The asteroid you pick decides what you can never build
Every asteroid in Oxygen Not Included is the same basic template. What changes is which biomes exist on it, and therefore which resources you can reach without the Printing Pod or a space destination.
That single fact is the whole ranking. A start is hard when the thing you need most in the first fifty cycles — water you can electrolyse — is scarce, buried, or sitting next to something hot. It is easy when water is at your feet and heat is somewhere you can walk away from.
The beginner guide covers the first three loops. This page is about the map you run them on.
All 14 selectable asteroids, ranked
Nine of these need no DLC, so they are the real choice for a new player.
| Rank | Asteroid | Biomes | The one fact that decides it |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rime | 10 of 11 | Only asteroid with every biome except Barren; cold makes industry easy |
| 2 | Terra | 8 | Default; Sandstone start holds large Water for Electrolysis |
| 3 | Oceania | 8 | Terra’s list plus big Salt Water oceans; Pod ~80 tiles lower |
| 4 | Volcanea | 8 | Terra’s list exactly, but guaranteed magma vents at most altitudes |
| 5 | Verdante | 8 | Wiki calls it a preset of advanced difficulty; oil appears at random |
| 6 | Arboria | 8 | Very limited early Water and no Algae to fall back on |
| 7 | Aridio | 8 | Starting Forest runs above 30 C instead of about 22 C |
| 8 | The Badlands | 8 | Only non-DLC asteroid with Barren Biome; no liquid-water biome |
| 9 | Oasisse | 8 | Starting Forest besieged by roughly 70 C sand |
The five DLC and Lab asteroids are a separate question, because you are choosing a scenario rather than a difficulty.
| Asteroid | Biomes | Catch |
|---|---|---|
| Relica (Prehistoric) | 6 listed | Adds DLC biomes the standard table does not count |
| Ceres (Frosty) | 7 listed | Cold biomes as the headline feature |
| Blasted Ceres (Frosty) | 8 listed | Sub-zero rubble, but natural fuel sources as the payoff |
| Skewed (Lab) | 8 | One fixed seed, rotated 90 degrees: Magma left, Space right |
| RelicAAAAAAAGHH (Prehistoric) | 6 listed | Demolior impact in 10 cycles, not adjustable by difficulty |
Why Rime wins, and why that surprises people
Rime is the only asteroid that reaches ten of the eleven biome types. It has the Sandstone, Forest, Marsh, Jungle, Tundra, Rust, Ocean, Oily, Magma and Space biomes. The only one it lacks is Barren.
Having ten biomes is not a cosmetic detail. More biome types on the map means more distinct resources within walking distance, which means fewer dead ends where the answer is “print it or fly it”. The wiki states the consequence directly: Rime is a very beginner-friendly asteroid, and the cold makes industrialisation easier.
That last part is the argument most players miss. Heat is what quietly kills a mid-game colony — it stops crops, it cooks your farms, it forces you into cooling loops before you have the steel for them. Rime hands you a map-sized heat sink for free. The temperature guide is where that advantage gets spent.
Rime charges you for it. Dasha Saltvines, Dreckos and Slicksters do not exist anywhere on the asteroid; you get them from the Printing Pod with care packages enabled, or from certain space destinations. Slicksters are your easy route to crude oil, so Rime’s oil plan starts later than you would like.
Why Terra is still the normal answer
Terra is the default asteroid and was the default preset before the Launch Update, which is exactly why so many guides assume it. Its Sandstone starting biome holds large amounts of Water, spread across several separate sources, so an Electrolyzer is a short pipe run from spawn rather than an expedition.
Look at what Terra actually has: Sandstone, Marsh, Jungle, Tundra, Ocean, Oily, Magma and Space. Eight types. No Forest, no Rust, no Barren.
And it is missing more than biomes. Pips are not available anywhere on Terra, and neither are Arbor Trees, Oxyferns or Dasha Saltvines — printing pod or space destination only. Nosh Sprouts are completely unobtainable. If your plan leans on Oxyferns as a passive oxygen top-up, Terra is the wrong map for that plan.
Terra is genuinely the gentlest first fifty cycles. It is not the gentlest run.
Oceania is Terra with a different commute
Oceania shares Terra’s exact eight-biome list, so the resource catalogue is identical. What changes is the terrain: very large Ocean Biomes full of deep Salt Water pools, and a Printing Pod that spawns about 80 tiles closer to the bottom of the world than Terra’s.
Those eighty tiles are the entire difference. Shorter trip to the Oily Biome means oil arrives noticeably earlier. Longer trip to the Space Biome means rocketry starts later. Salt Water is your biggest water reserve but it needs desalination, and that is power and heat you did not budget for on Terra.
Oceania also inherits Terra’s gaps: no Pips, no Arbor Trees, no Oxyferns, no Dasha Saltvines, and Nosh Sprouts remain unobtainable.
Volcanea: the same map with the floor heated
Volcanea’s biome list is byte-for-byte Terra’s eight. The difference is guaranteed magma vents at most altitudes, and not all of them are fully sealed by Abyssalite.
The layout shifts with it. The Magma Biome rises, the Space Biome cuts deeper, and you occasionally get floating biomes stranded inside the Space Biome. The Magma Channels world trait stacks on top of Volcanea’s own vents, which can make the Oily Biome hard to find or force you to tunnel through hot Obsidian to reach it.
The upside is real: geothermal plants built on Steam Turbines sit physically closer to the Printing Pod, so heat you were going to fight anyway becomes your power source. Read resource guide before you commit, because Volcanea punishes a power plan built for Terra.
Verdante: advanced difficulty by design
Verdante carries the Forest, Marsh, Jungle, Rust, Ocean, Oily, Magma and Space biomes — eight, with no Tundra, no Sandstone and no Barren. The wiki does not soften it: Verdante can be considered a preset of advanced difficulty.
The reason is oil placement. Verdante’s oil biome shows up in unexpected places, which behaves like the Irregular Oil world trait. You cannot plan a straight shaft down and expect to hit it.
Verdante also hides exactly one Hatch to the left of the Printing Pod, buried in a tile. Lose that Hatch and your coal plan is gone until a care package or a space destination bails you out. Three plants are absent: Bristle Blossoms, Wheezeworts and Sleet Wheat. Plan food around the farming guide instead of assuming wheat.
The three that actually punish a beginner
Arboria has very limited Water in the early game, and the lack of Algae compounds it. Early oxygen is described on the wiki as very difficult. The Rust and Salt on the map plus a Rust Deoxidizer is the intended bridge, and fast expansion plus geyser exploitation is not optional for surviving past it. Arboria also has no Marsh Biome, so Gold Amalgam only comes from meteors — which means hot liquid handling and crude oil processing need Steel early. Three plants are absent: Bristle Blossoms, Dusk Caps and Thimble Reeds, and without Reeds your only early Reed Fiber is Drecko shearing.
Aridio looks friendlier than it is. The starting Forest Biome runs a little hotter than 30 C from the very first cycle, against roughly 22 C on other asteroids. That is enough to make food production a challenge before you have any cooling. The Forest holds little Water you can electrolyse; the Marsh Biomes hold plenty of Polluted Water, which should last until you can exploit a water geyser. Wolframite does not spawn at all unless the map rolls Glaciers or Frozen Core, which makes Niobium painful even late.
The Badlands is the only non-DLC asteroid that includes a Barren Biome, and Barren biomes eat map space that would otherwise be resources. It has no liquid-water biome at all. Sedimentary Rock is unavailable in the early game, so Stone Hatch breeding needs Fossil crushed into Sedimentary Rock with a Rock Crusher first. Gold Amalgam arrives only by meteor shower, which puts Oxylite and Super Coolant production at risk unless worldgen rolls a Gold Volcano. Waterweeds are completely unobtainable, and Pips, Pokeshells and Pacus are all absent.
Oasisse is the one the wiki flatly calls one of the more difficult starts. The starting Forest is surrounded by roughly 70 C sand that occupies most of the map. Worse, the biome border is Granite rather than Abyssalite, so heat leaks in fast enough to stop crops growing while you are still solving oxygen. Its water is better spent on research than on electrolysis, and water near the Printing Pod is sparse. Wolframite does not spawn unless the map has Glaciers or Frozen Core. The compensation is oil: Oasisse seeds generate more oil reservoirs than any other asteroid, with up to 64 recorded on a single map.
What the seed and the traits actually change
The asteroid fixes the template; the world seed fixes the layout inside it. World Traits then add variation on top — they can add or remove biomes and terrain features, which is why the same asteroid can feel different twice.
Story Traits are separate and toggleable at world creation. They are lore points of interest, and they are the one part of map generation you can switch off before you start.
Practical order: pick the asteroid for what it guarantees, then reroll the seed for the geysers you want. Do not pick an asteroid for a seed you saw in a video — the biome list will not change, and that is the part that decides whether the run is survivable.
Picking your map is the first build decision
The asteroid is not a difficulty slider, it is a constraint list. Choose the constraint you want to solve, then build around it — the base building guide and the common mistakes list both assume you know which resources you are short of. On Rime you are short of Slicksters. On Arboria you are short of water and Algae. On The Badlands you are short of liquid, full stop.