Mining in Elite is a good way to make money in game, though it is a bit slower than bounty hunting and other means of making money.

Technically it could be classified under trading, and it does affect your trading rank.

You can mine in any ship, assuming you have the correct setup.

There are a total of 4 types of mining:

Basic Surface Mining, Advanced Surface Mining, Subsurface Mining and Deep Core Mining.

The required hardware for each style of mining is listed below.

For any type of mining the following is required:

• Cargo Space - So you can hold what you refine while mining
  
• A Refinery - So you can refine chunks that you pick up

For Basic Surface Mining, the following additional hardware is required

• Mining Laser - Blasts chunks off of an asteroid
  

For Advanced Surface Mining, the following additional harware is required

• Abrasion Blaster - Blasts off chunks from surface deposits on an asteroid
  

For Subsurface Mining, the following additional hardware is required

• Sub-Surface Displacement MIssile - Allows you to access subsurface deposits in an asteroid
  

For Deep Core Mining, the following additional hardware is required

• Seismic Charge Launcher - Allows you to break apart an asteroid to access the ore at the core
  

For assisting in mining and making your life easier, the following hardware is recommended:
(For all limpet controllers, a more detailed explanation of their workings is further in the guide)

• Collector Limpet Controller - Sends limpets to chase after bits so you dont have to
  
• Prospector Limpet Controller - When attached to asteroid, shows ore makeup and internal structures and fissures, if any are present

NOTICE: If you plan to do anything other than Basic surface mining, a Prospector Limpet Controller and Pulse Wave Analyzer is required

Before heading out to mine, make sure you have the correct hardware for the type of mining intended.

All Mining Tools come in 2 sizes, Small (Size 1) and Medium (Size 2). The exception being the Seismic Charge Launcher, which only comes in Medium (Size 2) and the Pulse Wave Analyzer, which takes up a utility slot.

Mining tools take up one hardpoint on a ship. The only noticable difference between the two sizes is the speed at which they break off chunks, the power draw, and the ammo capacity of tools that require it.

Some Mining Tools come as fixed or turreted. Turreted Tools are used in multicrew, your gunner position will have control of them.

If you are alone using turreted mining tools, navigate in your right side menu and switch turret mode to forward fire to use them like normal fixed mining tools.

Refineries are a bit complex. The higher the grade and size of refineries dictate 2 features that are important to keep track of:

• Bin count - refers to the amount of bins that the refinery has available to store ore to refine. In a simpler sense it dictates how many different types of ore you can be refining at any one time. The best refineries have 10 bins
  
• Power Draw - an important thing to keep in mind. The better the refinery, the more power it takes to run. You need to balance your power usage with bin amount, so your ship doesnt turn off critical modules whenever you try to mine.

!IMPORTANT!

When you target a chunk, it will say that it is comprised of __% one ore and __% another ore. When you collect a chunk, the ore it is made up of will be seperated into the refinery bins.

The percentage the chunk showed is how much it will fill a bin. So if you collect a chunck that is made of 13% Gallite and 2% Silver, it will fill a refinery bin 13% with gallite, and another bin 2% with silver.

Once the bin reaches 100% of an ore, it will then be refined into 1 unit (ton) of that ore, and it will place it in your cargo inventory. This will empty that bin, freeing it to be used by more ore.

There are 4 types of rings: ROCKY, METAL RICH, METALLIC, and ICY. Each one has its own type of resources that you can't find in any other ring type. These classifications also apply to belts.

You can find out what type of ring a planet has by going into system view, selecting the planet and then selecting the info tab on the left side of the screen. Scrolling down, it will list what type the rings of the planet are.

• Rocky Rings - typically are rich in mineral type ore, things like Gallite, Lepidolite or Bertrandite. Typically minerals do not sell for very high. However, some missions may require you to mine a decent amount of minerals, and the payouts are many times more than what you would get if you were to just sell the minerals on the market.
  
  
• Metal Rich Rings - are kind of an in-between of rocky ring and a metallic ring. They have a mix of metallic ore and mineral ore. You can find most mineral ores here, along with some more common metallic ore, such as Indium or Gallium. You can also find rare metal ore, like Silver or Gold. Metallic ore sells for a decent bit more than mineral ores.
  
  
• Metallic Rings - are the second best type of ring to mine. These types of rings are decently rare. They contain a small amount of mineral ore and large amounts of of metallic ore. You are more likely to find rare ore in these belts, such as Painite, which sells for 40k a ton.
  
  
• Icy Rings - These are THE best type of ring to mine. They have their own sets of minerals ores, which can only be found in icy rings. You can mine water from these rings, along with a large number of rare ores like Low Temperature Diamonds, Void Opals, and Alexandrite.

A very important thing to look at when scouting out a system to mine in is system reserves. This essentially means how depleted the ore reserves are in the system.

This can be found by opening the system map, selecting the info tab and selecting a planet. Even a planet without rings will tell you reserve status. Reserve status is uniform throughout a system.

There are 5 reserve states: Pristine, Major, Normal, Low, and Depleted. These are from best to worst, respectively.

Most of the time anything normal and above is a good mining spot. Pristine reserves are decently rare finds. These are the best spots to mine, as it increases the chance that you will find rare ore.

Any system outside of human occupied space is pristine. The trade off being that you have to fly a bit to get out there.

It is possible to scan planetary rings, which will show you where the ring's 'Hot Spots' are. These hot spots will have asteroids that contain better/rare ore and you are more likely to find asteroids that can be deep core mined.

Finding ring hotspots requires you have a Detailed Surface Scanner module installed. This will take up an internal slot.

Once you have selected a system and a planet ring to mine, fly towards it in supercruise. Fly until you are about 2 LS from the planet. Slow down to slowest speed and trigger your Detailed Surface Scanner.

Launch a probe so that it will land in the ring you want to mine in. Once the probe makes contact, you will see a scan line race around the entire ring.

After the scan finishes, the game will highlight the ring hotspots in a orange-ish color. Additionally, these hotspots will become visible in your navigation panel, and you can target them as a drop location. Hotspots wil also show what ore is in high quantity.

Once a ring has been scanned, you will not need to rescan it, even if you leave the system and come back. You still need a Surface Scanner installed to see the hotspots.

NOTICE: As people mine in a system/planet ring, hotspots will become depleted and disappear. This can happen extremely quickly if a nearby statioon is having a 'Gold Rush', which is something that can happen since the introduction of Chapter Four.

Pulse Wave Analyzer - allows you to scan sections of the asteroid field and highlights asteroids that may have fissures/deposits (Takes up a utility slot)

Switch to Analysis Mode and deploy hardpoints. Switch to the firegroup with the PWA (Pulse Wave Analyzer). Click the approptiate fire key once.

You will notice the asteroids will become covered in a blocky pattern. After a few seconds, asteroids that have deposits will glow anywhere between yellow to red. This glow will last for a few seconds. You can use this time to point your ship at the asteroid and fire off a Prospector Limpet.

The intesity at which the rocks glow determines the amount of 'interests' on the asteroid.
A low/subtle glow normally indicates maybe one or two deposits that have low volume.


Extremely bright glowing is an indicator of large deposits/fissures.


You can trigger the next pulse after the bar under the PWA empties. You have unlimited pulses, so use them as much as possible.

When mining you may have to work on bin allocation, especially if you have a refinery with a smaller number of bins

During normal running, the refinery will automatically assign ore to a bin. Occasionally, you may pick up a type of ore and not have a free bin. Your ship will alert you by displaying 'ORE UNALLOCATED' in the bottom left

To allocate, go into your right hand menu
Navigate to the ship invetory screen and then down to refinery.
From there you can select bin to allocate ore.

If you don't have any free bins, selecting a bin will vent whatever ore is in it. This is done to free up space for the other ore that is waiting for a bin.

You will have to allocate ore alot if your refinery only has 2 or 3 bins. This is why I recommend getting one with 6 or more bins. (Not all ships can run these)

This is the easiest/fastest way of mining. Returns/yield are rather low(~5 - 20% per chunk), but if you are starting out this is a good introduction.

Step 1: Deploy hardpoints and your cargo scoop
Step 2: Switch to mining lasers (if you haven't already)
Step 3: Fly to the nearest rock until your mining lasers are in range
Step 4: Fire your mining lasers at the rock, it will break off chunks
Step 5: Target the chunk. It will tell you what it is comprised of
Step 6: Chase after the chunk and capture it using your cargo scoop
Rinse and repeat steps 4 thru 6.
After the asteroid stops giving off chunks, fly to the next asteroid and repeat the process.

This is the next fastest way to mine. The chunks dropped from surface deposits are normally larger (~35 - 60% per chunk) than those dropped from basic surface mining, so return/Yield is much better than Basic Surface Mining, but is still lower than Deep Core Mining.

Advanced Surface Mining is similar to basic surface mining, except that you require a Prospector Limpet Controller to be able to mine. A Pulse Wave Analyzer can also aid in the process.

If you have a PWA equipped, switch to it and send off a pulse. Fire off a prospector towards an asteroid with glow. (Make sure you are close enough that your prospector can reach it before exceeding max distance from ship)

If you don't have a PWA, just fire off a prospector limpet towards an asteroid.

Once the Propsector latches onto the asteroid and completes its scan, you will be able to see whatever structures the asteroid has. For Advanced Suface Mining, the only ones you care about are called Surface Deposits.

Surface Deposit on asteroid:









After finding an asteroid with some Surface Deposits, follow these steps to mine.

Make sure your hardpoints are deployed and you have the fire group with the Surface Abrasion Blaster selected.

Step 1: Target the surface deposit.
Step 2: Maneuver your ship into position. Your ship has to be in front of the deposit for any of this to work
Step 3: Line up the lead indicator on the deposit with the dot of the SAB. picture reminder
Step 4: Press and hold the fire key. The SAB will fire once it has reached full charge.
Step 5: Chase after and scoop up the chunk that was blasted off. (Or make use of collector limpets if you have any)

Repeat for all deposits on the asteroid.

This is a slower way to mine. The chunks dropped from subsurface deposits are normally larger (~65-85% per chunk) than those dropped from Advanced Surface Mining, so return/Yield is better, but is still lower than Deep Core Mining.

SubSurface Mining requires a Prospector Limpet Controller to be able to mine. A Pulse Wave Analyzer can also aid in the process.

If you have a PWA equipped, switch to it and send off a pulse. Fire off a prospector towards an asteroid with glow. (Make sure you are close enough that your prospector can reach it before exceeding max distance from ship)

If you don't have a PWA, just fire off a prospector limpet towards an asteroid.

Once the Propsector latches onto the asteroid and completes its scan, you will be able to see whatever structures the asteroid has. For Sub Suface Mining, the only ones you care about are called SubSurface Deposits.

SubSurface Deposit on asteroid:










After finding an asteroid with some SubSurface Deposits, follow these steps to mine.

Make sure your hardpoints are deployed and you have the fire group with the SubSurface Displacement Missile selected.

Step 1: Target the SubSurface deposit.
Step 2: Maneuver your ship into position. Your ship has to be in front of the surface scar to start the extraction process.
Step 3: Aim at the surface scar.

Step 4: Press and hold the fire key. You need to hold your fire key even after the round impacts. (If you did not aim correctly, the round will bounce off and explode. This is okay, try adjusting you aim a little and fire again)

Step 5: If your round impacted correctly, in the lower left you will recieve a notice about extraction process starting. Keep holding your fire key.
Step 6: The following screen will pop up in the lower left:

The lower bar shows the quality. You want to release your fire key when the cursor (Looks like a capital I) is over a bright section. The upper section shows the density. The lower the structure is on that section, the faster the lower bar moves. Keep this in mind.

Release your fire key once the cursor is over a bright section. That screen will alert you if you were successful in extracting a piece.

Step 7: Chase after and scoop up the chunk that was blasted off. (Or make use of collector limpets if you have any)

Repeat for all deposits on the asteroid.

Keep an eye on the deposit health. deposits will allow anywhere between 2-5 extractions. If you mess up an extraction, it will damage the deposit and lower the amount you can retrieve.

This is the slowest way to mine. However, the return is extremely high. The chunks dropped are almost always >90%. Also, certain ores are only accessable in this method of mining. In my opinion, this way of mining is the most fun.

Deep Core Mining requires a Prospector Limpt Controller and A Pulse Wave Analyzer.

Switch to your PWA and send off a pulse. Fire off a prospector towards an asteroid with extremely bright glow. (Make sure you are close enough that your prospector can reach it before exceeding max distance from ship)


Once the Propsector latches onto the asteroid and completes its scan, you will be able to see if the asteroid is crackable. To be able to mine the core, the asteroid has to have Fissures.


Also, if the core of an asteroid is able to be mined, the prospector will indicate what the core is made of if targeted.


After finding a crackable asteroid, follow these steps to mine.

Make sure your hardpoints are deployed and you have the fire group with the Seismic Charge Launcher selected.

NOTICE: The following procedure is time sensitive. Once the first charge is placed, you have a limited amount of time to complete the process.

Step 1: Target a fissure. Once targeted, the lower
left info screen will infrom you what strength the fissure is. There are three strength levels: Low, Average, and High

The strength of the fissure is important to note as it dictates the charge you need to place on it to get ideal yield.

Step 2: Hold the fire key to charge the Seismic Launcher to the correct amount and release to fire the charge.

On either side of the croshair you will see 3 marks. The marks fill from bottom to top the longer the fire button is held. The bottom mark is Low Strength, the middle mark is Average Strength, and the top mark is High Strength.

Match the charge strength to the fissure strength.

Step 3: Once the charge is placed, the following screen will appear in the upper right:

Go around the asteroid and keep placing charges on fissures until the upper right screen gives you the message 'Optimum Yield Range!', similar to the screen shown here.

You have a finite amount of time to place the needed charges.

NOTICE: It is possible to place too many charges on an asteroid. If that happens, the upper right screen will indicate that you are too far above the ideal range. You can diffuse a charge by going into the Left Panel and contacts, then highlighting a charge and selecting diffuse. Once diffuse is selected, you will have ten seconds to cancel the charge diffuse.

TIP If you are having trouble getting into ideal range, try placing a lower power charge on a fissure. It can help boost the meter just enough to get you into the ideal range. Don't do this too much on one asteroid, the more unmatched charges there are, the more variance there is in the meter.

Step 4: Once the needed charges are placed and the upper right screen informs you that you have reached ideal range, move your ship slightly away from the asteroid. If its your first time cracking an asteroid, do yourself a favor and sit about 700M away from the asteroid.

As you become more experienced, you will find the perfect range to sit at. Make sure you are looking directly at the asteroid.

Step 5: You can now either wait for the timer to run down, or you can navigate into the left panel into contacts and select one of the charges and select Detonate. This will jump the timer down to 10 seconds.

Also, if you have a Ship Launched fighter, I would recommend docking it before detonating

Step 6: Once the cracking process completes, chase after and scoop up the chunks that were blasted off during the cracking. (I would recommend having collector limpets if you are cracking asteroids.)

If this is your first time cracking an asteroid, don't forget to turn your sound up a bit and quiet any background noises.

Limpets are essentially little drones that you can deploy to do a variety of tasks. The task they complete depends on the controller that you have installed in your ship. The ones we focus on are Prospector and Collection limpets.

You can purchase limpets at stations in the Advanced Maintenance section. They are listed in the Resupply Ammo tab

Alternatively, you can craft limpets in your ship while flying. They are under the synthesis section

Prospector limpets can be useful, but i would only recommend these for mining ships that have large amounts of cargo space (200 tons or more).

• When used, it shoots a limpet straight in front of the ship. When it hits an asteroid, it latches on. Targeting that limpet will then display the makeup of that asteroid, and how much of its ore is left. The prospector will also show any internal structures that the asteroid has along with any fissures.
  
  
• Prospector limpets significantly increase the amount of chunks an asteroid drops
  
  
• Prospector limpets are required for subsurface mining
  
  
• Prospectors are one-offs, so you will go through your limpets very fast. This is why i recommend them for large ships that can carry a large amount of limpets. However, considering they boost the amount of ore you get from an asteroid they can be extremely useful.

The different tiers of controllers dictate how many prospecting limpets can be active at one time, how far away they can be and how long they last.


Collector Limpets do as the name implies, they collect stuff and return it to your ship.This controller is the best for mining, as it saves you from chasing down every little piece of ore you break off. They have 2 modes:

• Target Retrieve mode is activated by targeting a chunk or container and then launching a collector. The collector will travel to the target, pick it up, and then return it to your ship. Once it places it in your cargo, the limpet self-destructs.
  
  
• Search & Return Mode is the default mode of collectors. Make sure you have no container or chunk targeted and launch a collector limpet. The limpet will fly around looking for chunks or containers to pick up. It will automatically target the closest one. It will collect it, return to the ship, deposit the container or chunk, then return to searching. This mode is the most useful for mining.

The different tiers of controllers dictate how many collectors can be active at once, the max distance from the ship they can go and how long they remain active in the Search & Return mode.

Now obviously when you mine, you dont want to spend time collecting ore that will sell for little money. You want the big bucks, the ore that will buy you that new anaconda or type 9 or whatever you want to get.

That is why when you get a bit more proficient with mining, you can start being more selective. This definitely comes into play when you have a refinery that only has 2 or 3 bins.

You want to balance between expensive ores, and how easily the ore is found. It's a balancing act that is made a little easier by getting a refinery with lots of bins. However you still will have to juggle bins at some point and occasionally your cargo space.

Another angle you have to work with is what type of mining do you want to do? Deep core is by far the most lucrative, but you can also fly around for a long time and not find any destroyable asteroids.
Basic surface mining is the fastest, but your return is low.

Your ship type will also limit you to certain types of mining, so you have to make the decision of which type to stick with.

The following section contains various tips for mining provided from other commanders along with recommendations. If you have a tip/recommendation for someone starting out, put it in the comments below. The best will be added.

"If you are planning on doing deep core mining, take along a Surface Abrasion Blaster. Cracked asteroids have a lot of surface deposits, you'll miss out on a lot of ore if you don't have one." - Cmdr 666Savior

"Positioning of your ship is very important when using collector limpets. Collector limpets always fly around to the back of your ship to drop off material, which can take up to 15-20 seconds if you're facing the asteroid. If you rotate your ship so the back is facing all the fragments you mined, the limpets can zip back and forth to your ship in as little as 3 seconds. This little trick can potentially cut your time spent mining in half." - Cmdr Osmium

"If setting up a ship for solo mining, I recommend to stick to fixed lasers. Only buy the turreted if you're 100% sure you'll have a friend manning them." - Cmdr Anarch157a

Thank you all commanders who have posted tips.

These are the basics to mining in Elite. As you do more mining you will develop your own tricks and things that make it faster or easier for yourself. Dont be afraid to try things.