Sandustry Materials

Sandustry materials wiki: density, states, and confirmed pixels — sand, slag, gold, water, fluxite, crackstone, and more. Unverified EA numbers stay TBA.

Scan before you burn — slag lights, spores may not.

~7 min read

Buildings Gold

At A Glance

This Sandustry materials page separates the confirmed Early Access factory loop from Demo-era numbers that may be stale after the 2026 simulation rewrite. Sandustry is a 2D falling-sand factory game from Lantto Games, published by Hooded Horse. Dig a destructible world, wet sand, shake gold, burn slag, pipe water, and unlock research while exploring ancient vaults. Use it beside the factory, not as a promise that every ratio still matches a 2025 wiki printout.

Gold buys research. Purple Fluxite buys tool, weapon, and drone upgrades. Energy exists as a later resource. When a ratio is uncertain, bank what you have and re-check the live panel.

Fact	Detail
Platform	Steam PC · GOG · Game Pass
Mode	Single-player
Status	Early Access · Aug 13, 2026
Topic	Materials
Early set	Sand · Wet Sand · Slag · Gold · Water · Steam · Ice
Progression	Spores · Flowers · Amethelis · Redsand · Voidbloom · Fluxite
Hazards	Crackstone · Lava · Scoria · Cinder
Source boundary	Steam listing, official site, and current EA player footage; Demo ratios stay TBA until re-checked

After you can name the pixels

Matched by build plan, shared topics, and guide progression — not random related links.

Buildings

Shaker · belts · pumps

Gold

Shaker · collectors

Filters

Sort gold from slag

Which Sandustry materials matter in the first hour?

Sand and water make Wet Sand. Wet Sand on a Shaker makes gold and slag. Slag burns into burnt slag. Everything else can wait until the Collector is ticking. The scanner upgrade exists because those interactions are easy to mix up once the pit is dirty.

The reliable foundation is the same on every seed: sand plus water becomes Wet Sand, a Shaker drops gold and slag, gold only counts in a Collector, and leftover water will flood a solids line unless you wall it with Blocks or belts. A basic Filter sorts one solid — it does not dam a lake. That is why materials advice should start with banking and containment, not with a supposed infinite trick.

Sandustry material scanner listing pixel interactions

Do01Scan Sand, Wet Sand, Water, Gold, and Slag until you recognise them without the tooltip
Do02Note which pixels launch (solids) and which need pipes (liquids)
Do03Do not shovel Crackstone — it is a later tool problem
Do04Park spores from the Press; they are a planter chain, not trash
Do05Treat Demo density numbers as TBA until you sort a test belt in EA

Treat the first factory as disposable

Early Access footage shows players throwing down a tiny Shaker just to bank the first research unlocks — Logistics 1 for belts and launchers — then deleting that stub once the washer can run. Hover is a Fluxite / movement upgrade, not a gold research node. A pretty first box is optional. A Collector that actually receives gold is not.

Copy (Shift-select, C) and delete (X-drag) are the hotkeys that keep this rebuild cheap. Press V while placing to read tile counts. Ctrl-place overwrites old pieces instead of stacking collisions.

Spend gold; do not hoard it

Holding thousands of gold in the first hour slows the factory more than it protects you. Unlock the next belt, Filter, or Flamethrower so the line can run while you scout. The Kinetic Slag Press is repeatedly called out in current EA clips as the early gold spike once slag can be burned.

With that baseline in place, the next question is not “can I scale?” but “what fails if water, slag, or Crackstone shows up on this line?”

What should I decide while working on Materials?

If two pixels share a belt, decide whether you can name-filter them or whether you must change the recipe so they never mix.

Use the table as a decision aid, not a hidden-stat calculator. Sandustry worlds are procedural and Early Access numbers move. A conservative threshold — bank gold, contain water, burn slag before pressing — beats a copied Demo ratio that no longer matches the live panel.

Sandustry Filter sorting gold from slag on a belt

Situation	Action	Why it is safer
Need research money	Wet Sand → Shaker → Collector	Gold is the only early currency
Need upgrades	Fluxite veins or Emanator later	Purple bar is not gold
Hard wall	Crackstone — rocket, not shovel	Wrong tool wastes the hour
Mixed mystery pile	Scan before fire or water	Slag burns; spores may not

Make the irreversible choice last

Deleting a running washer, dumping lava into a gold pit, or researching a vanity gun before Filters can remove options. Before doing any of those, confirm what the factory keeps if the attempt fails. If the answer is “the line floods,” choose the reversible option first: add a Filter, raise a wall, or pause the launchers.

That same habit makes progress steadier. One secure Collector cycle funds Logistics; a flooded pit repeats the first twenty minutes with no new research.

What do density and state actually change?

Density decides how stacks settle. State (solid / liquid / gas) decides belts vs pipes vs rising steam. Community pages list Sand density 150 and water 100 — useful as a hint, not as a patched databook. Official Filters use an Allow/Block name on one solid, not a density slider.

Avoid turning one creator’s layout into a universal rule. A 44×28 washer works in that cave. Your sand pit may be shallower. Record the context: water on which side, how high the launchers sat, and whether leftover water reached the Shakers.

Wetting is a recipe

Sand + water → Wet Sand is the interaction you must be able to see. If sand sits dry on a lake surface, the contact is wrong.

The useful follow-up is to connect this observation to the wider factory: does it bank more gold, stop a flood, unlock a research door, or only look neat? If it does not answer one of those questions, do not let it pull you off the Collector.

Steam is water in motion

Heat lifts it. Rain may return it. Confirm EA before you delete the only lake.

Which later materials should I not invent names for?

Amethelis, Voidbloom, Fluxite, Scoria, and Cinder are confirmed chains. Full wildlife, artifact, and boss material lists are not. If a Fandom page from Demo season adds extra element names, mark them TBA on this wiki until an EA clip shows the pixel.

A conservative guide matters while EA and Demo wikis sit side by side. Steam confirms the pixel-physics factory, artifacts, and mod tools. It does not publish a complete density table. This site therefore marks unverified costs and chances as TBA instead of inventing a databook.

Fluxite is an upgrade crystal

It is not spent in the research tree. Do not dump it into a Shaker.

If the observed result matters to your next unlock, verify it on the live research panel or compare a short clip in the official Discord. Keep the claim narrow: “this happened in this EA seed” lasts longer than “always 20 percent.”

Lava is a tool and a hazard

It burns slag and makes steam on water. Contain it like a machine, not like scenery.

What should I verify before trusting Materials advice?

Check the current Early Access build before treating a gold chance, research cost, channel name, or “unlimited water” clip as settled. The official Steam page is the source for the game’s premise; sandustry.com is the source for the Discord invite. Demo tutorials can still teach hotkeys and washer shape — they cannot guarantee today’s numbers.

Do01Confirm the claim is about Sandustry, not Mindustry or a sandwich guide
Do02Check whether the clip is Early Access (August 2026+) or a 2025 Demo rewrite leftover
Do03Separate a confirmed system (Shaker, Collector, Fluxite upgrades) from a personal layout
Do04Keep a Collector and a water wall before testing a risky burn or rocket shot
Do05Use buildings wiki when the next decision leaves this page
Do06Use the verified Steam listing or the official Discord for details marked TBA