6 of the Best Ways to Get Food in RUST
As a survival crafter, it’s half the game to know how to keep your hydration levels up and get food in RUST. Keeping your hunger and thirst bars full will provide you with the bonuses that will give an edge in PVP and keep you going longer while you roam the island.
Here are six ways to get your hands on food and water quickly.
- Foraging and Finding Food & Water
- Cooking Edible Meat
- Farming Vegetables and Fruit
- Purchasing Food & Water From Vendors
- Water Well Monument
- Boiling and Brewing Water
Each way of getting food has its benefits and drawbacks. Some are better suited to the casual player, while others are only for the truly committed chads.
Players who manage to keep their hunger levels above 100 receive bonuses for health regeneration. Meanwhile, let hunger drop down to zero, and you will begin to starve to death. It’s not an exceptionally fast death, depending on how much health you have at the time. But, during PVP and long journeys, it may be the difference between keeping your kit and loot or losing it to a lucky player or bear.
As well as calories, food gives a small bump in health over time. Helpful in recovering health while you travel or sit at your base. It’s not so good during combat, as taking any damage will cancel the health recovery. But slamming down some Cooked Bear Meat mid-fight may save your life in a pinch.
Hydration is also required to keep you alive. A player dying of thirst will suffer diminished movement speed and must maintain the water meter above 50 to prevent dehydration damage. Water can also restore some health, but only up to half your health bar. Beyond that point, you will need food or medication to restore more health.
Foraging and Finding Food & Water
As you travel along the roads, especially the Abandoned Supermarket and Gas Station monuments, you will find a wealth of processed and prepared food in crates and boxes. These items range from:
- Apples
- Black Raspberries
- Blueberries
- Cans of Beans
- Cans of Tuna
- Chocolate Bars
- Granola Bars
- Pickles
- Small Water Bottles
- Water Jugs
Processed foods have the advantage of being high in calories and health recovery but aren’t always high in hydration. Fortunately, wherever you find them, you’ll also tend to find Small Water Bottles and Water Jugs to wash the food down. Undoubtedly, foraging and looting crates are the quickest ways to get food in RUST, as the boxes containing them are plentiful along the roads.
Naturally occurring food exists too, which varies depending on which biome you find yourself in:
It’s common to find stalks of corn or wild pumpkins growing alongside the rivers in temperate and desert biomes. The bonus to the desert areas is the cacti. If struck carefully with a stone or gathering tool, cacti will yield cactus flesh, which is excellent for hydration and yields Cloth as a small bonus.
Mushrooms and potatoes are only found in wooded areas but are plentiful when found. If you spot just one, look around, as there are bound to be many more nearby. This plentifulness is also true for berries, as the different types of berries spawn across the various biomes, and where you find one bush, you’re bound to spot others nearby.
Water also can be found in natural formations such as lakes, rivers, and swamps. If you find a suitable water body, you can crouch in the water to see if it’s drinkable. Once you’ve determined it’s not salt water, you can fill your jugs and bottles to your heart’s content, hold the container, and use the right mouse button.
Cooking Edible Meat
Amongst the best ways to get food in RUST is through hunting. All animals, including humans, will yield some form of meat when harvesting with a sharp tool such as a Bone Knife, Combat Knife, or Hatchet in a pinch. The more appropriate the tool, the higher yield you will receive from your harvest, with the hunting knife providing the highest benefits.
Once carved, you can get your hands on:
- Raw Bear Meat
- Raw Chicken Breast
- Raw Deer Meat
- Raw Fish
- Raw Horse Meat
- Raw Human Meat
- Raw Pork
- Raw Wolf Meat
The unfortunate vegetarians of the RUST world, such as the chicken and deer, are much safer to hunt but have less value in terms of caloric intake. The more dangerous pigs, bears, and wolves have a much more fulfilling bounty in terms of meat, extra fat, and leather cuts.
Humans and horses are also meat options but are the worst in yield and effort. Horses are better to keep as functional pets, and Human Flesh has the unfortunate effect of massive dehydration. Make sure to have a water jug nearby if you are eating your teammates.
Fish are farmed using the craftable fish trap. Once placed in water, the fish trap will catch the relatively filling minnows and the much more delicious small trout. Place any food other than minnows or fish meat in the trap, wait for the sounds of water splashing, and check in on your fish trap. Once caught, the fish will eventually get away if not checked on within the next few minutes. The fish trap will also take damage over time while it is being used, so it is essential to go out with a hammer and repair them occasionally.
Spoilage System
RUST is a hazardous game in virtually every imaginable aspect; the environment, the inhabitants, the animals… everything is out to push you, test you, or kill you. Why should food be any different? With the introduction of the March 2025 patch, spoiled foods, a concept created almost a decade ago, is finally making its debut. Here’s a list of current spoiled foods:
- Spoiled Bear Meat
- Spoiled Chicken
- Spoiled Deer Meat
- Spoiled Fish Meat
- Spoiled Horse Meat
- Spoiled Human Meat
- Spoiled Pork Meat
- Spoiled Wolf Meat
Spoiled food cannot be salvaged after it turns. It will still provide a fraction of the calories it once did, but now with added poison that will damage or kill a player over time. Most meats can still be used as fish bait, though.
Spoilage Timer
Every listed meat type is created with a spoilage timer that starts when it enters a box, player inventory, or other lootable container. By default, this timer starts at 6 hours. Cooked food begins with a much longer timer of 24 hours by default. These timers are visible by clicking and viewing items in a player inventory. Once either Cooked or Raw reaches zero, they immediately spoil.
To combat spoilage, Fridges (receiving at least five units of RUST power) may be used to keep them fresh. Any food inside a powered Fridge is safe from spoilage and will remain so until removed or the fridge is otherwise destroyed. There is no countdown at all while in the Fridge, but timers do not start over if inserted or removed.
Those with access to a Cooking Workbench may also craft their Pies, utilizing all of the various meats listed above. Check out our Advanced Cooking guide for more information on Pies and Bread Loaves.
Farming Vegetables and Fruit
Since the farming update, managing a farm has become one of the most effective ways to get food in RUST to date. Building a Small or Large Planter will give you space to plant your berries, Corn, Pumpkins, or Potatoes. Seeds can be found when you eat berries, wild Corn, Pumpkins, Wheat, or Potatoes. Seeds for the various berry bushes can also be found in the wild if you plan to diversify your farming efforts for brewing teas.
Farming can be as complicated or as simple as you would like it to be. Plant your crop of choice; make sure it’s either getting sunlight or lit by an electric light source. Growing plants will also require fresh water from time to time. You can check the stats of your growing plants by looking at them in the planters. The plant UI will indicate whether or not more light or water is necessary.
For the truly dedicated, farming can be a rewarding experience through the manipulation of plant genetics. Each seed comes with its genetic code, which will determine:
- How fast the plant will grow
- How high the yield will be
- Requirements for light and water
If you aren’t happy with your plant’s genetic code, there is a crossbreeding process, which takes a lot of experience to master. Guides can walk you through the process. However, it’s unnecessary to understand if you’re happy keeping your plants sufficiently lit and watered, your farm will do just fine.
Purchasing Food & Water from a Vendor
In the Bandit Camp, the Food Market vendor sells food and water in exchange for Scrap; this includes Cans of Tuna, Pickles, and Water Jugs. While it is a bit overpriced if you need Water Jugs desperately or want a few Empty Tuna Cans for Tuna Can Lamps, this is an option.
Water Well Monument
The Water Well monument may or may not spawn on your map each wipe, but when they do appear, they can be invaluable. The mini monument water pump is a location where you can fill your jugs and bottles with fresh, clean water. Handy when you live far away from naturally occurring freshwater sources.
Boiling and Brewing Water
If you’re not lucky enough to live near fresh water, you can gather saltwater in containers and bring it back to the base. Building a water purifier is relatively cheap, but it can take time to convert your useless saltwater into healthy freshwater. Pour water into the top of the purifier, and put wood in the space underneath to begin the purifying process.
Once you’ve got a steady supply of fresh water for your base, you might begin brewing it into teas using the Mixing Table. Depending on what benefits you prefer, mix water with different berries to apply stat bonuses while maintaining better hydration levels than if the water had been drunk plain.
How You Choose to Get Food in RUST is Up to You
How you get food in RUST depends upon how you, as a player, approach the game. Will you wander the island as a salvager living off the foraged remains of the dying civilization? Are you the rugged hunter who keeps his kill or the stoic farmer tending his crop? What works for you will come with time and experience.
