Best Factory Layouts: Module Grids, Power Budgets and Basement Plans

Every Keeper’s first Factory ends the same way: a belt that wanders across the hall, one cell too many, and a basement full of zombies standing perfectly still. The cure is dull and reliable. Build small modules next to the heaps, let chests do the sorting, and count your power before you lay the first belt. Below are six modules drawn as grids with the power, crew and output of each, a three-stage plan for the whole floor, and what belongs in every other basement and work zone around the house.

If the Factory is still bricked up, start with the Factory automation guide: it covers the entrances, the technologies, the gathering posts and the porter network. This page is about where things go.

How to read the grids

Each grid is a top-down sketch with goods flowing left to right. A cell is one piece in the order items travel, not a measured tile: real footprints follow the build ghost, so stretch the spacing as needed and keep the arrows. Columns are letters and rows are numbers, so B2 means column B, row 2.

Power formula: belt cells + splitters + Supply Stations + workstations. Each zombie walking in a Zombie Carousel gives 7, or 10 with the Keeper talent Belt Master, and a Carousel holds 4 walkers. Power is pooled across the whole hall, so add up the demand of every module, not the walkers each one would need alone.

Six rules every grid obeys

1. Inputs and output sit on opposite sides, and the output never faces down. So a belt can never enter a station from above. Feed it from the left, the right or from below; an output facing up comes with a belt cell already placed.
2. Only a belt pointing into an input feeds a station. A chest always needs at least one belt cell between itself and the station. Some builders let a station empty straight into a chest without the output belt; others say it fails, so the grids keep the belt.
3. Belts pull from every Conveyor Chest they touch, and each side of a chest can be set to send one item. That makes a chest a free splitter with up to three filtered outputs. It also means a chest parked against the wrong belt leaks into it.
4. Logs and packed supply crates never enter chests. Logs travel straight from the wood heap; crates end at a Supply Station.
5. One recipe per station. Two products means two stations.
6. Demand above supply stops the whole Factory: every belt, every station, every worker and the Bioreactor.

Belts carry one item per cell and move one cell every 2 seconds, so a single belt delivers at best one item every 2 seconds. That matters for every recipe that swallows 16 of something. The Keeper can also build straight from materials stored in Conveyor Chests, so a full chest beside the build area doubles as a stockroom.

Layout 1: Wooden Kit starter (4 power)

The first module worth building, and the cheapest.

• Power: 3 belt cells + 1 bench = 4. One walker (7) covers it with 3 to spare.
• Crew: 1 crafter holding an axe, 1 walker.
• Output: 1 Log + 4 Bronze Nails = 4 Wooden Kit I on Assembly bench I. The recipe takes 12 ticks at Building 2, 6 ticks with an iron axe (Building 4) and 4 ticks at Building 6.
• Feeding it: a Bronze Ingot hammered at an anvil gives 12 nails, enough for three Logs. Fill the wood heap by hand through the Yard heap until a Sawmill porter takes over.

Nail-free variant: fit the Auto-hammer and delete row 2 for 3 power. It saves nails but runs slower: 14 ticks at Building 3, so an iron axe runs it at 1x, and full speed needs Building 9 (5 ticks per Log).

Layout 2: Fabric for town orders (6 power)

The classic first earner for town orders: Flax in, packed crates out.

C2 is a belt that touches the chest from below and pulls Flax out of its bottom side.

• Power: 4 belt cells + 1 bench + 1 Supply Station = 6. One walker covers it with 1 to spare.
• Crew in the hall: 1 crafter, 1 Zombie Supply Porter, 1 walker. A crafter with the Tailor perk makes 2 crates from the same 16 Flax.
• Crew outside: a gardener on a Gardener Stand working Flax tablets, a Lifting Crane (no zombie needed) that lifts the Flax into Garden Storage, and the porter who carries crates from Supply Storage to town.
• Output: 16 Flax = 1 Supply: Fabric. 8 ticks at Building 4 (an iron tool alone), 4 at Building 8, 3 at Building 12.
• Why both inputs: 16 Flax take at least 32 seconds down one belt and 16 down two.

The Spinning wheel takes the bench’s small extension spot, the same one the Auto-hammer uses, so this bench can never run the nail-free Wooden Kit I or Building Kit I. Players who pair fabric with iron crates early count about 20 Town Gratitude a week from them; the Town Gratitude guide and town orders guide explain what that buys. Crates with no order to fill earn nothing, so queue them after you take orders.

Layout 3: Iron hub (11 power)

One ingot Smithy feeding a chest that splits into kits and crates, with no splitter anywhere.

• Power: 7 belt cells + 3 stations + 1 Supply Station = 11. Two walkers (14), or two with Belt Master.
• Crew: 2 smiths, 1 bench crafter, 1 Zombie Supply Porter, 2 walkers. Outside: a Zombie Miner and the Old Mine porter.
• Ingots: 1 Iron Ore + 1 Coal = 1 Iron Ingot on Smithy I: 8 ticks at Smithing 2, 4 with an iron hammer (Smithing 4), 3 at Smithing 6.
• Kits: 1 ingot = 4 Iron Kit I on a Smithy with the Hammer: 8 ticks at Smithing 3, 3 at Smithing 9. A Steel Hammer (+6) plus the Advanced Blacksmith perk (+4 on iron recipes) reaches 10.
• Crates: 8 ingots = 1 Supply: Iron: 10 ticks at Building 2, 5 at Building 4, 4 at Building 6.

Column E is the point of this layout: one chest, two belts touching it, both sides set to Iron Ingot. The downward belt at E2 then turns right at E3, because nothing may enter a station from above. The catch is supply. On paper, one miner at full speed brings 1 Iron Ore and 2 Coal every 3 ticks, just enough for one ingot Smithy, with one Coal left over each cycle for Brick or Glass. Real timings may differ. Every Supply: Iron therefore costs 8 miner cycles plus the 32 Iron Kit I those ingots would have made. Run the crate branch only when the town has asked for one.

Before the Old Mine is open at both ends there is no Zombie Miner, and the miner is the only renewable supply of Coal. Leave columns A to D empty and drop Furnace II ingots into the chest by hand; each one still becomes 4 kits. The iron guide covers every ingot route.

Layout 4: Building Kit I block (9 power)

Town restoration eats Building Kit I by the stack, and this block makes it from raw Stone, Clay and Coal.

• Power: 6 belt cells + 3 stations = 9. Two walkers (14), or one with Belt Master (10).
• Crew: a Stone Kit crafter, a Brick smith, a Building Kit crafter, 2 walkers. Outside: both Zombie Stone Quarry spots with the Quarry’s supplier and porter, the Clay Digger with its Riverside porter, and Coal from the iron hub’s miner.
• Stone Kit: 2 Stone = 1 Stone Kit: 4 ticks with an iron tool, 3 at Building 6. The Novice Stonemason perk adds +2 on stone recipes.
• Brick: 2 Clay + 1 Coal = 2 Brick: 4 ticks with an iron hammer, 3 at Smithing 6.
• Building Kit I: 1 Stone Kit + 1 Brick on the Auto-hammer bench. It needs Building 5 just to start: 8 ticks at Building 5, 4 at 10, 3 at 15. Give this bench your best Building zombie.

Per kit: 2 Stone, 1 Clay and half a Coal. Clay sets the pace: the single Clay Digger Stand brings 1 Clay per cycle, so on zombie Clay alone the block tops out at one kit per digger cycle. The two Stone Quarry spots keep exactly that pace; if the Excavator perk cuts the digger cycle from 8 ticks to 6, the quarry zombies need Quarryman to keep up.

Two ways round it: shovel Clay into the Yard heap yourself, or fire bricks in a Yard Kiln, where 4 Clay + 10 Fuel make 6 Brick, half as much again per Clay as the Smithy. Carry them down into a [C] Brick chest at C2, delete B2, B3 and the Smithy, and the block drops to 6 power.

Crate variant: switch the last bench’s queue to Supply: Building materials I (the same two inputs, Building 5, Auto-hammer) and end it at a Supply Station instead of the output belt and chest. Check the crafting calculator for what a batch of kits really costs.

Layout 5: Crates and Supply: Iron Tools (11 power)

This block eats what layouts 1 and 3 make.

• Power: 8 belt cells + 2 benches + 1 Supply Station = 11. Two walkers.
• Crew: 2 bench crafters, 1 Zombie Supply Porter, 2 walkers.
• Crate: 1 Wooden Kit I + 1 Iron Kit I = 2 Crate: 8 ticks at Building 3, 4 at 6, 3 at 9.
• Supply: Iron Tools: 1 Crate + 4 Iron Kit I on an Assembly bench II = 1 Supply: Iron Tools, Building 5, 8 ticks. An iron tool alone gives Building 4, so this crafter needs a mastery node on top of it, or a steel tool (+6).
• Per crate shipped: 4.5 Iron Kit I and half a Wooden Kit I. Iron is the bottleneck again.

Row 3 starts with a belt under the Iron Kit chest, runs along the bottom and climbs at D3 into the belt at D2, which enters the second bench from the left. Furniture variant: Supply: Furniture I takes 4 Wooden Kit I + 4 Iron Kit I on an Assembly bench II with the Drill press, Building 6, 12 ticks. It needs only the two chests, one belt into each input and a Supply Station on the output: 4 power.

Layout 6: Wheat block, Zombie Power and flour (10 power)

• Power: 7 belt cells + Bioreactor + Kitchen + Supply Station = 10. Two walkers, or one with Belt Master and nothing to spare.
• Crew: 1 Kitchen crafter, 1 Zombie Supply Porter, 2 walkers. The Bioreactor works alone. Outside: a gardener on Wheat tablets and the Lifting Crane.
• Zombie Power: 5 Wheat in on the left, 1 Zombie Power out on the right, 10 ticks. It is an item for Supply: Appliances I, Zombie Mechanisms and Supply: Engineering Mechanism, not electricity: it adds nothing to your power.
• Flour: 16 Wheat + 2 Fabric = 1 Supply: Flour Sack on Kitchen I with the Millstone: Farming 4, 10 ticks (5 at Farming 8). A Miller zombie makes 2 crates per craft.

The Fabric chest sits at B3, one cell away from the Wheat belt at C2, on purpose: a belt touching it would pull Fabric into the Wheat input. Keep every chest out of contact with belts that must not carry its contents.

The whole floor in three stages

Here are the six modules side by side. Walker counts keep at least one point of power spare.

Built in order, they make a three-stage plan:

• Carousels: 8 walkers fit exactly in the two Broken Zombie Carousels you start with, once repaired (6 Bronze Gear + 4 Bronze Detail + 4 Wooden Plank each, Building 5, no technology). The three new Carousel spots behind Zombie Gears are for whatever you build after this, up to 140 power, or 200 with Belt Master.
• Belt Master is one Keeper talent point for 43% more power per walker; see talents and inspirations. In stage 3 it frees two zombies for real work.
• Factory Tour: stage 2 already has 20 belt cells and 35 power, enough for the rating of 20 that Jack asks for in Factory Tour.
• Headcount: stage 3 runs 11 crafters and 8 walkers. Whether one Zombie Supply Porter can serve several Supply Stations is not confirmed, so plan one per station: four more. Add the porter who ships crates to town, and the hall complex holds 24 zombies before a single gatherer.

For scale, players have tested a floor that makes every tier I and tier II kit on 80 power with 26 zombies: 8 walkers with Belt Master and 18 station workers, built in three stages much like these.

Making room on the floor

The hall grows as you repair the six Broken Conveyor Mechanisms; each one opens another build area.

Which mechanism takes which repair is not mapped yet, and the mastery levels rest on a single report, so treat this table as medium confidence. Two Broken Walls take 1 Dynamite each, and clearing the rubble on the east side opens a ladder straight up to the Yard, which is handy for carrying Kiln bricks down.

What to build in each basement and work zone

Belts only run in the Factory hall. Everywhere else, crafting automation means a Zombie Supplier Station (4 Wooden Plank + 4 Bronze Nails, Zombie Assistant, 35 red and 5 green). One supplier serves every crafting zombie in its zone: it fetches ingredients from the zone’s open chests, not your backpack, and clears finished goods first. Orders never cross zones, so every zone where zombies craft from chests needs its own supplier. Gardeners and the gathering posts store their own output and need none, except the Quarry.

The gathering posts are covered post by post in the Factory automation guide, and the material locations guide shows where everything comes from before zombies take over.

Supply Storage: the buffer you forget

Each Supply Pallet holds 2 crates, or 4 after the Supply Pallet II upgrade (Appliances I). When every pallet is full, the Zombie Supply Porter stops and the crate line backs up to the bench, so the pallet count is your buffer. The Porter Station here (8 Iron Nails + 2 Advanced Detail + 4 Polished Stone) needs both blockages in the tunnel under the Crossroads well and both in the Warehouse Cellar cleared; a second Porter Station here unlocks with Wooden Kit II. Untick crate types in its window once an order is filled: crates delivered with no order waiting give nothing.

Writing Basement: the paper mill

The cellar under the house (hatch: 1 Bronze Detail + 2 Board) is where paper and newspapers can run on zombies. Two blockages in its south wall lead into the Factory hall, each 4 Iron Detail + 1 Reinforced Beam. Stock the inputs in open chests in this room, then let one supplier serve the crafters.

So 12 Flax become 60 Clean Paper, enough for six prints and 120 Newspapers. Each print also eats one Story, written at the Writing Desk from 3 Faith, 2 Clean Paper and 1 Ink. Newspaper is a quality craft: at Book writing 8 or more every tick succeeds and the print comes out gold. That matters because the PR Machine wants 10 Newspapers at tier II, 20 silver or gold at tier III, 100 silver or gold at tier IV and 100 gold at tier V. Put a Dead printer zombie on the press for 30 per print, and the Dead press perk adds +3 Book writing at the Printing Press. The Jewelry Table, where collars are made, also lives here.

Vineyard Basement: the brewery

The only place in the game where drinks are pressed, fermented and brewed. A Porter Station in the Vineyard carries Hops, Grapes and Honey down here, and a second one in the basement carries Beer and Wine to the Factory drinks pallet; both cost 2 Piece of stone + 4 Brick, and the basement porter needs both blockages toward the Factory cleared (4 Iron Detail + 1 Reinforced Beam each). A Firewood shed in the room feeds Fuel to every station in the zone.

An iron shovel (+4) plus Brewer reaches the Beer requirement. In the Factory, Kitchen I turns 12 Beer into a Supply: Beer (three brews, 15 Hops) and 8 Wine into a Supply: Wine (two barrels, 48 Grapes and 8 Empty Bottles), fewer if the Wine is silver or gold. The wine and alcohol guide covers grades, prices and the other drinks.

Yard: the workyard

The Yard (also called the Workyard) has no belts, but its seven heaps share their contents with the Factory heaps, so anything dumped there reaches the Factory belts. With a supplier it makes a good training ground for fresh zombies on quick crafts of their branch: Board at the Sawhorse, wood wedges, Piece of stone.

The Yard also beats the Factory on two conversions: the Kiln makes 6 Brick from 4 Clay + 10 Fuel against the Smithy’s 2 from 2 Clay, and a Furnace makes 3 Glass from 3 Sand + 10 Fuel against the Smithy’s 1 from 3 Sand. For now, though, a Kiln or Furnace batch waits for someone to collect it before the next one starts. A Firewood shed serves every station in the Yard.

Common mistakes

• Laying the floor before counting power. Add belts, splitters, Supply Stations and stations first; one cell over capacity stops the whole Factory.
• Long belt runs. Every cell costs 1 power. Short hops between chests do the same job for less.
• Splitters as sorters. They alternate and cost power. A chest with filtered sides sorts.
• Feeding a station from a chest, or from above. Only a belt pointing into an input works, and inputs never face up.
• Parking a chest against the wrong belt. Belts pull from every chest they touch.
• One belt into a 16-Flax recipe. Feed Flax into both inputs and delivery takes roughly half as long. Supply: Flour Sack cannot do this: its second input is the Fabric.
• Two extensions for one spot. The Auto-hammer and Spinning wheel share the bench’s small spot; the Hammer, Press and Grindstone share the Smithy’s large spot.
• Running Supply: Iron with no order. Each crate eats 8 ingots that would have been 32 Iron Kit I.
• Expecting belts in a basement. Outside the hall, it is chests plus one supplier per zone.
• Building around a bug. Some players see sideways-rotated stations draw no power. A patch can close that at any time, and your Factory will stop with it.