Figuring out what to upgrade first in Clash of Clans isn’t easy unless you know a ton about the game. Crunching numbers to optimize your base isn’t easy to do, and there are a ton of factors that you may never consider. That’s why learning about what’s best to upgrade first is important.
To get started, once you’ve upgraded your Town Hall always make sure you buy everything in the shop that you can. Go ahead and place all your new walls and any new buildings and tools first – after you’ve done that, you’re in the clear to start upgrading things.
What to Upgrade First: The Laboratory and Clan Castle
It might not seem like it, but the first thing to upgrade in Clash of Clans is generally your Laboratory. The Laboratory makes it so that you can upgrade your army units and potions, which makes your army stronger.
Keep in mind that you can research troops while you upgrade your Laboratory – this will help you optimize your time in-game, where it can take years to max out your Clash of Clans account. Doing this is also great for your offense and your clan’s defense in the future. If you’re looking to gather resources through attacking, then having a stronger army is always better.
Upgrading your Clan Castle is generally what’s recommended next to help prioritize resources. A higher-level Clan Castle will give you additional rewards for attacking, which can snowball into more resources. Considering the game is centered around upgrading your base, these resources are incredibly important and deserve to be focused on at the beginning.
Gold Storage, Elixir Storage, and the elusive Dark Elixir Storage
Because you’re focusing so much on gathering resources, it’s important to make sure you have the space to hold them all. That’s why upgrading your Gold Storage, Elixir Storage, and Dark Elixir Storage next is important. This will ensure that you’re never losing out on resources.
If you’ve got Dark Elixir, then make sure you’re paying attention to its storage. Dark Elixir can be incredibly useful since it upgrades many different units and your heavy hitters, like the Barbarian King and Archer Queen. Considering these heavy hitters can be upgraded past your Town Hall level and are extremely useful, you don’t want to mismanage Dark Elixir.
Your Money Makers vs. Your Army Camp in Clash of Clans
Once you know your reserves can handle all the resources you’re earning, it’s time to make a decision. Upgrading things like your Gold Mines or Elixir Collectors sounds like the natural next step, but your Army Camp can be better depending on how you play the game.
If you’re someone who likes to constantly attack others as a way to get resources (or even just to play the game), then you’ll actually want to upgrade your Army Camp. This will allow you to make better armies with stronger units, which means that you’ll be more successful in attacks while also losing fewer units.
However, if you’re mostly wanting the game to run passively in the background, then your Gold Mines and Elixir Collectors are a great option to upgrade next. They’ll earn you more resources over time in case you don’t get much time to play.
The Suggested Building Tool
Figuring out what to upgrade in Clash of Clans after these can be simplified by following the Suggested Building tool that pops up at the top. It will generally give you the best option to build while also keeping the number of resources you have in mind. There, you’ll also be able to see everything you can upgrade, and it’s a good overview of what you have on your base.
The Deal About Upgrading Walls
Here’s the thing: upgrading walls in Clash of Clans can be a pain. There are a ton of them, and they take a lot of resources. One way to make sure that you’re getting to them without saving them all for the end is to upgrade your walls with leftover money before starting a major upgrade.
For example, let’s say you have one builder, 100,000 gold, and a defense that costs 50,000 gold to upgrade. Instead of heading straight toward upgrading the defense, spend 50,000 gold and use your builder to upgrade as many walls as possible. Once you’ve depleted your gold, then send the builder to the defense item that takes more time to build.
This is a handy way to make sure you’re not losing resources constantly to people attacking you. If you spend everything you have while upgrading, there’s nothing for an enemy to take.