While putting together your factory, Alternate Recipes can be a huge boost to production, providing a better alternative for many of the in-game elements. When you get the opportunity to unlock new alternate recipes in Satisfactory, a random choice of two will be available, so knowing which is the best and worst choice is essential. This ranking system should help you choose the right one every time.

How to unlock Alternate Recipes in Satisfactory

To get your hands on the better versions of recipes in Satisfactory, a little exploration is required. The Alternate Recipes can be found on hard drives around the world in crashed drop pods. These must be collected and researched at the M.A.M. This process will take ten minutes. You can use a dedicated server to give yourself the time and space you need to search for the various drop pods.

Once these hard drives have been researched, you will have the option to research one of two recipes or gain additional inventory space. Some Alternate Recipes are much more beneficial to productivity and output in Satisfactory, so make sure you check our tier list to ensure you make the right choice.

However, if you’re lucky enough to come across extra inventory space, I would recommend taking this option. It is incredibly useful, especially in the early game, and would come to the top of the tier list. It’s a pretty rare find, but one that will make playing Satisfactory much easier.

Alternate Recipes tier list

These items are ranked on their productivity changes. The better the Alternate Recipes are for power consumption and output, the higher they rank in the Satisfactory tier list. Of course, you may disagree with some of their placements, but for me, this is where they all sit.

In these tables, minus numbers are a positive thing. Power is a reduction in power use, Items are a reduction in items needed to move around the map, buildings are a reduction of buildings required for a production chain, and resources are a reduction in necessary raw resources in production. These numbers are based on parameters across a whole production chain.

Use CTRL F to find the various recipes.

S Tier Alternate Recipes

These Alternate Recipes are ones you should always keep an eye out for in Satisfactory. They have the highest bonuses for output, productivity, and resources.

These are the most common Alternate Recipes in Satisfactory. They will certainly help you with productivity and output of your Satisfactory build, but they aren’t the final solution for a perfect build.

You got unlucky if you’re pulling one of these from a hard drive in Satisfactory. Almost all of these will be worse than their alternatives.

F Tier Alternate Recipes

These ones are more of a detriment than anything else. If you’re unlucky enough to find one of these Alternate Recipes in Satisfactory, I would recommend picking anything else.

How much difference do Alternate Recipes make?

If you’re wondering whether the time and effort of collecting and researching the Alternate Recipes in Satisfactory are worth it, the answer is yes. With your builds using a lot of the top-ranking Alternate Recipes, not only will your factory use a lot less power, but it will also move items much faster, build significantly faster, and mine resources much quicker.

It is worth going out into the world and looking for those crashed drop pods. Of course, you won’t always be lucky enough to get your hands on an S Tier parts, but chances of getting a better recipe than an original are high. Once you have figured out the best place for your factory and your dream layout, these new parts will make all the difference.