Factorio Oil Tutorial - Absolute Basics

This tutorial is accurate at time of publishing, with the current version of Factorio being 0.17.69. If anything changes, look for a pinned comment.

Next in my series of Factorio tutorials for absolute beginners - Oil!

Oil has long been one of the main obstacles for less-experienced players, and is a sudden ramp in the complexity curve of the game. This tutorial aims to walk you through everything to do with Factorio's oil system in a careful, logical manner. It's quite long, so use these timestamps to skip to specific chapters if you want:

Title: 0:00
Introduction: 00:30
Research: 01:47
Gathering and Storing: 06:49
Basic Oil Processing: 09:36
Chemical Plants: 12:34
Advanced Oil Processing: 17:42
Fraction Management - Oil Recipes: 21:12
Fraction Management - Cracking: 22:48
Fraction Management - The Circuit Solution: 25:06
Fraction Management - Ratios: 29:37 (final answer 33:44)
Pipe Management: 33:59
Barrelling: 37:24
Coal Liquefaction: 39:09
Outtroduction: 40:51

My other Tutorials of this style:

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Background music from Factorio OST, available on Steam.

Like learning things? Check out my other channel, 100 Seconds of Science:

#MiniBetrayal #Factorio #Tutorial

[MrBlitzpunk]

You know this game is deep when the "absolute basic" tutorial is 42min

[KingSulley]

I know this video is 3 years old, but I really appreciate the minute detail you go into. I really just needed the specifics of liquid production to make sure my plan wasnt going to start in a wildly inefficent way.

[Paralellex]

You can actually travel steam around in barrels if you put in the freezer overnight.

[Adam-ormb]

I'm kind of confused with oil but after watching this it has made it way more clear, thank you!

[LabrnMystic]

I appreciate the slow and clear steps you give to help teach us newbies.

The highlights as well. Very professional and much appreciated.

*Subscribed*

[kalon]

You should be a teacher. Concise, patient, and easy to understand. Thank you!

[holmes]

Thanks, helped a lot. For a game with complex builds, Factorio doesn't explain much. This was absolutely needed

[MiniBetrayal]

CORRECTION: 08:20 (thanks to fdl-fan on reddit)
When mining a tank (or pipe) with fluid in it, if that pipe or tank is connected to other tanks, it will attempt to redistribute its contents to any immediately neighbouring pipes or tanks, and you'll only lose what doesn't fit. I still recommend being careful about deconstructing anything with large amounts of fluid in it though!

CORRECTION 33:35 (Thanks Sydriax)
20 oil refineries would use 100 crude oil each... in 5 seconds. They therefore use (20 * 100 / 5) = 400 crude oil per second, not the stated 2000.
(still a fairly large amount though)

[pubs]

Even at the release of the game, your video explains everything extraordinarily. I am not a new player to the game, as this is my 4th playthrough. However, I learnt a few things from this video, without which my time of playing this game would a lot worse. Thanks a lot!

[LunaLapis]

You are a godsend, my guy. New to factorio; stumped by oil. I enjoyed the video & like how you covered each base/aspect. Other videos on oil were so brief & left so much unexplained that they were not helpful. You did a good job of explaining these processes to ppl who had no prior knowledge of the game whatsoever. Ty ♥

[justingolden]

This is PERFECT. Searched YouTube for a while looking for a tutorial on and all this stuff that, like you said, is kinda all sprung upon you at once. All of the other vids I found were lets plays that gave almost no information after 5-10min. This tutorial, (despite being 42min) is a "tutorial", not a "lets play", and shows you the absolute minimum to understand just about everything. Thank you so much : )

[UnfortunateWatcher]

100+ hours in and I forgot to make a blueprint for the refinery. Thanks for the reminder.

[versystudio]

You are very talented teacher. Thank you!

[notCheckerz]

Bro...how tf you only got 81k views ? this was my first time watching your videos and i am amazed at the how you baby fed the these tips to me...you deserve more subcribers!!

[adityapermana]

This is so basic, my deadass brain now can solved the "WHY I RUNNING OUT THE LIGHT OIL?!" problem..
10/10 would watch another tips from this channel again..

[timbaumann]

I've owned Factorio for MANY years... yet when I finally got to this part of the game I got so confused that I just gave up with the whole thing. This was of course BEFORE the Full Release of v. 1.0. I tried SEVERAL older YouTube videos and yet still I just gave up. This time was MUCH different! I think I finally understand this WHOLE mess so for this, . THANK YOU!!!! I'm once again at the point of trying to deal with the whole OIL mess. I'll try to post here one way or the other as to how well I did. But I think I got it (at least BASIC oil processing) so here's hoping!
Again, THANK YOU. You actually explained this in a way that was MUCH easier for me to understand!

[tobiassuarez]

I know you uploaded this like 3 months ago, but I must let you know... You saved my game! I am new to Factorio and couldn't just figure out the way oil works out. I'll make sure to implement your advice on my campaign. Thank you so much! I hope you continue making these awesome vids. (I watched the train one too, was absolutely useful)

[astrawby]

I was wondering why barrel, then I realized that at 4 chests in a square with 48 slots each of 10 barrels stacks containing 15 units of liquid, that's 28.8k in the same space as a storage tank, and barrels can be picked up by the logistic network
As far as storing as much liquid as possible in as little space as possible goes, you can't beat barrels

[ccrky]

I have no words to explain how well made this tutorial is, well done, and thx, it was very usefull.

[Paul_Oz]

best breakdown of oil i have come across as a confused beginner. appreciate the time, clarity and approach. subscribed.