Black Desert Leveling Guide
In this Black Desert Leveling Guide, we’ll go over all the ways to level in Black Desert, the fastest ways to level up depending on your level and discuss the differences between quests and grinding mobs.
leveling in Black Desert can be confusing, but once you understand the basics, it should be a fun experience. So lets get straight into it:
- New Player or Veteran Starting Zone
- Questing Or Grinding
- Black Desert Leveling Guide
- Level 1-51
- Level 51-52
- Level 52-56
- Level 56-58
- Level 58-61
New Player or Veteran Starting Zone:
As a new player you are very limited to leveling as your are forced into the “New Player” quest route. This is a long series of quests that take you through multiple main quests zones and can be very long. Players who have already level a character already can do:
For New Players:
You will progress through the main story quests from the ancient stone chamber, all the way up through the Mediah Zone. This will take you to around lvl 55 if you choose to follow it all the way.
For Veteran Players:
This is a much faster leveling experience. Once you have completed the main story, your can level your alts here.
You progress through the eternal winter storyline, which only takes a couple of hours and you will finish around 51.
Black Desert Questing Or Grinding
A big question is always “what’s the best way to level in BDO?” and usually the answer is questing where possible. Questing usually revolves around talking to people and travelling from zone to zone, where as grinding can be many hours of tedious grinds for one level.
We highly recommend questing up through either the main story, or through the mountain of eternal winter until at least level 50. From then on grinding can actually become a viable option for black desert leveling. Once you hit around level 58 we would recommend switching back to questing until 60/61 where you go back to grinding. So lets go through each level bracket below with our Black Desert Leveling Guide:
Black Desert Leveling Guide
Level 1-51
For levels 1-50, you level up so fast that solo grinding is not worth the time and you do not have the abilities, gear or rotation to make good use leveling this way. Therefore we highly recommend completing quests.
If you choose to follow the main story quests. You will just choose the quests in your “Main” quest list all the way to at least the Mediah (lvl51) zone. Returning players should take the eternal winter quest line and follow that all the way until it ends, also at level 51.
Level 51-52
Once you reach the Mediah questlines via either completing the main quests or finishing the eternal winter storyline, we’d recommend switching to mob grinding. The Mediah questline is very slow and not as easy as the other main quests. You can still do this if you wish but we would recommend the below grind spot:
The Catfishman camp west of Calpheon is very populated, very easy to grind, very little gear requirement so perfect for new players and will get you to 52, very fast.
Level 52-56
Again you can continue questing, but we’d suggest continuing to grind out these levels. Grinding at these levels is fairly fast, will help you learn your rotation, get loot and levels very fast. It also helps to save side quests for later when the leveling really slows down. You have a few options to grind here and it depends on your gear.
If your gear score is good, we highly recommend Polly Forest. Located North West of Grana in Kamasylvia, this place is incredible for 52-56. There are tons of mobs clustered together that respawn super fast. (perfect if attack power is above AD 160):
If you’re gear is lacking or you’re struggling at Polly Forest, then you could also level at Manes Hideout. Located east of Heidel, it only needs power of AD80 and is much easier, however the mobs are less clustered and leveling is much slower. We’d recommend trying to get some better gear and going Polly Forest, but this zone is still a viable second option:
Level 56-58
If you’ve been leveling at Polly Forest, this is still a great place to continue leveling to 58. However, Desert Naga Temple may be slightly faster if you’re willing to travel to the desert (Requires AD100). From Altinova head north east through the Barhan gateway, into the desert and then north to reach the desert naga temple:
Level 58-61
From level 58, leveling slows down significantly. Grinding mobs is still a perfectly fine way to level. However an insanely fast leveling route was found using quests and it so much faster than any grind spot. The quest line involved doing a long quest to receive an item called a “Chenga Tome” that increases quest XP by 30% and then performing a chain of specific quests all the way from 58 to 61. Rather than repeat all that information here, check out the two guides below for insane quest experience:
Getting the Chenga Tome: Chenga Tome Guide
Specific Quest Chain to follow: Begin here at level 58
If this all seems too complicated, then there is still plenty of grinding to be done and there is nothing wrong with grinding to 61. Some people still use Polly Forest for 58-59, but a better place for these higher levels would be somewhere such as the Blood Wolves, north east of Duvencrune. Requiring power level AP190
Once you hit level 61, you’re at the soft level cap and leveling experience slows down drastically. It becomes more about grinding out items, silver and loot rather than just purely leveling. Hopefully this Black Desert Leveling Guide has helped you find some nice spots to level or make the leveling experience a little smoother. thanks for taking the time to read. Check out our black desert nodes and workers guide below too: