in rank.
Food Items
- Provides 3 unique buffs that affect all major stats
Food items are a great source of buffs that add plenty of overall stats. These items are especially important in the secret world seeds The Constant and Get Fixed Boi, which enable a hunger system similar to the Don’t Starve series.
If you’re planning to farm food items early, we suggest farming in the surface Corruption biome in pre-Hardmode so you can farm Burgers (tier 3 food) from the Eater of Souls mobs. Farming for these will also net you some Rotten Chunks which you can then make into Monster Lasagna (tier 2 food).
Vision-related Potions
- Increases night vision, light radius, and various indicators for the player
Exploration has always been an integral part of Terraria. This is why the Shine, Nightowl, Spelunker, and Dangersense potions are always good to have when you’re farming for resources underground. These potions will provide you with much-needed help in being able to see in the dark and see valuables and traps scattered in the lower layers of the world.
The increased vision from the Shine and Nightowl are also some of the best Terraria potions for nighttime bosses. Another use for the Dangersense potion is for easy traversal of the Temple, which is riddled with traps.
Class-specific Potions
- Affects only specific classes
The Summoning, Magic Power, and Mana Regeneration potions are your best buff potions if you’re either a Summoner or a Mage class player. Having that extra minion slot can change how much damage you can output exponentially. For mages, these 2 items, especially Magic power, are something you’ll always want to have a few bottles of.
For rangers, you also have Ammo Reservation and Archery potions which benefit only the Ranger Class. Currently, there are no class-specific buffs that target the Melee class specifically. Melee classes generally only use the basic Offense and Defense potions that we’ll list later down below.
Resource Potions
- Helps you gather things quicker
- Affects the speed at which you can gain resources
There are a lot of times when you would need to be constantly farming necessary resources to upgrade your gear. The best Terraria potions for this purpose enable you to gather resources in a quicker way than you would without them.
You can use Crate and Fishing potions to increase your chances of hooking up treasure. You can also use Mining and Spelunking potions to increase mining speed and show where ore veins are. We also have Battle and Calm potions that increase or decrease mob spawn rates.
As a bonus, you can also use Luck potions to increase drop rates and probabilities while farming.
Health Buff Potions
- Increases health and regeneration
These potions include those that increase your base health and regeneration. The most basic Health Buff Potion would be the Regeneration Potion which gives a 2 health per second heal buff. This is equivalent to equipping 2 Band of Regenerations if equipping multiple is possible.
Another potion in this category includes the Lifeforce potion which adds a 20% health boost when used. The final addition to this entry is the Heartreach potion that increases the radius in which you can pick up health drops from mobs. This set of potions is integral to every boss fight, which is why we’ve ranked it high in this list.
Offense Potions
- These include potions that increase your overall DPS
Potions in this category increase overall damage and the amount you can deal per second in combat. These include the Wrath and Rage potion, which increases all damage and critical chance by 10%, and the Inferno potion, which sets any creature in a radius close to you on fire.
Another potion that just narrowly fits this list is the Titan potion which increases knockback from any viable weapon. These are the best Terraria potions for dealing the optimal amount of damage to anything you encounter. Having these potions handy is crucial to any boss fight, but not as crucial as the defense potions that will undoubtedly keep you alive.
Defense Potions
- These potions increase your survivability and defense
The best Terraria potions are the ones that keep you alive. These include the Thorns, Endurance, and Ironskin potions. The Thorns potion, as the name suggests, coats you with a reflective barrier that damages anyone who attacks you. This is best used for fights where contact with the enemy is inevitable.
If you’re not keen on taking too much damage, then the Ironskin potion is your best bet. This potion increases your defense by 8 solid points. Want to go even further? Add an Endurance potion to the mix for an extra 10% damage reduction from all sources.
Conclusion
The best Terraria potions are never just this or that. They’re specifically tailored to fit whatever you need them for. Whether it be farming, exploration, or combat, there are always potions for you to use. This list sorts out what’s the best of the best for each different scenario so you won’t have to look any further.
If you have a potion that you think should be on our list, let us know in the comments!
Need help with fighting your next boss? Check out our boss arena tips here! Want to spice up your game with the best mods? Check our mod recommendations here!
