If you’ve spent any time farming resources for base upgrades or armor crafting in Enshrouded, you’ve probably asked how long does it take flax to grow enshrouded at least once. Flax is one of the most useful early to mid-game resources, used to make linen for bandages, furniture, and even high-tier cloth armor, so getting your farm running smoothly can save you hours of running around the map looking for wild patches. I’ve sunk over 80 hours into Enshrouded’s farming system, testing different planting spots and conditions to figure out exactly how to get the most flax out of every seed, so I’m breaking down everything you need to know below.
How Long Does It Take Flax to Grow in Enshrouded? Exact Growth Timing
First, let’s cut straight to the answer you came for: under ideal conditions, flax takes 12 in-game minutes to fully mature from the time you plant the seed. That works out to roughly 30 seconds of real-world time if you’re not speeding up time by sleeping, or just a few seconds if you nap in a bed to skip the waiting period. It’s one of the fastest-growing crops in the game, which is part of why it’s such a reliable resource for early-game players.
The 12-minute in-game timer only applies if you plant your flax in the right conditions, though. If you plant it in the wrong spot, the timer might not start at all, or your seeds might disappear entirely after a few minutes. I made this mistake my first week playing, planting a full patch of 20 flax seeds in the Shrouded lowlands, only to come back 20 minutes later to find nothing left but empty dirt.
You don’t have to do anything special while the flax grows, either. Unlike some other survival games, Enshrouded doesn’t require you to water crops or add fertilizer to get them to mature. As long as you meet the basic planting requirements, you can go off to mine ore or clear out a monster camp while you wait, and come back to fully grown flax ready to harvest.
Conditions You Need to Grow Flax Successfully
To make sure your flax grows on schedule, you need to hit three non-negotiable conditions when you’re picking your planting spot. Skip any of these, and you’ll waste seeds waiting for crops that will never mature.
You don’t need to worry about light levels, either. Flax grows just as fast during the in-game night as it does during the day, so you can plant a full patch right before you go to sleep in your bed, and it will be fully grown by the time you wake up. That’s my go-to trick for stocking up on flax without wasting any active play time waiting for crops to mature.
Maximizing Your Flax Harvest Per Plant
Getting your flax to grow on time is only half the battle. If you know what you’re doing, you can get up to 3 flax and 2 extra seeds per harvest, which lets you expand your farm exponentially every time you plant. A small 10-plot farm can turn into a 50-plot farm in just a couple of in-game hours if you play your cards right.
If you’ve ever sat around waiting for crops to grow and wondered how long does it take flax to grow enshrouded when you’re using better tools, the answer is the same 12 in-game minutes, you just get more rewards at the end.
The first trick is to unlock the Scythe tool from the Farmer NPC as early as possible. Harvesting flax with a regular stone axe only gives you 1 flax per plant, and a 20% chance to get one extra seed. Harvesting with a Scythe doubles your flax drop, and gives you a 70% chance to get 1 or 2 extra seeds per plant. It’s a tiny investment that pays off almost immediately, especially if you plan to make a lot of linen for bandages or cloth armor.
You can also boost your harvest even more by equipping the Farmer’s Charm you get from completing the Farmer’s second quest line. The charm adds a 30% bonus to all crop drops, so you’ll regularly get 3 flax per plant when you use it with the Scythe. I keep this charm equipped any time I’m tending to my farms, and I usually end up with more seeds than I can use after just two harvests.
Don’t make the mistake of eating all your extra flax seeds, either. Even if you think you have enough tilled soil, save every extra seed you get. You’ll need thousands of linen later in the game for building furniture, upgrading your base walls, and crafting high-tier mage armor, so the bigger your flax farm, the less time you’ll spend grinding for resources later.
Common Flax Growing Mistakes to Avoid
I’ve made almost every possible mistake when it comes to growing flax in Enshrouded, so I’m sharing the most common ones so you don’t waste your seeds or time.
The first mistake I see new players make all the time is planting flax too close to their base building walls. If a tilled soil plot is within one block of a wall or other solid structure, the flax plant can’t fully spawn, so it will never mature. I lost 15 seeds to this my first time building a farm right next to my base, so I always leave at least two blocks of space between my tilled soil and any walls or fences now.
Another common mistake is planting flax in areas that spawn regular monsters. Goblins and wild wolves will trample your crops if they spawn near your farm, destroying fully grown flax before you have a chance to harvest it. I recommend building a small two-block high fence around your entire farm area to keep monsters out, or placing your farm on a raised platform that enemies can’t climb onto. It only takes a few extra minutes to build, and it saves you from losing entire harvests out of nowhere.
Finally, don’t bother trying to grow flax in the Desert or Snow biomes. Even if you’re above the Shroud line and use tilled soil, flax only grows in the Grassland and Forest biomes. I tested this by planting 10 seeds in the Desert just to see if it would work, and none of them matured even after an hour of in-game time. Stick to the starting Grassland biome for your flax farms, and you’ll never have to worry about slow growth times.
At the end of the day, flax is one of the most low-maintenance, high-reward crops you can grow in Enshrouded, as long as you follow the basic rules for planting and harvesting. Next time you’re gearing up to stock up on linen, you won’t have to wonder how long does it take flax to grow enshrouded, or worry about wasting seeds on failed crops. With a small dedicated farm and the right tools, you’ll have more linen than you know what to do with in no time, so you can focus on exploring the deeper parts of the Shroud and taking on harder boss fights without worrying about running out of supplies.