Building a new base is one of the most important things you’ll need to do in Subnautica, so picking a good place to build rather than a based place is important. This guide will show you three different locations with various benefits to building near them.
First location
To get to the first location, start from the coral tube that sticks out of the water and head about two notches to the right of the northwest on the compass until you reach a grassy plateau area next to the underwater islands.
There are a few reasons this spot is a good spot to build; one of the reasons is because of how much space there is in the area. There’s plenty of space for you to build your base, especially with large rooms; you’ll need a lot of space to build your base.
There aren’t many threats or any threats at all in this area, so it’s relatively safe aside from sand sharks.
And there are also a lot of sandstone outcrops you can find around the biome too. So you will have a good source of gold and lead as well.
The last reason is that there are Underwater islands right next to this location and three heat zones at the bottom of the underwater Islands. If you place thermal plants near them and use power transmitters to connect them to your base, you will have an infinite and good power source depending on how many you place and connect.
Second location
You can reach the next base building location by using the same starting point as before and heading southwest until you Reach the sparse reef biome.
The sparse reef has benefits similar to the building as the previous spot but just slightly different. Like the last spot, the sparse reef is spacious, so you will have plenty of room to build your base in almost any direction. You can make your base as big as you’d like. Although the sparse reef isn’t as well-lit as the other biomes, you might have to build floodlights around your base to make things seem more lively.
Now while you can’t find sandstone outcrops here, you can find limestone and shale outcrops. You’ll be able to get copper or titanium from limestone and gold, diamonds, or lithium from shale outcrops if you can find them.
You can find sacks throughout the caves of the sparse reef as well. And you can find rubies in the caves as well. Regarding resources, the sparse reef is richer than the previous location.
There aren’t any threats in the sparse reef; the only thing that can hurt you are tiger plants which you can easily avoid if they start shooting spines at you.
Third location
The last spot is probably the safest spot to build in the game. You have to use the same coral tube starting point and head about one notch to the right of the northeast until you reach an open area in the safe shallows biome.
The last place is in the safe shallows; this specific spot is safe and pretty balanced in terms of the stuff it offers. The only threat you might encounter here is crash fish; they can come out of their nests to charge at you and explode when you are exploring the caves of the safe shallow. But they are pretty easy to avoid.
You will find mostly limestone outcrops in the caves, but you can rarely find sandstone outcrops. Throughout the surface of the biome, you will be able to find a plethora of acid mushrooms that you can use as biofuel for the bioreactor, so that’s a good starting power source as well.
Like the second spot, this location has a heat zone to draw thermal energy. Although it isn’t s good as the one at the 2nd location, it’s still an energy source you can utilize if you decide to build here.
You can find the heat zone by staring from that area in the safe shallow and heading about 2 notches to the right of the northwest on the compass until you reach a heat zone underground. You will be able to see smoke coming from a large hole as you start to get near it, so it should be easy to spot when you’re near it.
