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Once you've reached level 50 in Lost Ark, a vast endgame experience will open up for you. Chaos Dungeons, Guardian Raids, island quests, and much more await. But before you can delve into any of these activities, you'll need to ensure that your item level is up to par with the content you're facing.

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Just like your character, the items you find in Lost Ark also have a level tied to them, referred to as "item level" or "ilvl." Increasing your item level is a simple yet important aspect of the endgame grind. Let's delve into what item level is, how to increase it, and give some tips for increasing your item level quickly.

Updated January 11, 2024, by Sean Murray: If you're wondering how to maximize your item level in Lost Ark, this guide has you covered. We've given this guide a fresh formatting pass to make it a little easier on the eyes and to include more breakout tips to make building your item level easier than ever. We've also added more links to other helpful Lost Ark topics.

What Is Item Level?

Lost Ark Weapon Tripod Rank Bump Example

In Lost Ark, all weapons and armor you obtain come with an item level. This number is used to determine how powerful your character is and what sorts of endgame content they can partake in. The higher your character's overall item level is, the more activities they can do, and the higher content tiers you can clear.

It's paramount that you increase this number once you reach level 50 to unlock most of Lost Ark's endgame content.

Starting out, items have an incredibly low item level. As you level your character in Lost Ark, you'll receive items with higher item levels, granting your character more potent stats and even ability-centric upgrades when you reach the endgame.

You'll start the endgame at around 250 item level—the first breakpoint for clearing Chaos Dungeons and Guardian Raids. Through the honing system and endgame rewards, you'll be able to raise your item level high enough to access T3 content, Lost Ark's most challenging offerings currently available.

If you reach level 50 and don't have ilvl 250 gear, complete the Shushire questline at the north end of the map. This will give you a gear set with a high enough ilvl to start clearing Chaos Dungeons.

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Increasing Your Item Level

Lost Ark Vern Honing Vendor

Your main source of item level is going to be through honing your gear. When you first reach level 50, you'll want to complete a few Chaos Dungeon runs to get your first set of gear. With that gear, you'll want to speak with a honing vendor in the crafting district of your town. In Vern, it's located at the southern end of the castle hub.

Honing an item requires three materials when starting out:

  • Stone Fragments
  • Harmony Leapstones
  • Harmony Shards

Only weapons and armor can be honed. Jewelry and ability stones do not contribute to your item level, granting Engraving progress and character stats instead.

The type of Stone Fragments you'll need will depend on the item you're attempting to upgrade. Weapons take Destruction Stones, while armor takes Guardian Stones. Harmony Leapstones and Shards are used for all weapons and armor.

When you reach T2 and T3 content, the material types will also change. Stone Fragments will just become Stones, Harmony Shards will become Life Shards, etc. Clearing content at your character's maximum item level will ensure that you're receiving the correct upgrade materials for honing your gear.

Lost Ark Honing UI

When you enter the honing UI, you'll see an "upgrade" button under a percentage orb. This orb tells you the chance that your upgrade will succeed. Yes, upgrading your gear has a chance to fail, consuming all resources in the process.

A honing failure will not destroy the item you wish to upgrade, only the materials you used.

Failing will also increase your chance of a successful honing system, as shown by that item's Artisan's Energy. Should your Artisan's Energy reach 100 percent, your next honing attempt is guaranteed to succeed. Artisan's Energy is reset upon a successful hone.

To attempt a hone, you'll need to invest Harmony Shards. Investing the maximum amount will allow you to attempt a hone. The first few tiers will always succeed. However, once you exceed a certain number of upgrades, your upgrade chance will no longer be guaranteed.

You do not need to reinvest Harmony Shards (or a higher tier equivalent) into an item if your honing attempt fails. Once you invest your Harmony Shards, you won't need to do so until the hone succeeds.

This is where additional honing items come in. There are three ways that can increase your honing chances:

  1. Star's Breath: Increases your honing chances by two percent per item.
    1. Can use up to 20 per honing attempt.
    2. Item name changes with each tier, similar to other honing materials.
    3. Items are consumed on use, regardless of whether the hone was successful.
  2. Metallurgy Special Materials: Increases your honing chance by ten percent.
    1. Can only use one per honing attempt.
    2. Item name changes with each tier.
    3. Item is consumed on use, even if the hone fails.
  3. Stronghold Research: Once you've reached item level T2, you can increase your T1 honing chances by 20 percent for your alts by researching a honing upgrade at your stronghold.
    1. Another research option unlocks when you reach T3, increasing honing chances for T2.
    2. These honing buffs are account bound.

Items can reach up to +20 ranks before they need to be replaced, although tier thresholds occur when you reach +15. For this reason, it is not recommended that you increase an item beyond +15 unless you're already at T3.

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Obtaining Honing Materials

Lost Ark Chaos Dungeon Menu

Your main sources of honing materials are Guardian Raids and Chaos Dungeons. Clearing either activity will grant honing materials in decent quantities, so be sure you're completing two of each activity every day. Should you complete your daily runs of both activities, you can farm Chaos Dungeons for a vendor currency you can use to purchase additional honing materials, up to a weekly cap.

However, for players just starting out, we highly recommend you complete island quests for honing materials. You'll get hundreds of Stone Fragments and dozens of Harmony Leapstones from these quests, so they're absolutely worth your time.

The Lost Ark community has created an excellent resource that showcases each island reward that you can view here. Starting out, it's recommended you clear Glacier Island and as much of Shadow Island as possible. Keep clearing islands as needed. When you've completed these island quests, you'll need to rely on daily Chaos Dungeon and Guardian Raid clears.

Beyond that, you can obtain Star's Breaths and their higher tier equivalents by completing Ghost Ships, the Cube activity, and certain Una's Tasks. Metallurgy special materials are a rare drop from Abyss Dungeons.

You can also purchase honing materials from other players in the Auction House or from Mara's Secret Shop in Lost Ark's in-game store. It's not recommended to use the Auction House this way unless you absolutely have to.

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Using Gear Transfer

Lost Ark Gear Transfer

Of course, you're going to find better items as you play Lost Ark. You might invest thousands of materials into upgrading an item, only for a better option to become available to you. In these situations, you can use the gear transfer system to transfer the upgrades of one item onto another, allowing you to upgrade your gear without worrying about lowering your item level.

Using the gear transfer system is incredibly simple:

  1. Visit your town's local honing vendor.
  2. Click on the "gear transfer" tab at the bottom of the dialogue menu.
  3. Select the item you wish to upgrade.
  4. Select a compatible, upgraded item.
  5. Transfer the levels onto your better item, destroying your upgraded item in the process.

This process is incredibly cheap and has no chance of failure, so be sure to gear transfer whenever you find better items for your character.

You cannot gear transfer upgrades onto a higher item level tier. For example, you cannot upgrade a T2 set to +15 by gear transferring your T1 set.

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Lost Ark: How To Farm More Harmony Shards
Here's a guide on how to farm Harmony Shards in Lost Ark. These shards are crucial to hone your gear on your way to tier 2.

Item Level Farming Tips

Lost Ark Login Screen
  • Complete island quests once you reach level 50. These quests shower you with upgrade materials. You can find a reward breakdown for them here.
  • Use your Star's Breath and Metallurgy materials when you reach +13. Going from +13 to +15 on your gear is more or less a coin flip, so use these items to shift the odds in your favor. We recommend using them for honing attempts on your weapon first.
  • If you're strapped for time, send your stronghold crew to complete a daily Chaos Dungeon or Guardian Raid for you.
  • Always invest the maximum number of Harmony Shards into the honing process. This maximizes the chances that the upgrade won't fail.
  • Whenever you find a weapon or armor piece with higher quality than what you're using, use the gear transfer system to transfer your upgrade process onto the better item.
  • While not directly related to ilvl, ensure that you're only replacing jewelry and ability stones whenever they have better stats or Engravings. They don't give ilvl.

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Lost Ark: Complete Guide And Walkthrough
This Lost Ark guide covers release date news, as well as links to our growing collection of guides and walkthroughs.