Leveling up in Elden Ring is an essential part of character progression, allowing you to increase your stats to better suit your preferred playstyle, whether you focus on melee combat, magic, or hybrid builds. Here's a detailed guide on leveling up efficiently in Elden Ring:
How to Level Up
To level up, you need to visit Sites of Grace and spend Runes (the in-game currency) to increase your attributes. The option to level up becomes available after meeting Melina, which typically happens early in the game after visiting a few Sites of Grace in Limgrave.
Melina will appear at a Site of Grace and offer to act as your maiden. After this interaction, you can level up at any Site of Grace.
Attributes and What They Do
Elden Ring has eight primary attributes that you can level up. Each of these contributes to different aspects of your character's build:
•Vigor (VIG): Increases your HP (health) and fire resistance. Important for any build, especially melee-focused characters who need to absorb more damage.
•Mind (MND): Increases your FP (Focus Points), which is used to cast spells, incantations, and special abilities. This stat is crucial for magic builds or any build that heavily uses Ashes of War or summons.
•Endurance (END): Increases your Stamina, equip load, and resistance to frostbite. Stamina is essential for melee combat, blocking, dodging, and running. Equip load affects how much armor and weapons you can carry without being overburdened.
•Strength (STR): Increases the damage you deal with Strength-based weapons. Higher Strength also allows you to wield heavier weapons and shields.
•Dexterity (DEX): Increases damage with Dexterity-based weapons (like katanas, bows, spears, etc.), improves casting speed for some spells, and reduces fall damage.
•Intelligence (INT): Primarily increases damage with Sorceries and allows you to wield more advanced Sorceries. It also affects certain magic-scaling weapons.
•Faith (FTH): Increases damage with Incantations (healing and offensive magic) and allows you to cast more powerful Incantations. Some weapons also scale with Faith.
•Arcane (ARC): Increases your Item Discovery, enhances the effectiveness of certain spells and weapons (like Blood and Poison builds), and contributes to Holy Damage scaling for some weapons.
Choosing What to Level Up
Your leveling strategy should align with your build and playstyle. Here’s a breakdown of which stats are best for various builds:
Melee Builds
•Focus on Vigor, Endurance, and either Strength or Dexterity.
•Vigor is essential for survivability since you'll be in close range of enemies, taking hits more frequently.
•Endurance ensures you have enough stamina to dodge, block, and perform long attack combos.
•Strength builds are ideal for heavier, slower weapons like greatswords, axes, and colossal weapons. Strength also lets you use larger shields effectively.
•Dexterity builds focus on faster weapons like katanas, spears, and bows. Dexterity also helps reduce spell casting times, which is useful if you mix melee with magic.
Magic Builds
•Focus on Mind, Intelligence, Faith, and Vigor.
•Mind increases your FP, allowing you to cast more spells. This is crucial for spellcasters who rely on ranged magic attacks.
•Intelligence is important for Sorcerers who focus on offensive spells like Glintstone Sorceries.
•Faith is key for Incantation users, whether for healing, buffs, or powerful flame and lightning attacks.
•Arcane is useful for certain specialized builds that focus on status effects like bleed or poison.
Hybrid Builds
•Mix Strength or Dexterity with Faith or Intelligence.
•Spellsword builds use both melee weapons and magic, so you'll need to balance between physical and magic stats.
•Faith/Strength or Dex/Dexterity builds allow you to use a combination of strong melee attacks and buffs/heals or ranged spells like Lightning Spear (Faith) or Glintstone Comet (Intelligence).
Quality Builds
•Balance between Strength and Dexterity for versatile weapon scaling. This allows you to use a wide range of weapons effectively, benefiting from both Strength and Dexterity scaling.
Bleed/Arcane Builds
•Focus on Arcane, Dexterity, and Endurance.
•Many weapons in Elden Ring scale with Arcane, especially those that inflict bleed, poison, or madness. Dexterity helps with faster weapons, while Arcane boosts status effect buildup.
Leveling Strategies for Early Game 
Early in the game, prioritizing Vigor to around 20-30 is a good idea to ensure survivability.
•Once your Vigor is at a comfortable level, focus on your primary offensive stat (Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, or Faith).
•Endurance can be leveled when you find yourself running out of stamina often or when you want to wear heavier armor without being over-encumbered.
•Mind should only be leveled up early if you’re using magic regularly; otherwise, it can wait.
Leveling Strategies for Mid-Game
By mid-game, aim to get your primary offensive stat (Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, Faith, or Arcane) to 30-40, depending on your build. This will significantly increase your damage output.
•Raise Vigor to 35-40 to withstand more powerful enemies and bosses.
•If you rely on blocking, consider raising Endurance to improve stamina and equip load, which allows you to block more attacks or wear heavier armor without a heavy load penalty.
Leveling Strategies for Late Game
For late-game content, your offensive stat should be at 50+, and Vigor at 40-60 to handle the most challenging bosses.
•Mind should be high enough to support your FP needs if you rely on magic or summoning Spirit Ashes.
•Further investment in Endurance or Dexterity may be necessary if you rely on dodging or fast weapon attacks.
•At this point, you can also experiment with secondary stats, such as boosting Arcane for bleed builds or leveling Faith for hybrid spellcasting abilities.
Farming Runes for Leveling
Farming Runes efficiently is important for leveling up quickly. Some key locations to farm include:
1.The First Step: Farm weak enemies around Limgrave to get early levels.
2.Stormhill: The giants near Stormveil Castle drop decent Runes early on.
3.Liurnia of the Lakes: Once you reach Liurnia, tougher enemies will drop more Runes.
4.Mohgwyn Palace (late-game): This area is considered one of the best Rune farming spots in the game, particularly after completing Varre’s questline.
5.Gold-Pickled Fowl Foot increases Rune acquisition, so use these when farming to maximize your gains.
Avoiding Over-Leveling
In Elden Ring, it's important to level up according to your playstyle but avoid over-leveling certain stats unnecessarily. For example, having extremely high Vigor but weak offense could make boss fights more time-consuming. Balance your stats for the best performance.
By following this guide, you'll be able to create a well-rounded character that suits your playstyle and adapt your build as needed to face the increasing challenges in Elden Ring.
