Sortable Crop XP and Profits chart

[Lew Zealand]

Hi everyone! This chart was inspired by this post asking about the best Crops for Farming XP in early game. While there's a singular answer for each season, it's not always optimal just to plant that one crop and be done with it as you may also want to balance g and the amount of effort put in to watering, harvesting, and replanting. This seeks to put all of that data in one sortable chart so you can make you own decisions.

Immediate tl;dr link and example so you can skip the verbal peoplesplaining below:

Stardew Farming XP and Profits

What assumptions are made and game mechanics accounted for in this chart?

1. This is tailored to Year 1 and it uses Farming Level 5 so it's target and the g amounts listed are the average of all the crops you would harvest to reach Farming 5
1a. As your Farming skill increases, so does the g you acquire from Crops as you get more and quality items
1b. As you spend more of your time at Farming Level 4 than 3, and then 2 and so on, this needs to be factored in
1c. So the average price increase over this time period ends up being 1.14x base value, which you will see in the formulas

2. Additional drops are always base value, this applies to Potatoes, Coffee Beans, etc.
2b. This is also reflected in the formulas

3. This assumes the use of Fertilizer after reaching Farming 1
3a. Fertilizer requires only 1 Sap and even in early game you should have a surplus of that
3b. So the regular, , and Crop harvest rates are at base g values for Level 0 and improved Fertilizer g values for Level 1 thru 4 (yes, redundant but I want to make this clear)
3c. This is also factored into the 1.14x base value noted in 1c.

4. Seed costs are factored into the profits
4a. So free Seeds cost nothing and multi-harvest Crops have a single seed cost
4b. Rice Shoots can be a free drop or purchased, there's a line for each

5. Ancient Fruit makes nothing in Spring Year 1, even if you find a seed Day 1
5a. Added in a line for Ancient Fruit in the Greenhouse for comparison (more relevant for Year 2+)

6. Year 2 and Seeds from The Oasis (functionally Year 2) are also there for reference
6a. Strawberry is split into 2 lines as you only get it halfway thru Spring 1 for a total of 2 harvests, Year 2 added for reference

7. Total Tile-Seasons needed to Farming 5 means if you plant this many tiles and replant/harvest the entire season, this many tiles will be needed to get you to Farming Level 5
7a. So only 47 tiles of Cauliflower but with 2 harvests, this is 94 total Cauli plantings
7b. With only 30 tiles of Carrots but with 9 (!) harvests per season, that's 270 (!!) Carrot plantings but of course you won't be able to find 30 Seeds on Day 1 and very likely not 270 over the whole month
7c. However if you could somehow find the g for 40 Green Bean Seeds on Day 1, you'd be set!

8. Lower effort focus: Green shading is reharvestable
8a. Lower effort focus: High harvest/season means more effort, very especially if not reharvestable
8b: Lower effort focus: consider balancing low harvests/season (Cauli with 2, needing 1 replant) with reharvesting only (Green Bean with 6 Harvests)

Summer, Fall, and Winter will come soon, hopefully tomorrow. Please let me know if there are errors and if you think some other assumptions are more relevant for a new player in Year 1. I'll update this and make notes here when necessary and to cover things I've forgotten. Which is likely a lot because that's my thing!

 

[Storm628]

Something that I would personally add, is energy/g ratio. If you sell your parsnips and buy salads, you're losing g. This makes carrots even better, as they are worth a lot in terms of energy.

The chart also makes strawberries look a bit worse than they are. They give pretty good xp/day, even though they only grow half a season. On the other hand, you lose half a day to a festival, so that may balance them out.

 

[Lew Zealand]

Summer is in the table now. Edit: and Fall + Winter, the table is complete now. Notes:

1. Sunflower is treated as a reharvestable as you get on average 1 Seed (0-2 random) per harvest to replant but of course you could get unlucky and get none.

2. The (Sp) and (Su) suffixes are for the season planted, so carrying forward Cactus and Ancient Fruits from Spring are of course wayyy profitable for g and XP

3. Compare Blueberry and Corn. Both give you the same XP/tile but Blueberry is wayyy more profitable and you don't need to replant. This will change next season (see #2 above).

4. Also compare Hot Pepper and Summer Squash. Both give the same XP/tile but you may not have enough Squash Seeds to start though you might if your playstyle covers the map and carry your Hoe everywhere. Both are reharvestable but Squash gives more g profit/tile.

5. Established, producing Ancient Fruit is better than Sweet Gem Berry for g Profit and much better for Farming XP, this was always a question of mine and it's good to know: just fill the Greenhouse with Ancient Fruit and be done with it!

Something that I would personally add, is energy/g ratio. If you sell your parsnips and buy salads, you're losing g. This makes carrots even better, as they are worth a lot in terms of energy.

Once I'm done entering all the data, I'll add this as some crops like Carrots have a strong use case not indicated in the table

The chart also makes strawberries look a bit worse than they are. They give pretty good xp/day, even though they only grow half a season. On the other hand, you lose half a day to a festival, so that may balance them out.

Strawberries are not that great Year 1 because of that very short harvest season, IMO better used as gifts for Maru than selling or Farming XP. And IMO it's also not great Year 2 because you need to sit on those seeds for almost a whole year before you can use them. Problem is you're in early game and g is at a premium, so taking a bunch of hard fought early game g and effectively ignoring it for 7x as long as you've currently played seems not to be sound economic sense. Instead I grow a few for gifts and save 1 Strawberry seed for the Greenhouse. I've never grown them outside in Year 2 or later but have some in the Greenhouse and later at Ginger.

 

[BeenASon]

Summer is in the table now. Edit: and Fall + Winter, the table is complete now. Notes:

1. Sunflower is treated as a reharvestable as you get on average 1 Seed (0-2 random) per harvest to replant but of course you could get unlucky and get none.

2. The (Sp) and (Su) suffixes are for the season planted, so carrying forward Cactus and Ancient Fruits from Spring are of course wayyy profitable for g and XP

3. Compare Blueberry and Corn. Both give you the same XP/tile but Blueberry is wayyy more profitable and you don't need to replant. This will change next season (see #2 above).

4. Also compare Hot Pepper and Summer Squash. Both give the same XP/tile but you may not have enough Squash Seeds to start though you might if your playstyle covers the map and carry your Hoe everywhere. Both are reharvestable but Squash gives more g profit/tile.

5. Established, producing Ancient Fruit is better than Sweet Gem Berry for g Profit and much better for Farming XP, this was always a question of mine and it's good to know: just fill the Greenhouse with Ancient Fruit and be done with it!



Once I'm done entering all the data, I'll add this as some crops like Carrots have a strong use case not indicated in the table



Strawberries are not that great Year 1 because of that very short harvest season, IMO better used as gifts for Maru than selling or Farming XP. And IMO it's also not great Year 2 because you need to sit on those seeds for almost a whole year before you can use them. Problem is you're in early game and g is at a premium, so taking a bunch of hard fought early game g and effectively ignoring it for 7x as long as you've currently played seems not to be sound economic sense. Instead I grow a few for gifts and save 1 Strawberry seed for the Greenhouse. I've never grown them outside in Year 2 or later but have some in the Greenhouse and later at Ginger.

I can never bring myself to gift Strawberries lol. But yeah the harvest time really screwed up a otherwise perfect fruit.

 

[Luna_Tuna]

Hi everyone! This chart was inspired by this post asking about the best Crops for Farming XP in early game. While there's a singular answer for each season, it's not always optimal just to plant that one crop and be done with it as you may also want to balance g and the amount of effort put in to watering, harvesting, and replanting. This seeks to put all of that data in one sortable chart so you can make you own decisions.

Immediate tl;dr link and example so you can skip the verbal peoplesplaining below:

Stardew Farming XP and Profits

View attachment 35110

What assumptions are made and game mechanics accounted for in this chart?

1. This is tailored to Year 1 and it uses Farming Level 5 so it's target and the g amounts listed are the average of all the crops you would harvest to reach Farming 5
1a. As your Farming skill increases, so does the g you acquire from Crops as you get more and quality items
1b. As you spend more of your time at Farming Level 4 than 3, and then 2 and so on, this needs to be factored in
1c. So the average price increase over this time period ends up being 1.14x base value, which you will see in the formulas

2. Additional drops are always base value, this applies to Potatoes, Coffee Beans, etc.
2b. This is also reflected in the formulas

3. This assumes the use of Fertilizer after reaching Farming 1
3a. Fertilizer requires only 1 Sap and even in early game you should have a surplus of that
3b. So the regular, , and Crop harvest rates are at base g values for Level 0 and improved Fertilizer g values for Level 1 thru 4 (yes, redundant but I want to make this clear)
3c. This is also factored into the 1.14x base value noted in 1c.

4. Seed costs are factored into the profits
4a. So free Seeds cost nothing and multi-harvest Crops have a single seed cost
4b. Rice Shoots can be a free drop or purchased, there's a line for each

5. Ancient Fruit makes nothing in Spring Year 1, even if you find a seed Day 1
5a. Added in a line for Ancient Fruit in the Greenhouse for comparison (more relevant for Year 2+)

6. Year 2 and Seeds from The Oasis (functionally Year 2) are also there for reference
6a. Strawberry is split into 2 lines as you only get it halfway thru Spring 1 for a total of 2 harvests, Year 2 added for reference

7. Total Tile-Seasons needed to Farming 5 means if you plant this many tiles and replant/harvest the entire season, this many tiles will be needed to get you to Farming Level 5
7a. So only 47 tiles of Cauliflower but with 2 harvests, this is 94 total Cauli plantings
7b. With only 30 tiles of Carrots but with 9 (!) harvests per season, that's 270 (!!) Carrot plantings but of course you won't be able to find 30 Seeds on Day 1 and very likely not 270 over the whole month
7c. However if you could somehow find the g for 40 Green Bean Seeds on Day 1, you'd be set!

8. Lower effort focus: Green shading is reharvestable
8a. Lower effort focus: High harvest/season means more effort, very especially if not reharvestable
8b: Lower effort focus: consider balancing low harvests/season (Cauli with 2, needing 1 replant) with reharvesting only (Green Bean with 6 Harvests)

Summer, Fall, and Winter will come soon, hopefully tomorrow. Please let me know if there are errors and if you think some other assumptions are more relevant for a new player in Year 1. I'll update this and make notes here when necessary and to cover things I've forgotten. Which is likely a lot because that's my thing!

this is pretty helpful, how long did this take?

 

[Storm628]

Strawberries are not that great Year 1 because of that very short harvest season, IMO better used as gifts for Maru than selling or Farming XP. And IMO it's also not great Year 2 because you need to sit on those seeds for almost a whole year before you can use them. Problem is you're in early game and g is at a premium, so taking a bunch of hard fought early game g and effectively ignoring it for 7x as long as you've currently played seems not to be sound economic sense. Instead I grow a few for gifts and save 1 Strawberry seed for the Greenhouse. I've never grown them outside in Year 2 or later but have some in the Greenhouse and later at Ginger.

I'm also not the biggest strawberry fan. However, if I want to have quality sprinklers in summer, they are one of the few crops to help me get there. Once I have enough regular sprinklers for the kale to get me from level 2 to 6, I have enough sprinklers for the rest of summer.

 

[Lew Zealand]

this is pretty helpful, how long did this take?

Thanks, I hope it ends up a useful tool for making crop decisions! It took me a few hours, most of it troubleshooting the math differences between 0.2% or 5% or 214% extra crop drops adding to profits but not to farming XP, and how many different crops have different planting and harvesting behaviors as well as carrying forward a season.

 

[Luna_Tuna]

Thanks, I hope it ends up a useful tool for making crop decisions! It took me a few hours, most of it troubleshooting the math differences between 0.2% or 5% or 214% extra crop drops adding to profits but not to farming XP, and how many different crops have different planting and harvesting behaviors as well as carrying forward a season.

I respect the dedication lol I’ll use this when I figure out how to get ancient fruit

 

[BeenASon]

I respect the dedication lol I’ll use this when I figure out how to get ancient fruit

Who's gonna tell this guy? Not me.