Magnifying Glass
This instrument, while primitive, is effective at short-range analysis of both flora and fauna.
Details
- Category
- Tool
- Games
- ASE + ASA
- Expansion
- Base
- Recipe
- 6 ingredients
- Loot crates
- 23 crates
- Item ID
- 152
Engram
How you unlock it
- Required level
- 25
- Engram points
- 16
- How to unlock
- Manual
Maps
Found on 7 maps
Video guides: search YouTube for Magnifying Glass guides
How to craft Magnifying Glass
Magnifying Glass is crafted from 6 ingredients. The engram unlocks at level 25, costs 16 engram points, takes 5 seconds, gives 2 XP.
Ingredients
For one craft
Raw materials
If you craft every ingredient yourself
16MetalCrafted along the way: Metal Ingot ×8.
How to get Magnifying Glass
Magnifying Glass is found in 23 loot crates.
Loot crates
23 crates
- Astraeos BlueAstraeos · ASA
- Astraeos Blue BonusAstraeos · ASA
- Astraeos Desert BlueAstraeos · ASA
- Astraeos Desert Blue BonusAstraeos · ASA
- Astral T-RexThe Island, Scorched Earth, Aberration, Extinction, Lost Colony, The Center, Astraeos, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Island BlueThe Island, The Center, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Island Blue BonusThe Island, The Center, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Island Cave BlueThe Island, The Center, Astraeos, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Island Cave GreenThe Island and Ragnarok · ASA
- Island Cave RedThe Island, The Center, Astraeos, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Island Cave YellowThe Island, Astraeos, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Island GreenThe Island, The Center, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
Show all 23 crates
- Island Green BonusThe Island, The Center, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Ragnarok Cave RedRagnarok · ASA
- Ragnarok Cave YellowRagnarok · ASA
- Scorched BlueScorched Earth, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Scorched Blue BonusScorched Earth, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Scorched Cave BlueScorched Earth and Astraeos · ASA
- Scorched Cave RedScorched Earth, Aberration, Astraeos, and Ragnarok · ASA
- Scorched Cave YellowScorched Earth, Aberration, and Astraeos · ASA
- Scorched GreenScorched Earth, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- Scorched Green BonusScorched Earth, Ragnarok, and Valguero · ASA
- The Center Cave YellowThe Center · ASA
Magnifying Glass — Detailed Guide
A close-range scanner
The Magnifying Glass is a tool in ARK: Survival Evolved for close inspection. Its description presents it as a primitive instrument that still handles short-range analysis of plants and animals well. What it reveals depends on the target:
- Harvestables: the items that can come from it. The ARK Wiki stresses that this is the possible yield, not necessarily what you will receive.
- Creatures: their Health and Torpor, handy while knocking out a creature whose Health is running low. Against hard hitters such as the
Giganotosaurus, 
Spino or Therizino it is of little help, since getting that close tends to get you killed fast. - Structures: their Health.
Mind the range
Its range is only 1 foundation from the target, and that is under ideal conditions. Things in between, such as a window in a taming pen, can block it when you check a creature during a tame. With large creatures you may need to move up to the legs before Health and Torpor show.
Crafting the Magnifying Glass
The engram requires level 25 and 16 engram points. The glass is crafted in the inventory in 5 seconds for 2 XP from:
- 30
Crystal (or 
Primal Crystal) - 20
Hide - 20
Fiber - 15
Wood (or 
Fungal Wood) - 15
Obsidian - 8
Metal Ingot (or 
Scrap Metal Ingot)
It weighs 0.5 and stacks to 1. Our records count 23 crate types that can contain one, for example the Island Blue crate found on The Island, The Center, Ragnarok and Valguero.