ARC Raiders Leveling Guide

The only way to make your character better at different things is by investing in different branches of a Skill Tree. You get one skill point per level, so you’re going to have farm levels a lot to make a build that you really want. This ARC Raiders leveling guide breaks down exactly how experience works, how to earn it efficiently, and what to avoid to make your journey through Speranza smoother. This is going to help you prioritize and plan your progression, avoiding the feeling of being stuck even when you lose.

And if progression still feels too slow, you can use ARC Raiders Leveling Service at Skycoach, where skilled players will handle the grind for you—saving your time and letting you focus on building the perfect setup with all the skill points you need.

Read our other ARC Raiders guides:

• Beginner's Guide
• Best Builds
• How to Farm Coins
• Best Settings
• Weapons Tier List

 

 

ARC Raiders Leveling Overview

The ARC Raiders max level is 75. Luckily, every action in ARC Raiders contributes to your experience total. 

You might expect to gain XP for kills or quest completion, but there are way more sources than just these two. In fact, there’s a whole complicated system that calculates your XP at the end of a raid that takes into account far more than just kills. Thanks to it, you’re not limited to just “being good” at the game; you can earn XP and level up focusing on what you like to do the most and playing the way you like.

That’s why experience accumulation is divided into four major sources: quests, combat and looting, time in raid and extraction, and weekly trials. Each of these contributes differently, and learning how to balance them is what separates slow progress from rapid advancement. And we’re going to break them all down in this guide.

How XP Is Calculated in ARC Raiders

If you want to understand how to level up fast in ARC Raiders, you first need to understand how XP is calculated. 

Every completed raid ends with a detailed summary screen showing how your total XP is distributed across several categories. These categories define how the game tracks your progress and make it easy to see where most of your experience comes from.

The five XP categories shown on the post-raid results screen are:

• Scavenged – XP from searching containers, corpses, and ARC fragments
• Damaged ARC – XP from inflicting damage on ARC enemies
• Destroyed ARC – XP from delivering the killing blow to ARC units
• Time on Surface – XP earned for staying alive during a raid (roughly 181 XP per minute)
• Safe Return Bonus – XP granted for successfully extracting from the surface

Each value is added together to form your total raid XP, and that’s how you get the XP that you get. Let’s break it all down with an example: a 16-minute 26-second run generated 2,977 XP from time on surface, confirming the rate of about 181 XP per minute, plus 1,147 XP from a successful extraction. In the same session, scavenging contributed 2,000 XP, damage to ARC enemies added 557 XP, and destroying them provided 200 XP, for a total of 6,881 XP.

At low levels, every rank requires 10,000 XP to level up. One skill point is awarded per level gained, and this pace continues until you reach the confirmed level cap of 75. Because XP is added cumulatively from every category, your results will vary depending on playstyle: longer survival and thorough looting can often outperform pure combat-heavy runs.

Understanding this calculation makes it easier to plan efficient ARC Raiders XP farming. Every minute survived and every container searched directly increases your progression, turning consistent play and safe extractions into the most reliable way to reach higher levels quickly.

XP Sources and Their Values

There’s no single best way to earn XP in ARC Raiders. First off, quests are a very reliable way to gain XP once you move past the introductory missions. Not every early quest grants experience, but later ones begin to reward anywhere from 5,000 to over 30,000 XP, depending on difficulty. Quest XP is granted on completion and stacks with any XP gained during the raid itself. Unfortunately, though, some of these quests require pretty specific things like killing ARC with grenades. Later quests get progressively more complex, so a lot of players new to extraction games might struggle with them. BLOG20

Combat XP scales based on both the damage dealt and the type of enemy destroyed. Fighting ARC enemies provides steady growth since every point of damage contributes to your total. Smaller ARC types, such as Wasps, yield around 100 XP for a kill and roughly 300 XP from damage dealt. Mid-tier enemies like Hornets grant a few hundred more. Heavy units like Rocketeers reward about 500 XP from the kill and can provide several thousand more through damage due to their higher armor and health pools.

Scavenging is another substantial XP source. Each container searched provides roughly 200 to 500 XP, depending on rarity and danger level. Standard bodies or small containers sit around 200 XP. Looting a Rocketeer corpse or an airdrop container can grant up to 500 XP per seARCh, and since these large enemies break into multiple pieces, you can earn up to 2,000 XP from looting a single fallen ARC. The system also counts partial searches, meaning you can open a container, cancel immediately, and still earn XP. If you are in a squad, you can gain XP from containers your teammates open as long as you interact with them afterward.

Simply staying alive in the raid also matters. Every minute spent topside provides roughly 181 XP. Upon a successful extraction, you gain an additional bonus ranging from 1,000 to 2,000 XP depending on your time survived, activity, and loot value. Dying before extraction forfeits this bonus and any progress not banked through meta systems, making survival a key part of efficient leveling.

Below is a reference table summarizing current XP ranges:

The final source is Trials—weekly challenges of varying difficulty that test your performance and place you on Speranza’s leaderboards. These trials are expected to grant significant rewards, including XP, materials, and leaderboard recognition. While their final values have not been officially published, it is clear they represent long-term progression events beyond regular raids.

How To Farm XP in ARC Raiders

Efficient leveling requires clear planning before you even step topside. Before launching into a raid, select a quest that aligns with what you intend to do. If you are hunting ARC units, take a contract requiring kills of specific types such as Wasps or Hornets. If you prefer to play stealthy or focus on scavenging, choose objectives that reward looting containers or collecting materials.

Always carry enough ammunition and healing items. Engaging multiple ARC types inevitably creates noise that draws other players, leading to extended firefights. Successful engagements with both ARC and Raiders yield heavy XP, but surviving them is essential to keep your progress. For quiet loot runs, focus on low-traffic areas with dense container clusters.

Salvaging is another overlooked element that ties into efficient progression. Many quests require common materials such as Fabric. These can be obtained not only through looting topside but also by salvaging stored items back in Speranza. Salvaging in your stash typically yields more resources than doing it mid-raid, helping conserve time and inventory space.

ARC Raiders skill tree leveling, in a certain way, is important. The Conditioning skill tree contains Proficient Pryor, which reduces breaching time for doors and containers. Faster breaches allow you to loot more containers in the same window. Gentle Pressure reduces noise from breaching, but most players consider investing a single point sufficient, as the payoff diminishes quickly beyond that. Under the Survival tree, Looter’s Instinct is one of the best perks in the game for XP farming—it increases looting speed across all container types, giving you more time to move and less exposure during looting sequences.

During raids, search every body and ARC fragment you encounter. You don’t need to fully loot each one—simply initiating a seARCh is enough to trigger the XP reward. Many ARC types disintegrate into multiple lootable parts, each providing its own XP reward. Even if most loot has already been taken by others, the act of searching still contributes to your XP total.

If you join a raid already in progress—sometimes you will spawn with only 17 minutes left instead of 30—many containers may have been looted. Even so, it’s worth visiting them for partial XP credit. Over time, this repetitive action adds up and keeps your progression consistent.

For PvP enthusiasts, the XP system is equally rewarding. Eliminating enemy Raiders grants 500 XP per kill, with an additional 250 XP for assists. The damage dealt to them before elimination contributes even more, typically adding up to about 500 XP per player kill on average. Looting their bodies provides another 500 XP per seARCh, meaning a single skirmish with three kills can easily net around 4,500 XP before even accounting for damage dealt to ARC units, containers looted, and extraction bonuses.

To summarize the optimal XP loop:

1. Accept a quest that matches your raid goal.
2. Bring sufficient ammo, heals, and utility items.
3. Target both ARC enemies and Raiders for damage-based XP.
4. Search every container and body for extra experience.
5. Use skill tree nodes that improve looting and reduce breach noise.
6. Stay alive and extract to secure the 1,000–2,000 XP survival bonus.

Consistently following this routine can yield 5,000 to 10,000 XP per safe raid, with high-intensity sessions reaching far more when combined with quest completions.

ARC Raiders Leveling Tips and Tricks

Being an extraction game, albeit quite casual compared to other titles in the same genre, you play with high stakes – losing all your gear on death is the most obvious cause of players quitting before getting to the more comfortable place where they can enjoy the game. Missed timing when you come to a POI to loot just to find yourself surrounded and overwhelmed by another team is another common hurdle in this kind of game. And only veteran extraction shooter players have no “loot fear”, which lets them keep grinding to get to a higher level. So, the following five ARC Raiders leveling tips summarize the most effective ways to maximize XP while surviving consistently if you’re new to this type of game.

1. Prioritize Survival Over Speed
   Always extract safely instead of chasing risky kills or loot. Dying cancels your extraction bonus and wastes the XP from the entire run. Consistent safe returns of 4,000–6,000 XP add up much faster than occasional high-risk 15,000-XP raids that end in failure.
2. Plan Each Raid Before Moving
   Open your map immediately after spawning. Locate your position, check the timer, and mark extraction routes before heading out. A quick 10-second plan prevents disorientation, helps manage carry weight, and keeps you from losing XP through poor positioning.
3. Avoid Unprepared Fights
   Only engage enemies you can confidently defeat. Rocketeers and other heavy ARC types drop great XP but consume vast resources and generate noise that can attract other Raiders. Bring enough ammunition, heals, and shields before tackling them.
4. Use Your Time Efficiently
   Time on the surface awards about 181 XP per minute, so even careful movement is rewarded. Combine this passive gain with scavenging and safe extraction for steady progression instead of sprinting through objectives.
5. Stay Consistent and Patient BLOG20
   Treat every successful extraction as a win, even small ones. Regular 5,000-XP raids will advance your level faster over time than risky plays that end in defeat. ARC Raiders rewards consistency, not recklessness.

After a while, you’re going to get used to the game and its dangers. Just don’t rush – even though casual, this is still an extraction game where you lose everything on death.

ARC Raiders Levels Give You More Than Just Skill Points

Leveling feeds into the broader progression ecosystem. Every level earned from ARC Raiders quest XP rewards or other sources grants one skill point, letting you advance through Conditioning, Mobility, or Survival trees. Beyond personal level progression, there are other systems influencing growth:

1. Mastery Challenges: Independent progression lines rewarding long-term goals like defeating specific ARC units or performing extractions.
2. Raider Decks: Cosmetic battle-pass-style progression offering skins and visual rewards through Cred expenditure.
3. Expedition Projects: Optional prestige resets that allow experienced players to reset progress for permanent bonuses or seasonal rewards.

These systems don’t directly provide XP but heavily affect the rhythm of long-term advancement.

Conclusion

Leveling in ARC Raiders is not about a single method but a complete approach that values combat, looting, survival, and planning equally. Quests deliver major XP injections, but consistent raiding and smart extraction habits define your long-term growth. Kill ARC units for steady damage-based XP, loot every container and corpse you can, and always plan to extract safely. The difference between an underleveled Raider and a high-level survivor often comes down to discipline, preparation, and consistency. Keep your routes efficient, your skill points optimized, and your extractions clean—and you’ll rise through Speranza’s ranks faster than you think.

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