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 a 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.
Portable wells are also helpful as they yield 10% more experience and have a 5% chance of creating an extra potion, which can save even more money.
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, or 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
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 are sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−15,450 in total or −24.72 per experience point.
Level 12 to 26
Make Strength potions. Items needed:
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 64) 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 40 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, and all 3-dose potions are sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−716,832 in total or −124.45 per experience point.
Level 15 to 38+
Make Serum 207s. Items needed:
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, As of the update on 14 January 2013, serums can be noted but not traded.
Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−178,080 in total or −6.36 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:
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, and all 3-dose potions are sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−323,062 in total or −14.86 per experience point.
Level 36 to 52
Make combat potions. Items needed:
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, clean herbs are used, and you sell the finished potions, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−4,161,872 in total or −42.1
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:
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, and all potions are sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−138,580 in total or −1.49 per experience point.
This cost can be significantly reduced by combining the prayer potion (3)s into prayer potion (4); 1,066 3-dose potions will make 799.5 4-dose potions. 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:
These give 92 experience each. It will take 940 Summoning potions to get level 52. This method can be a rather cheap, if slow, method to train Herblore to a further stage.
Assuming you purchase the unfinished potion and secondaries on the Grand Exchange, and all 3-dose potions are sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−238,760 in total or −2.76 per experience point.
Provided the player wishes to get to level 99 by making summoning potion. It will take 141,274 Summoning potions to get to level 99. This would cost −35,883,596 in total. Players should be advised that this method is rather slow, in comparison to others.
Level 45 to 52
Make super attack potions. Items needed:
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,and all potions sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−11,818 in total or −0.19 per experience point.
Level 52 to 63
Make super energy potions*. Items needed:
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**, and all potions sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−1,411,545 in total or −5.76 per experience point.
Level 63 to 72
Make super restores. Items needed:
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, and all potions sold at the end, you will spend −5,157,740 in total which is about −9.7 per experience point.
Level 72 to 81
Make Super ranging potions. Items needed:
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 7,961 Super ranging potions to get level 81.
Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, and all potions sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−24,559,685 in total or −18.98 per experience point.
Level 81 to 84
Make saradomin brews. Items needed:
Clean the herb if it's grimy, use the herb on the vial of water, and then add the secondary.
These give 180 experience each. It will take 4215 saradomin brews to get level 84.
Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, and all potions sold at the end, you will spend (-) or earn (+):
−15,747,240 in total or −20.76 per experience point.
Level 84 to 99
Make adrenaline potions. Items needed:
Use the papaya on the super energy potion.
These give 200 experience each. It will take 50,416 Adrenaline potions to get level 99.
For level 99 Herblore, assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend:
−482,229,040 in total or −47.83 per experience point.
It will take 1,537 Adrenaline potions to get level 85.
For level 85 Herblore, assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend:
−14,701,405 in total or −47.83 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.
Level 85 to 99
Make super antifires. Items needed:
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:
−352,445,192 in total or −36.05 per experience point.
It will take 5,368 Super antifires to reach level 88.
Assuming you buy the antifire potions on the Grand Exchange, you will spend:
−40,641,128 in total or −36.05 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:
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.
Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend:
−29.74 per experience point for a total of −13,583,268 for level 89 or −257,224,959 for level 99.
Level 89 to 99
Extreme strength potions are generally more expensive than extreme attack or adrenaline 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:
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 5,180 extreme strengths to reach 91.
Assuming you buy all of the items on the Grand Exchange and clean herbs are used, you will spend:
−104.47 per experience point, for a total of −124,459,860 for level 91 or −855,793,686 for level 99.
Level 91 to 99
Make Extreme magics. Items needed:
Use the Ground mud runes on the Super 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: −361,052,585 in total or −50.62 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:
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 -6.36 coins per experience point.
As of an update on January 14th, 2013, Serum 207 can now be withdrawn from the bank as a note, and can be disposed of very quickly. The serum cannot be sold, but it can be alchemized. While not worth the runes to do this, players who have the Explorer's ring can use its low-alchemy ability or high-alchemy (if ring is 4) 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 reward fairly good experience and often results in a profit. To find out if money will be lost or gained, look at the cost of the grimy herb and compare it to the cost of the clean herb.
As an example, grimy harralanders cost around 315 - 320 each, but clean harralanders cost around 345 - 350. Cleaning them can earn around 25k experience per hour. Then selling the clean herbs earns about 7% profit.
This method is tedious. However, making potions always results in a loss, often surpassing 50%, while cleaning the herbs results in a gain. Overall, if you are willing to commit the time, cleaning herbs is a much more cost-efficient method to gain herblore experience.
 Level
|
Herb | Grimy | Clean | Clean XP
|
 Profit
| ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Icon | Price
|
Icon | Price
| ||||
| 1 | Guam | 
|
709 | 
|
738 | 2.5 | 29 |
| 5 | Marrentill | 
|
2,307 | 
|
2,516 | 5 | 209 |
| 9 | Tarromin | 
|
105 | 
|
127 | 3.8 | 22 |
| 20 | Harralander | 
|
741 | 
|
938 | 6.3 | 197 |
| 25 | Ranarr | 
|
1,860 | 
|
2,108 | 7.5 | 248 |
| 30 | Toadflax | 
|
11,250 | 
|
11,699 | 8 | 449 |
| 35 | Spirit weed | 
|
16,575 | 
|
17,285 | 7.8 | 710 |
| 40 | Irit | 
|
5,008 | 
|
5,305 | 8.8 | 297 |
| 41 | Wergali | 
|
2,701 | 
|
2,593 | 9.5 | −108 |
| 48 | Avantoe | 
|
1,043 | 
|
1,151 | 10 | 108 |
| 54 | Kwuarm | 
|
11,782 | 
|
11,981 | 11.3 | 199 |
| 59 | Snapdragon | 
|
1,789 | 
|
1,979 | 11.8 | 190 |
| 65 | Cadantine | 
|
4,322 | 
|
4,724 | 12.5 | 402 |
| 67 | Lantadyme | 
|
7,551 | 
|
8,002 | 13.1 | 451 |
| 70 | Dwarf weed | 
|
8,476 | 
|
8,810 | 13.8 | 334 |
| 75 | Torstol | 
|
5,389 | 
|
5,548 | 15 | 159 |
| 91 | Fellstalk | 
|
6,860 | 
|
7,166 | 16.8 | 306 |
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 
1-3
Attack potion
25 -24.72 9
Guam
Attack potion
9
Guam
Attack potion
(value:226 coins per 3-dose potion) 3-7
Ranging potion
30 -1.47 9
Guam
Ranging potion
9
Guam
Ranging potion
(value:1390 coins per 3-dose potion) 7-26
Strength potion
40 -124.45 19
Tarromin
Strength potion
19
Tarromin
Strength potion
(value:435 coins per 3-dose potion) 26-34
Energy potion
67.5 -16.28 26
Harralander
Energy potion
34-36
Agility potion
80 -149.2 38
Toadflax
Agility potion
36-38
Combat potion
84 -42.1 26
Harralander
Combat potion
38-45
Prayer potion
87.5 -1.49 32
Ranarr
Prayer potion
32
Ranarr
Prayer potion
(value: 2208 coins per 3-dose potion) 45-48
Super attack
100 -0.19 44
Irit
Super attack
48-55
Super anti-poison potion
106.3 -3.76 44
Irit
Super anti-poison potion
55-57
Super strength
125 -16.4 56
Kwuarm
Super strength
56
Kwuarm
Super strength
(value: 15217 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 because of the drops monsters give. Higher level monsters that can drop herbs tend to drop lower level ones more frequently than high level herbs.
- 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. However, some herbs are very expensive (such as Grimy dwarf weed, which is currently semi-expensive) and players who pick up the herb, clean it and use it in a potion will gain much more experience then having the herbicide cleaning it up. However, the herbicide does clean up low-level herbs players would generally avoid.
- Herblore can be a very expensive skill since the ingredients usually cost more than the finished product. However, if the player does not mind taking their time, they can grab the herbs and ingredients from slaying monsters while in combat. Most monsters tend to drop one herb, but stronger monsters will more likely drop a large number of herbs. Some monsters are also good for gaining their secondary ingredients, though some of them can be gained without having to kill monsters. Try to aim for one or two potions at a time however to maximize the experience gained per hour.
- Such examples to make Herblore cheaper is by killing bosses. Bosses like K'ril Tsutsaroth drop Grimy lantadymes in stacks of 10 and noted, useful for making Antifire potions or Super magic potions. Then, you can either collect Blue dragon scales from the blue dragon location at Taverley dungeon for the antifire potion, or kill Fungal mages for their relatively common drops of Potato cactus, which are dropped in stacks of 8 and noted. Another example would be making Super strength potions. One can kill General Graardor's bodyguards as they drop Limpwurt roots in stacks of 5 (noted) and killing something which drops kwuarms frequently.
- 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.
- However, if the player feels that that location is not as good as others, there are a few more places for quick herbs. One can use the resource dungeon in the Edgeville Wilderness as there are many Chaos druids there along with free spawns of ranarr, irit, harralander and marentill with plenty of Chaos druid spawns. Another location would be Salarin the Twisted's dungeon, as Salarin drops the Sinister key which gives plenty of low-high level herbs and his Chaos druid warriors who can drop herbs frequently too.
- Often people use another free method of training herblore: they simply enter a solo Dungeoneering floor, go through a few rooms, gather some money and find some farming patches. Then they alternately grow herbs, make potions and cast High Level Alchemy or sell the potions for some coins. Although this is slow experience per hour, it is free of cost, with experience rates varying from 25k-40k per hour, depending on the players Herblore and Farming level.
- An option for 78-81 is to continue with Super 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 263,667,728 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.
- A really effective, free method, but very dangerous method of training Herblore is taking part in the Wilderness Warbands. Up to level 66, you are guaranteed to get one or more levels per camp raided (25 supplies).There are many Warband Friend Chats to join in order to complete Wilderness Warbands daily and safely.
- Daily challenges are also useful. Not only do they give additional XP, the cost of raw materials is also reimbursed.
- Bank presets can save time when training by making potions. Instead of repeatedly withdrawing e.g. 14 vials and 14 herbs, do that once and store it as a quick preset. Then store 14 unfinished potions & 14 secondaries as the second quick preset.
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