The Island Sanctuary in Final Fantasy XIV is supposed to be a relaxing experience that players can use to unwind from the stresses of the day. A truly calming venture on a deserted island, without duty queues, party finder stress, or rotations to worry about. So naturally, the FFXIV community has taken to rushing through this relaxation as quickly as possible.

Much of what your Island Sanctuary has to offer is unlocked through leveling up. Players typically want to level up quickly in order to consume all the content this activity has to offer. Warriors of Light can use their islands to unwind, use those outdoor decorations they’ve been saving when they inevitably fail Housing Market (Savage), and unlock new items. The Island Sanctuary offers a variety of mounts, minions, fashion accessories, and glamour pieces that are only obtainable by ranking up.

To get started on your journey, read our guide on how to unlock the Island Sanctuary.

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island sanctuary ffxiv 1.png — Screengrab by Fanbyte via Square Enix

Progressing the Island Sanctuary

The Island Sanctuary evolves as you complete goals and unlock additional tiers of progression. What starts as an overgrown jungle slowly starts to become a bustling hub of activity. You’ll be putting mammets to work as you build your own slice of paradise, by gathering materials, upgrading buildings, working a farm, and managing animals.

In order to level up, you’ll need to gain Island experience. You get this experience by engaging in any of the content the Sanctuary offers, but some things are more valuable than others. Most players want to get to the final tiers of this content as quickly as they can, since the most desirable rewards unlock after several levels of progression.

As you level up, you gain access to more buildings, allowing you to have your mammets craft more items, which in turn lets you get more of the Island’s unique currency to buy rewards with. You’ll also be able to automate more of your island as the currency becomes abundant. While the mammets charge you for their services, the amount of cowries they bring in vastly outweighs the cost.

The table below shows you the tools and features that unlock with each level, as well as how much Island EXP is required for each level.

Sanctuary Rank	Island EXP to next rank	Tool Unlock	Feature Unlock
1	3,000	Stone Hatchet	Cabin I
2	6,000	Makeshift Net	Cropland I Pasture I
3	9,500	Stone Hammer	Workshop I Windmill Landmark Treefort Landmark Minions Unlocked
4	13,500		Cabin II Cropland II Pasture II
5	18,000	Shovel	Granary I Bath House Landmark
6	23,000	Makeshift Restraint Copper Scythe	Workshop II Granary II
7	28,500	Bronze Gig	Cabin III Cropland III Pasture III
8	34,500	Makeshift Soporific Bronze Beakaxe	Workshop III Granary III
9	41,000	Iron Hatchet	Lighthouse Landmark Otter Fountain Landmark
10	42,000		Flight
11	43,500
12	44,000		Garden Landmark Cave Access
13	45,500	Steel Hammer	Cabin IV Granary IV
14	47,500		Workshop IV
15	65,000		Clock Tower Landmark
16	65,500		Cave Expansion
17	66,000	Mythril Pickaxe Mythril Chisel
18	70,000		Granary V
19	100,000		Workshop V Felicitous Favors
20	N/A	Flawless Restraints

Now that you know the basics of what each rank offers you, let’s dig into how to get there fast.

Island Sactuary ffxiv.png — Screengrab by Fanbyte via Square Enix

Earning Island EXP

Earning Island EXP isn’t difficult, since every activity you engage in will grant you at least some, but getting a lot of it quickly means knowing what’s worth your time and what’s best left undone. Some activities can grant you a quick boost of experience, while others slowly trickle in but provide a steady stream.

When you start your island, you’ll go through a tutorial where you’ll be introduced to the Sanctuary’s activities. The quests you complete during the tutorial give you a large amount of experience, easily putting you at rank four. Once you have a better understanding of the basics, you can look into what gives you the most experience for the effort involved.

Realizing Visions

As you’ve seen in the tutorial, realizing visions gives you a huge chunk of Island EXP towards your next level. These quests are important for more than just EXP, since it's also how you unlock more features of your island. Visions are tied to your Island Sanctuary expanding, so whenever you see a new one is available, this should be your top priority.

Building and upgrading facilities and landmarks

Facilities and landmarks also give a massive boost of Island EXP, whether you’re building one for the first time or upgrading one. Whenever you have a new facility available to build or upgrade, go out and gather the needed materials as soon as you can. To find the building materials required, click on the board next to the facility or landmark. These are limited in quantity, and you’ll have to wait for the construction to complete, but be sure not to skip them. When a building is done, simply interact with its placard to gain the earned EXP.

It is also possible to rebuild your landmarks. This comes with no limit or timer, but doesn’t give anywhere near as big a reward as the initial build. It also takes a lot of materials, so while it can be a good option for a small boost when you have a large surplus, it’s not considered a viable way to get a lot of experience in a short amount of time.

The workshop

Earning experience can be pretty tiresome, but using mammets and facilities can help bring in passive experience. This is the most sustainable and steady stream of Island EXP available without needing to grind. Simply set up your workshops every day, make sure you have all the needed materials, and let the cowries and experience passively flow in. If you’re unsure how to run your workshop for maximum profits, worry not, the community over at the Overseas Casuals Discord has weekly recommendations to help you maximize your output.

Pasture and croplands

Mammets take care of your crops and animals, but if you want to gain the experience they provide, you’ll have to go out and interact with them yourself. This can net some daily experience, though the payoff isn’t that great. Many players forego this option once their pasture and crops are established, often relying on the passive experience from the workshop instead. I find it much more time efficient to leave animals and crops to the mammets, and grind for materials instead.

Grinding for materials

This is your last resort for earning experience, but it is bottomless. If you have the motivation to go gather materials in order to level up your Sanctuary, this is where you’ll shine. Each node you hit gives you a 10 Island EXP, but the nodes are plentiful and respawn after you hit 10 more nodes. This can be a tedious task if you’re in it for the long haul, but the easy routes make it possible to drown out the tedium by putting on a show or listening to your favorite playlist.

At lower ranks, the best method the community has found of gaining EXP through gathering is Sandlooping. This method has you gathering Sand in a small loop, minimizing time spent walking from node to node and thus maximizing EXP gain. The suggested loop is located in The Wilds (x:22.3, y:25.9).

island sanctuary sandlooping.png — Screengrab by Fanbyte via Square Enix

Once you are rank 10 or above, you can use a method the community has dubbed Quartzlooping. This method requires flight, making it impossible to use at lower ranks, but is faster than Sandlooping. The trick here is to mine the set of nodes at the top of the mountain (x:24.8, y:16.1). There is just enough of them to make a loop, respawning nodes as you go.

island sanctuary quartzlooping.png — Screengrab by Fanbyte via Square Enix

To make both of these even easier, there’s a macro you can use in order to target and walk to the next node. For Sandlooping, you’ll need to keep an eye on your camera, since nodes 10 and 11 are a little further outside the main loop. For Quartzlooping, you shouldn’t run into any such issues. For both, it is recommended you manually walk your first loop to ensure nodes are spawned in the correct order. After that, all you will have to do is spam your macro and confirm buttons, and turn your camera as needed.

The macro is made as follows:

/merror off
/micon “Duty Action I”
/ac “Duty Action I”
/targetnpc
/lockon on
/automove on

island sanctuary ffxiv 2.png

In case you want to farm materials you need, just try to set a route that can be fast so you can capitalize the most out of your grinding session. If you want some help with that, we already have a handful of guides on key materials with the location of each gathering node.

Now that you have all the information, you’ll be able to level up your Island Sanctuary quickly. After all, why progress slowly in what you can grind out today? Put on a leisurely outfit, grab a pickaxe, and go relax until you drop.

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