Rust Base Builder

Quick answerA Rust base builder lets you plan a base before you build it in game. Lay out foundations, walls and doors on the grid above, set each piece to twig, wood, stone, sheet metal or armored, and it adds up the wood, stone, metal fragments and HQM you need, the daily upkeep your Tool Cupboard will take, and the cheapest sulfur path a raider can blow to reach your TC.

How to use the Rust base builder

The planner is a top-down floor plan, one square per foundation, the same way builders sketch bases on paper. Each grid line is a spot for a wall, doorway, window or wall frame, just like the snap points in game.

1. Pick a grade. Choose twig, wood, stone, sheet metal or armored. Every piece you place takes that grade, and you can mix grades, for example a stone shell with a sheet metal core.
2. Lay foundations. With Foundation selected, click or drag across squares. Use Triangle and click the outside edge of a square to add a triangle foundation on that side.
3. Add walls and doors. Pick Wall, Doorway, Window, Wall Frame, Half Wall or Low Wall and click the grid lines. For a doorway, pick the door first (wooden, sheet metal or armored). For a wall frame, add a garage door.
4. Place the Tool Cupboard. Click a square with the Tool Cupboard tool. The raid panel then works out the cheapest way in, and marks it in red on the plan.
5. Go up a level. Switch to level 2, 3 or 4. The level below shows as a dashed outline. Copy level below gives you the same footprint with solid walls, then add stairs, ladder hatches and windows.
6. Read the totals. Build cost, upkeep and raid cost update on every click. Copy share link saves the whole plan in a URL you can send to your group.

Not sure where to start? Load one of the presets. They are the same layouts we rank in our Rust base designs guide, from a 2×1 starter to a 2×2 honeycomb with a sheet metal core.

Rust building costs for every piece

Every building block in Rust costs the same per grade no matter where you place it. A full-size piece (foundation, wall, half wall, stairs) is the base price. Doorways and windows cost 70% of a wall, and floors, frames, low walls and roofs cost half.

Two things catch new players out. First, the twig you place is not refunded when you upgrade, so a stone wall really costs 50 wood plus 300 stone. The builder includes that twig by default (untick Include twig placement to hide it). Second, doors, locks and the TC are crafted items, not building blocks. The builder adds them from the game files:

Item	Craft cost	Workbench
Wooden Door	300 wood	None
Sheet Metal Door	150 metal frags	None
Garage Door	300 metal frags, 2 gears	Level 2
Armored Door	20 HQM, 5 gears	Level 3
Code Lock	100 metal frags	None
Ladder Hatch	1 wooden ladder (300 wood, 3 rope), 300 frags, 3 gears	Level 2
Tool Cupboard	1,000 wood	None

For a full breakdown of each grade, soft sides and upgrade times, see our Rust building guide.

How upkeep works in the base builder

Every block inside your Tool Cupboard range takes a share of its own build cost from the TC each day. If the TC runs dry, the base starts to decay. The share is not flat. It grows with the size of your base:

The game blends these brackets into one rate for the whole base, which is what the builder shows under the totals. A small 2×1 pays close to 10%. A big clan compound with 400 blocks pays about 26%, so doubling the size of a base more than doubles its upkeep.

Since the Breach and Clear update (September 3, 2026), upkeep also scales with how many players are authorised on the TC. The first 4 are free, players 5 to 10 add 2% each, and every player after 10 adds 4%, up to a cap of 300%. Use the player counter in the upkeep panel to see what your group pays. Our Rust decay guide explains what happens when upkeep runs out.

Doors, windows and ladder hatches pay the same blended rate as the blocks, but do not count toward the brackets. To work out upkeep for a base you already have, how long your TC will last and how much to stock until wipe, use the Rust upkeep calculator.

Raid cost: how the builder finds the cheapest way in

Raiders do not blow every wall. They look for the cheapest line from outside to your TC. The builder does the same: it checks every route through your walls and doors, prices each piece with the cheapest boom (or the one you pick), and shows the total sulfur and the list of pieces a raider would break.

Target	C4	Rockets	Satchels	Explo ammo	Cheapest sulfur
Wood piece	1	2	3	49	1,225
Stone piece	2	4	10	185	4,400
Sheet metal piece	4	8	23	400	8,800
Armored piece	8	15	46	799	17,600
Wooden door	1	1	2	18	450
Sheet metal door	1	2	4	63	1,575
Garage door	2	3	9	150	3,750
Armored door	3	5	15	250	6,250

Doorways, windows, floors and foundations take the same explosives as a wall of the same grade. That is why doors are almost always the weak point: a sheet metal door costs less than a fifth of the stone wall next to it. Half walls and low walls can be climbed with a ladder, so the builder treats them as open. Use the full Rust raid calculator to price any list of targets on its own.

Base planning tips that save sulfur and upkeep

• Put the TC in the middle. Every wall you add between the outside and the TC adds a full wall price to the raid. A TC right behind the front door costs one door to reach. Ring the TC room with a honeycomb and every extra layer adds another wall or door.
• Upgrade the core, not the shell. A sheet metal core inside a stone honeycomb costs far less than a full sheet metal base and still doubles the price of the last layer.
• Count your doors. Each door on the path is cheaper than the wall it sits in. Use an airlock (two doors in a row) at the entrance, and an armored door on the TC room.
• Use triangles to add depth cheaply. A triangle foundation costs half of a square but still forces raiders through an extra wall.
• Watch the block count. Going past 65 and 190 blocks raises the upkeep rate of the whole base. The block counter above the build cost shows where you are.
• Plan for wipe day. Know your build cost before the wipe so you know what to farm first. Check when the next Rust force wipe is and have the plan ready.

Rust base builder FAQ

Building costs and upkeep come from the Rust game files. Raid counts are vanilla values for a direct hit on the hard side. Sources: Facepunch Rust news for update changes and the game item data for craft costs. Last checked October 2026.