Asteroids and ore

Ore is the basic material found in the various asteroid fields throughout EVE. In their native form asteroid ores cannot be used, but must be refined into minerals, which can then be used for ship and equipment manufacture.

Where to find asteroids

An asteroid belt. The ship in the middle is sitting at the warp-in point.

Asteroid belt geometry

Each mineable asteroids contains only one kind of ore, and they can be found in:

Asteroid belts
Deadspace pockets
Cosmic anomalies

Asteroid belts

Virtually every star system (with the notable exception of Jita) in Eve has at least one asteroid belt, and most star systems have several (to up to tens in some cases). These belts are listed on the overview and the right-click menu, and always have the same geometry: a rough semicircle of asteroids, approximately 50 km in diameter. A ship warping to an asteroid belt's beacon (through the right-click menu or the overview) will warp to the centre of the semicircle. Note that mining lasers only have an (unboosted) range of only 10-15 km, so a ship has to fly closer to the belt after warping in in order to mine asteroids; if you want to save on travel time, you can warp to mining bookmarks instead.

A given belt will have a mixture of asteroids containing different ores; the mixture and the size of the asteroids (i.e. how much ore each asteroid contains) is determined by the system's location in the Eve universe and its security status (see asteroid distribution, below). The asteroids in an asteroid belt will respawn after downtime. The websites Ombeve and Dotlan have maps showing the number of asteroid belts per system.

Deadspace pockets

Mineable asteroids can also spawn in deadspace pockets, such as the ones created for missions. Unlike asteroid belts, these are not organised into a set shape; some are composed of dense clumps of asteroids, while others are scattered fields. For a list of which missions' deadspace pockets contain asteroids, see Mission Mining or Eve-survival.

Cosmic anomalies

Lastly, one of the two kinds of cosmic anomaly contains asteroids (the other contains hostile rats). The asteroids in cosmic anomalies tend to be a little larger and contain rarer ore than the normal asteroid belts in a star system; however, unlike asteroid belts, once all the asteroids in the anomaly have been mined, the anomaly disappears.

Note that in many locations you will find decorative asteroids, which cannot be mined (or otherwise interacted with); these will have colourful names such as "Snake-shaped Asteroid".

Asteroid distribution

An asteroid belt, as seen on the overview. Note the belt's warp-in point (marked with an inverted triangle), as well as the variety of different asteroid types (all labelled according to what kind of ore they contain).

The Eve universe can be divided into four quarters:

The Amarr quarter (includes systems held by the Amarr, Ammatar, Khanid, Blood Raiders, and Sansha's Nation)
The Caldari quarter (includes systems held the Caldari and Guristas)
The Gallente quarter (includes systems held by the Gallente and Serpentis)
The Minmatar quarter (includes systems held by the Minmatar and Angel Cartel)

Each of these four quarters has its own set of asteroid types. Additionally, the lower the security rating of a system, the rarer the asteroid types that can be found there. Finally, each system can also include all the asteroid types of same-quarter higher-security systems; e.g. a Gallente system with a security rating of 0.7 will not only include Omber asteroids, but also Veldspar, Scordite, and Plagioclase asteroids.

System security rating	Quarter
System security rating
1.0 and lower	Veldspar Scordite	Veldspar Scordite	Veldspar Scordite	Veldspar Scordite
0.9 and lower	Pyroxeres	Pyroxeres	Plagioclase	Plagioclase
0.7 and lower	Kernite	Plagioclase	Omber	Omber
0.4 and lower	Jaspet	Kernite	Jaspet	Kernite
0.2 and lower	Hemorphite	Hedbergite	Hemorphite	Hedbergite
0.0 and lower	Spodumain Gneiss Crokite Arkonor Bistot Mercoxit	Dark Ochre Crokite Spodumain Bistot Mercoxit	Dark Ochre Crokite Arkonor Bistot Mercoxit	Spodumain Gneiss Arkonor Bistot Mercoxit

In general, the rarer the ore, the higher its volume per unit (e.g. one unit of Veldspar has a volume of 0.1 m³, whereas one unit of Arkonor has a volume of 16 m³). Since mining lasers mine a given volume of ore per minute, it takes longer to mine the rarer ore types. Additionally, each ore refines into a different set of minerals; for details, see Refining.

Ice follows a similar geographic distribution to ore; for details, see Ice Mining.

Ore variants

Each asteroid type has two further subtypes, which yield more (+5% / +10%) minerals when refined. Otherwise they are identical in every way to their base ore, and are found in the same regions (just in lower quantities). For instance, if an asteroid belt has Omber asteroids, it will also have some Silvery Omber asteroids and a few Golden Omber asteroids. If you get the chance, you should always mine the higher-yield variants before mining the base ore.

Base ore	+5% variant	+10% variant	Found in
Veldspar	Concentrated Veldspar	Dense Veldspar	Everywhere
Scordite	Condensed Scordite	Massive Scordite	Everywhere
Pyroxeres	Solid Pyroxeres	Viscous Pyroxeres	Amarr and Caldari 0.9 (or lower) space
Plagioclase	Azure Plagioclase	Rich Plagioclase	Caldari 0.7 (or lower) space Minmatar and Gallente 0.9 (or lower) space
Omber	Silvery Omber	Golden Omber	Gallente and Minmatar 0.7 (or lower) space
Kernite	Luminous Kernite	Fiery Kernite	Amarr 0.7 (or lower) space Caldari and Minmatar 0.4 (or lower) space
Jaspet	Pure Jaspet	Pristine Jaspet	Amarr and Gallente 0.4 (or lower) space
Hemorphite	Vivid Hemorphite	Radiant Hemorphite	Amarr and Gallente 0.2 (or lower) space
Hedbergite	Vitric Hedbergite	Glazed Hedbergite	Caldari and Minmatar 0.2 (or lower) space
Gneiss	Iridescent Gneiss	Prismatic Gneiss	Amarr and Minmatar 0.0 (or lower) space
Dark Ochre	Onyx Ochre	Obsidian Ochre	Caldari and Gallente 0.0 (or lower) space
Spodumain	Bright Spodumain	Gleaming Spodumain	0.0 space (or lower, except Gallente)
Crokite	Sharp Crokite	Crystalline Crokite	0.0 space (or lower, except Minmatar)
Arkonor	Crimson Arkonor	Prime Arkonor	0.0 space (or lower, except Caldari)
Bistot	Triclinic Bistot	Monoclinic Bistot	All of 0.0 (or lower) space
Mercoxit	Magma Mercoxit	Vitreous Mercoxit	All of 0.0 (or lower) space

External links