On this page7 sections
- Build a Stonecutter (10
Wood, 2 
Iron, 4 
Stone) as soon as you smelt your first Iron. - Stone climbs well but cannot extend sideways: support every span with Wood Iron Beams or the ground.
- Wood cannot hold Stone up, so never put a stone wall on a wooden floor.
- Build the iron skeleton first, then clad it in stone, then roof it with wood.
- Mine Stone in the Mountain and bring it home through a
Portal.
Why Stone Changes Everything
Stone is the first upgrade that makes a base feel permanent. After watching wooden walls rot in the rain, your first stone wall is satisfying: stone ignores rain, resists fire and frost, and has 1,500 durability, several times tougher than basic wood.
Not just better wood
Stone has its own quirks. It is very strong vertically but useless horizontally without iron support: a stone floor extended from a wall with nothing beneath it collapses instantly. That single rule shapes every stone design.
When to switch
Stone unlocks in the Swamp tier, once you smelt Iron and build a Stonecutter, just as raids get tougher. Most players move their main crafting hall to stone and keep wood for secondary buildings and roofing, the smartest use of resources.
Stonecutter Recipe
WorkbenchUnlocking Stone: The Stonecutter
You build the Stonecutter at a Workbench. Its Iron cost means visiting the Swamp, mining 
Scrap Iron from Muddy Scrap Piles in Sunken Crypts and smelting it. Two bars is trivial, but it gates the whole stone tier behind Swamp progression.
Placement
The Stonecutter has only 200 durability and takes rain damage, so put it under a roof. It needs cover only to craft, not for you to place stone pieces around it. You must stay within its radius while building, so big projects may need several 
Stonecutters, or you can move one as you work.
Other unlocks
- The Hearth (15 Stone), a large stone fireplace.
- Paved Roads with the
Hoe. 
Black Marble and 
Grausten pieces in later biomes.
Your first 2 Iron bars should go toward the Stonecutter, not weapons or armor. A stone base protects everything else you build, and you will be farming far more Iron in the Swamp anyway. Getting your Stonecutter up early means you can start upgrading your Meadows base while you continue running crypts.
StoneMaterial · MeadowsTeleportable and abundant: the only material stone pieces need
- Weight
- 2
- Stack size
- 50
Stone Building Piece Recipes
Stone Piece Dimensions & Best Uses
| Stat | Stone Floor 2x2 | Stone Wall 4x2 | Stone Wall 2x1 | Stone Wall 1x1 | Stone Pillar |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Size | 2x2x1 | 4x2x1 | 2x1x1 | 1x1x1 | 1x1x2 |
| Cost | 6 Stone | 6 Stone | 4 Stone | 3 Stone | 5 Stone |
| Best For | Foundations, raised floors | Exterior walls (most efficient) | Half-walls, window openings | Gap filling, detail work | Vertical support, corners |
Stone Structure Properties (All Pieces)
| Durability | 1,500 HP |
| Max Support | 1,000 |
| Min Support | 100 |
| Vertical Loss | 1/8 per connection |
| Horizontal Loss | 1/1 (100%) |
| Damaged by Rain | No |
| Weak To | Pickaxe |
| Resistant To | Fire, Frost |
| Immune To | Poison, Spirit |
Understanding Stone Stability
Every material has a MaxSupport, a MinSupport and loss values. Stone's MaxSupport of 1,000 dwarfs wood's 100, so grounded stone is extremely stable. But its horizontal loss is 1/1: a stone piece loses all support extending sideways from another stone piece.
You cannot cantilever stone
A Stone Floor on top of a stone wall works fine, since that is a vertical connection (1/8 loss). Extend a Stone Floor sideways from another raised Stone Floor and it collapses. That is why stone towers are easy and stone bridges impossible without iron.
What blue really means
- Blue: maximum support for that material, from ground contact or a much stronger material below.
- Green: good support with room to build.
- Yellow and orange: running low.
- Red: one more piece and it breaks.
Blue does not always mean touching the ground. A wooden piece on a solid stone foundation reads blue because it carries the most support wood can hold.
Wood cannot hold stone
Stone's MinSupport is 100, exactly wood's maximum. A stone wall on a wooden floor collapses because the wood cannot pass on more than 100. Support stone with iron or ground contact only.
“Stone is the strongest wall material you will use for most of the game, but it is completely dependent on iron beams and ground contact. Think of stone as the muscle and iron as the skeleton.
Building Material Stability Comparison
| Stat | Wood | Core Wood (Log) | Stone | Iron (Wood Iron) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Max Support | 100 | 140 | 1,000 | 1,500 |
| Min Support | 10 | 10 | 100 | 20 |
| Vertical Loss | 1/8 | 1/10 | 1/8 | 1/13 |
| Horizontal Loss | 1/5 | 1/6 | 1/1 (100%) | 1/13 |
How to Build a Two-Story Stone Structure
- 1
Flatten the ground and plan your layout
Use the Hoe to level the terrain where your structure will go. Uneven ground causes inconsistent stability, where some pieces register as touching the ground and others do not. Walk slowly with the Hoe equipped: if the placement circle suddenly disappears, you have found a dip that needs raising. Plan your footprint first and mark the corners with temporary wooden poles.
- 2
Build the iron beam skeleton first
Place Wood Iron Poles at each corner, touching the ground so they show blue. Burying them deeper adds nothing. These are your primary supports. Each pole costs 2 Wood and 1 Iron and needs a Forge nearby. Space them no more than 3 floor tiles apart. The iron skeleton goes up first, then you clad it in stone: the single most important stone building technique.
- 3
Place ground-level stone floors and walls
Lay Stone Floor 2x2 pieces on the ground, making sure they touch the terrain. Each floor piece touching ground gets the full 1,000 MaxSupport. Build Stone Wall 4x2 pieces around the perimeter for maximum coverage with minimal material cost (6 Stone covers a 4x2 area). Stack Stone Pillars at the corners for additional vertical support.
- 4
Add horizontal iron beams for second-floor support
At the height where your second floor will go, place Wood Iron Beams horizontally between your vertical iron poles. These beams have incredible horizontal stability (only 1/13 loss both vertically and horizontally) and will support the stone floors above them. You can hide these beams inside the stone walls with careful placement. Connect them to ground-contact poles for maximum stability transfer.
- 5
Place second-floor stone pieces
With your iron framework in place, lay Stone Floor 2x2 pieces on the second level. They will inherit support from the iron beams below. Work from the corners inward, as corner pieces that touch two iron supports get better stability through the dual-support calculation. Continue adding walls and pillars for the second story. With proper iron beam spacing, you can comfortably build a ground floor plus two additional stories using only stone walls.
- 6
Cap with a wooden or thatch roof
Stone does not have its own roof pieces, so you will need to use Thatch, Shingle, or Darkwood roofing. Since wooden pieces sitting on stone inherit maximum wood stability, your roof will be perfectly stable. This is actually an advantage, as wooden roofs are lighter on resources and come in more shapes. Just remember that roofing pieces are damaged by rain, so check them periodically.
The most common stone building mistake is placing walls before the iron skeleton. If you build stone walls first and then try to add iron beams afterward, the beams often will not snap correctly to the stone, or they will be visible on the wrong side. Always build your iron support frame first and clad it in stone second. It saves time, materials, and frustration.
Iron Support Beam Recipes
IronMaterial · Swamp1 bar per Wood Iron Beam or Pole; cannot go through Portals
- Weight
- 12
- Stack size
- 30
- Teleportable
- No
Farming Stone Efficiently
Stone building eats Stone fast. An 8x8 room needs around 150 Stone for walls plus 96 for the floor, and a two-story build easily passes 500. Luckily Stone is abundant and teleportable, so mine it anywhere and portal it home.
Best sources
Rock deposits in the Mountain and large stone formations in most biomes. A 
Bronze Pickaxe or better makes short work of them.
Copper deposits in the Black Forest, which drop plenty of Stone as a byproduct.- Enemies:
Greydwarfs (1), 
Greydwarf Brutes (2) and 
Stone Golems (5 to 10). Much slower than mining. - Loose stones on the ground, picked up by hand. They do not respawn.
For serious projects, the Mountain is the best spot: its terrain is almost entirely mineable rock. Bring a cart or set up a Portal.
Advanced Stone Building Techniques
Raised terrain pillars
Raise a pillar of terrain with the Hoe inside your structure: any stone touching it gets the full 1,000 support for no Iron. Hide it in a chimney or hearth vent. This is ideal for second-floor Hearths, which break instantly on unsupported wooden floors.
Dual support for open floors
When two parent supports sit at least 100 degrees apart and both below a piece, the game uses only VerticalLoss (1/8) instead of HorizontalLoss (1/1). A Stone Floor between two iron poles on opposite sides counts as vertical support. With iron at the corners only, you can build unsupported stone floors up to 7x7 tiles (14x14 meters).
Buried iron beams
- Snap a half-height wooden wall into the ground.
- Attach Stone Floors to it.
- Snap Wood Iron Beams to the underside of those floors.
The beams end up buried in the terrain, invisible, while giving full iron support above. The building looks like it rests directly on the ground.
Stone vs Other Building Materials
Stone is the first material that resists fire, ignores rain and survives mid-game raids, but it is not the last word in construction.
Stone vs wood
Stone has 1,500 HP against around 400 for basic wood structures and never decays. The tradeoffs: it needs iron for anything beyond ground-level walls, and it has no roof pieces. Almost every stone build is a hybrid:
- Stone for the first floor and exterior walls.
- An iron beam skeleton underneath.
- Core Wood for structural beams.
- Wood or Darkwood for roofing and interior details.
Later materials
Black Marble (Mistlands) shares stone's support range of 100 to 1,500 with better horizontal loss (1/2 instead of 1/1). Grausten from the Ashlands goes further, with 2,000 MaxSupport and 1/3 horizontal loss. Stone stays useful even in late-game builds because it is so cheap and abundant.
Iron is far too valuable to waste on building walls. Each Wood Iron Beam or Pole costs 1 Iron bar, and you will need dozens for a proper skeleton. Only use iron for structural support beams, never as a visible wall material. Stone walls cost zero Iron and provide excellent protection. Save your Iron for gear upgrades and essential structural support only.
Stone Building FAQ
Can I build a stone roof?
No. Valheim has no stone roof pieces. You must use Thatch, Shingle, Darkwood, or Grausten roofing. The good news is that wooden roof pieces on stone walls will show blue stability since wood's MaxSupport (100) is easily met by stone's high support value.
Why are some of my stone pieces blue and others green?
Blue means maximum support for that material. Pieces directly touching the ground are always blue. Pieces one step above ground show green. If some pieces at the same height show different colors, you likely have uneven terrain, meaning some pieces are registering as ground contact while others are not. Use the Hoe to raise the earth at connection points to fix this.
How tall can I build with stone?
With proper iron beam support from ground level, you can build a ground floor plus two full additional stories. Without iron, stone alone allows roughly two stories of walls directly on the ground before pieces start turning orange. Using the raised terrain technique or additional iron support poles extends your vertical reach further.
Do I need a Stonecutter nearby to repair stone?
Yes, the Stonecutter must be within range to both build and repair stone structures. Keep one near your main base at all times. Repairs cost no materials, just the station proximity.
Can enemies destroy stone walls?
Yes, but it takes significant effort. Stone walls have 1,500 HP and are resistant to fire and frost. Most Swamp-tier enemies will barely scratch them. 
Trolls with their log clubs are the main threat in the mid-game. Stone is neutral to blunt, slash, and pierce damage, so enemies like Fulings can chip away at it over long raids, but a well-maintained stone base will hold up far better than wood.
Recent Updates
- Updated for Valheim 1.0: verified Stone sources and recipes, fixed support advice, and reorganised the guide for easier reading.