What is the best leveling path right now?

[Tradu]

No - you are the first to bring that up. I never even hinted I was inefficient.

I'll take your error on that as a sign you are absolutely wrong on the rest. Hope that helps.

Luckily we have the ability to quote on these forums:

Around 1 hour per level of unhurried levelling.

There you go, "unhurried" strongly implies you're not playing efficiently.

[Deleted]

Some feedback Feedback on what i did.
1-60
Stay out of Redridge Mountains, some quest are broken. dustwood is also pretty bad, Way to much run from 1 edge of the zone to the other and do this 9 times.
westfall,swamp of sorrows, and Stranglethrone vale, all are pretty good zones. DO this and instances and you make it to 60.
60-80
howling fjord is a mess, Dont do it.
borean thundra, and Nagrand are pretty good zones Remember to do dungeons, and you will have lots to do as both TBC and WOLK dungens, do as many dungeons as you can ones(for the quest xp)
80-90
jade forest And kun lai summit will do it for you hell, I was almost 88 before i made it to kun lai.
90-100
Any zone really, Shadowmoon got some good fast xp. DONT do dungeons i think they are Broken, I got 87 xp From ogres in slagmines, While i got 824xp From normal mobs.
And then 100+ welcome to legion, want to do it as effecient as possible? only do invasions, if not, then pick a zone(i recommend val'sherad, as some class quest want you to get the Tear of ellune)

[Rorke]

Some feedback Feedback on what i did.
1-60
Stay out of Redridge Mountains, some quest are broken. dustwood is also pretty bad, Way to much run from 1 edge of the zone to the other and do this 9 times.
westfall,swamp of sorrows, and Stranglethrone vale, all are pretty good zones. DO this and instances and you make it to 60.

This is the worst piece of advice I've seen. Redridge is a good zone up until you save all of the squad guys then you leave as the last section in that zone is slow.

Both Stranglethorn zones are absolute trash because of the amount of backtracking and people in them. There's also so many quests there like the crocodile one that have poor drop rates where you're going to be competing with other people for mobs. Slow ass zone and the Pirate quests in the Cape are fucking the worst with all of that water you have to swim through. Nope fuck that.

Oh yeah and if you're alliance the rebel camp quests are some of the slowest quests in the game. They send you back and forth 100 times, its not worth it, its a slog the whole zone through.

I would even argue that Westfall isn't a good zone because of how little quests there are there and the amount of quests that have NPC dialogue. Then there's the quest where they send you into the mines only to sit through a 2 min RP event and then you have to walk back out of the mines only to watch more RP dialogue then they send you to king then back again. Yeah no its slow I always just skip that chain because to me its not worth it.

Fully completing zones is mostly a time loss still. Most zones have a bunch of trap quest chains that are going to eat up your time.

[Micronetic]

Luckily we have the ability to quote on these forums:



There you go, "unhurried" strongly implies you're not playing efficiently.

Do you even know what that word means? Since when is unhurried = not efficient?

[Rotted]

That's good info.

I almost never go to Redridge anyway. How far into the zone is that stealth quest? IIRC it's about halfway, right? Might be you could still get some decent experience out of the zone before hearthing out and going somewhere else.

Pretty much 2/3 of the way in. But honestly if you aren't doing the end quests it's not worth going into the first place. The end story quests often give more exp than the start ones.

I also forgot to add duskwood isn't great. More viable at 40+ but still not great. There's a lot of running backwards and forwards between darkshire and the other side of the map

Doesn't work if you enjoy playing alts at max level.

- - - Updated - - -

When did they speed anything up?

I assume by speed up, he means decreasing the amount of exp needed between levels in previous expansion content. Which, even with the 20% added exp now, it's still true.

I remeber 60-61 taking well over a million experience, you used to pretty much do every quest in hellfire and BF / Ramps once each and just get a bar or two into 61 depending how much trash you killed

[Stelio Kontos]

Just to slightly alter what the guy you quoted said.

I'd advise against redridge mountains unless you have a high level friend with free time online. Part of the main quest line requires you to do a stealth mission, you have abilities to stun / distract NPCs. However, scaling has broken this, the NPCs can literally see through your stealth at a range greater than your abilities to distract / stun them. Rendering said abilities completely useless, the NPCs are also elites and will kill you.

I did it because a friend just nuked the area, my other friend did it through kamikaze runs dying a dozen times.

Yeah, I ran into that with my Lightforged Draenei and had to switch zone.

I decided to try dual-boxing running my Nightborne warlock through ramparts since he was 58. Dungeon runs still seem faster than the painful questing.

Made 12 levels this afternoon/evening, so not too bad. Tomorrow I'll try to crank out 70-80.

[Myta]

Based on leveling a Void Elf recently, Darkshore as people have mentioned is a godly leveling zone, the quest density is very high and outside of two quests that have you go around weird terrain to get into caves in the fractured parts of the zone, it's very well laid out and close. I hear Ashenvale is good as well. Loch Modan is also very good as it's condensed without a ton of travel except for the times where you need to go from Stormpike from Thelsamar and back. Save your hearthstone to the Thelsamar Inn for this.

I suggest going from Stormwind to Loch Modan, then to Wetlands, then to Darkshore, by Darkshore you should have your epic mount. You should be nearly 60 just from doing this with dungeons. If you're close to 60 but not yet, do Redridge up to the riding the boat point, then head to Westfall, and remember to set your hearth to Sentinel Hill.

60-80 I did Borean Tundra into Shalazar Basin (be mindful of the questing order in Shalazar, as the Freya quests and the Wolvar quests overlap a lot in questing locations.

80-90 Jade Forest then another panda zone, I would suggest direct queuing for Stormstout Brewery or Temple of Jade Serpent just for the quests.

90-100 do the Timeless Isle intro skip, start your garrison and quest to 61, then buy Accelerated Potions from the Garrison Quartermaster, with Heirlooms and pots, you need a max of 3 pots to do 90-100. First do all treasures in Shadowmoon Valley/Frostfire, then Gorgrond and Talrador until you are 96, then go the Spires of Arak and do the intro quest until you get to the faction base where you'll choose the Inn for another 20% exp. Spires treasures at 90% bonus exp will get you to 100.

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

20-58:

Loch Modan, Westfall, Redridge, Darkshore, and Bloodmyst Isle while queuing for Ragefire Chasm and Stockades.

NOTE: It appears that as of the recent buff to random queue exp, it's actually VERY worthwhile to do random dungeons while questing. I would still bail on longer dungeons like Diremaul, Wailing Caverns, and Uldaman. But that may just be my own personal preference.

58-73:

Northrend quests while queuing for Utgarde Keep, Ramparts, and Blood Furnace. TBC quests, despite seeming nostalgic, are literally twice as slow as Northrend.

74-81:

Set your dungeon difficulty to heroic and proceed to solo every TBC dungeon. Alternatively, Karazhan trash clears serve the same purpose.

NOTE: Some people are saying it's possible to start kara trash as early as level 70. YMMV depending on class, spec, enchants, and such. If you can manage it, I'd recommend it. That trash is crazy exp/h.

81-82:

You could potentially continue doing Kara trash clears til 82, but you might be better off doing Serpentshrine trash clears instead.

82-84:

Set dungeon difficulty back to normal and solo ramparts. Some classes can start at 82, others at 83. YMMV

83-87:

Back to questing/queuing for dungeons. Pick Cata or MoP, whichever you're most familiar with. Speed will rely greatly on how focused you are. MoP has the advantage of treasures which can be grabbed along the way for a little boost. Personally I'd stick with questing, since the speed is based entirely on you, whereas a group is random, and you could suffer a lot of wasted time if you get a bad group.

88-90:

Heroic Zul'Gurub. You can clear all the trash(and I do mean ALL the trash, including the fish and gators in the water) for a LOT of experience. Kill the sub-bosses, but do not kill any main bosses. Again, you might struggle a bit right at 88. A lot depends on familiarity and persistence.

90-98:

Use the Timeless Isle portal to Gorgrond to skip the WoD intro scenario. Fly to your garrison and do the quests to set it up. Buy exp pots and start doing bonus objectives and treasures. Potentially buy a 630 weapon from the AH if it's available and not too expensive. This will be more powerful than your heirlooms. At level 96 go to Spires and set up the Inn for another 20% experience.

Note: Some people have expressed difficulty with WoD right at level 90 due to scaling and heirlooms not leveling up correctly. If this is a problem, grab some free gear from Timeless Isle, or simply wait to start WoD until 91.

98-102:

Go get your artifact weapon. Some classes will have an easier time passing the required quests. Go back to WoD and continue clearing treasures and bonus objectives on EZ mode because your weapon is OP.

100-110:

Quest, queue for dungeons. Again, go to whatever zone you're most familiar with. Flying will help immensely. Invasions are technically the fastest, if you can do them.


This has all been tested pretty extensively by many people. There are ways to cheese the leveling process using something called "Method zero", but it's questionable whether or not it's against the ToS. Google it and do it at your own risk, and I expect Blizzard to nerf it somehow soon.

What if you're Horde?

[Katchii]

What if you're Horde?

From 20-60 on my Highmountain Tauren I did Hillsbrad, Hinterlands, Swamp of Sorrows, Burning Steppes, Searing Gorge, Tanaris and have like 1 level to go to get to 60 so I'm just going to use Ungoro Crater. I was playing a Shaman and really wanted to see the story in those fire zones for the elemental tie in they have. I just picked the zoned I wanted to see the story of

Hillsbrad and Hinterlands had pretty packed quests and went quickly as did Burning Steppes and Searing Gorge, Swamp of Sorrows maybe a little less so, but still decent. Tanaris is garbage IMO....I just wanted to get out of Thousand Needles ASAP as I had initially started there and hated it.

Queueing dungeons while you're questing adds a significant chunk of xp, as each random dungeon is worth 50%+ of a level generally, couple that with quests and you can get a level out of it sometimes.

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

From 20-60 on my Highmountain Tauren I did Hillsbrad, Hinterlands, Swamp of Sorrows, Burning Steppes, Searing Gorge, Tanaris and have like 1 level to go to get to 60 so I'm just going to use Ungoro Crater. I was playing a Shaman and really wanted to see the story in those fire zones for the elemental tie in they have. I just picked the zoned I wanted to see the story of

Hillsbrad and Hinterlands had pretty packed quests and went quickly as did Burning Steppes and Searing Gorge, Swamp of Sorrows maybe a little less so, but still decent. Tanaris is garbage IMO....I just wanted to get out of Thousand Needles ASAP as I had initially started there and hated it.

Queueing dungeons while you're questing adds a significant chunk of xp, as each random dungeon is worth 50%+ of a level generally, couple that with quests and you can get a level out of it sometimes.

thanks. got the void elf to 110 on valentine's day was thinking of getting nightborne without falling asleep because of this boring and slow ass level experience.

[NomCarver]

I had leveled my HM tauren with a combo of questing and queing. Make sure that you random que. The amount of xp at the end is worth it. To eliminate downtime always be questing. I found Hellfire Pennisula and half of Zangarmarsh to be enough to get to 80. The slowest is 60-80

[SirCowdog]

What if you're Horde?

Top zones for Horde:

Azshara, Ghostlands, and Silverpine are SUPER amazing, largely because they're "low level" zones.

Personally I feel that Northern and Southern Barrens are quite fast. Dustwallow Marsh and Hillsbrad are top tier after the low level zones.

Western Plaguelands and Hinterlands are decent.

Shared Zones like STV, Blasted Lands, Badlands, and Searing Gorge, and Burning Steps are theoretically really good, but suffer from overpopulation.

I would avoid Ashenvale and Arathi due to the sheer running back and forth involved. Zones like Stonetalon, Desolace, Thousand Needles, Feralas, Tanaris, Ungoro, Winterspring...I have no idea. I generally hit 60 long before I have to ever consider them.

Keeping in mind that you'd need to weave in dungeons, rares, or pet battles along the way. Whatever catches your interests.

[BicycleMafioso]

What if you're Horde?

Silverpine forest, hillsbrad foothills and Dustwallow Marsh are amongst the best zones I've done so far, and it made me willing to do them four times in less than two weeks.

[Teri]

Winterspring is a good zone from 40 onwards if you like pet battling too, if you have some teams around the zone's pet level or a bit lower, you get like 8-11k XP at 50ish (heirlooms)

I haven't tested it at low 40s, but it should be decent xp then too.

[Gwiez]

In my experience, stay out of Duskwood, if you're on a pvp realm. There's almost always horde griefing there. There's a druid portal to there and the portal to kharazan next door make it a prime target for people who want to be assholes, but are too lazy to travel very far.

[SirCowdog]

I updated the list with some of the added info we've learned. However, I'm not super fluent with Pet battles, so if someone can explain(in detail) how to squeeze the most efficient way to milk it for EXP, that'd be appreciated. I think it has something to do with the quests being account wide?

[BicycleMafioso]

In that list, I'd put emphasis on not actually killing a karazhan boss at all and that the wod part works only with flying. Otherwise, looks good. Examples of good instances with m0 too? Stratholme from 37 is bae, as the kids probably wouldn't say, but you get my point.

[SirCowdog]

In that list, I'd put emphasis on not actually killing a karazhan boss at all and that the wod part works only with flying. Otherwise, looks good. Examples of good instances with m0 too? Stratholme from 37 is bae, as the kids probably wouldn't say, but you get my point.

Since this is a guide for speed, it's assumed you have flying and full heirlooms, etc. Because if you don't your level speed is going to tank hard, especially when you get into Legion.

And method-0 is literally just Stockades or RFC until you can't stand it anymore, then Ramparts. The bulk of the exp comes from the completion reward, so it's better to use a short/fast dungeon instead of a longer one with more trash. RFC/Stocks/Ramps all have the advantage of a quick exit to facilitate resetting too.

Besides, if you Google the original video about it, it covers all that anyway. And as I stated originally, I'm not 100% convinced of the validity of it from Blizzard's standpoint, so I'd rather not fully endorse it. I only mentioned it because some people might be willing to take the risk for maximum speed.

But you do still have a point, so I updated accordingly.

[Rorke]

I can't believe some people think both STV's are good zones. They're the worst zones in the game probably outside of Arathi Highlands.

Hinterlands is trash if you're alliance because they send you across the entire map so early and you have to go down that cliff where the horde base is and those quests SUCK. They're so slow and the quests in the temple area are a fucking slog you have to backtrack so many times. Good luck if there's other people there too because the quest requirements are so strict where you'll spend time waiting on things to respawn.

I hear so much about Sholazar being a good wrath zone but I fondly remember hating how slow it was. I think people just love jungles and think that every jungle zone is fast when they suck. I recall Sholazar quests taking forever to complete because some of them have ridiuclous kill requirements and there's 100 other people doing the same quest as you. And I remember how bad the intro quests are where you have to go to that rebel base area and there's an escort quest there that takes forever. It sucks, I'd rather waste time in Dragonblight or even fucking Zul Drak than go there.

- - - Updated - - -

Silverpine forest, hillsbrad foothills and Dustwallow Marsh are amongst the best zones I've done so far, and it made me willing to do them four times in less than two weeks.

Duskwallow Marsh sucks there's no way that zone is good. Half of the zone is pre cata quests.

[SirCowdog]

I can't believe some people think both STV's are good zones. They're the worst zones in the game probably outside of Arathi Highlands.

It depends. If you can get in when no one is around, the quest density is really high and efficient to run. But if it's packed with people the respawns will be hell.

Hinterlands is trash if you're alliance because they send you across the entire map so early and you have to go down that cliff where the horde base is and those quests SUCK. They're so slow and the quests in the temple area are a fucking slog you have to backtrack so many times. Good luck if there's other people there too because the quest requirements are so strict where you'll spend time waiting on things to respawn.

Horde side is alright. The first half out of Revantusk Village is really fast and easy kill quests. But Jintha'Alor and Hiri'Watha Research Station are all back and forth quests. Too much running.

I would do Revantusk then bail straight to the flight master at Hiri'Watha for a free ride to The Battle of Andorhall in WPL if you don't have the heirloom flight paths.

I hear so much about Sholazar being a good wrath zone but I fondly remember hating how slow it was. I think people just love jungles and think that every jungle zone is fast when they suck. I recall Sholazar quests taking forever to complete because some of them have ridiuclous kill requirements and there's 100 other people doing the same quest as you. And I remember how bad the intro quests are where you have to go to that rebel base area and there's an escort quest there that takes forever. It sucks, I'd rather waste time in Dragonblight or even fucking Zul Drak than go there.

The entire decade or whatever since WotLK has been around, I've done scholazar maybe 3 times, and never felt bad about it. That place is crap.

And really, if you do Kara trash or TBC heroics, there shouldn't be any reason you'd need to do more than Borean Tundra and your choice of Dragonblight/Grizzly/Zul'Drak.

Duskwallow Marsh sucks there's no way that zone is good. Half of the zone is pre cata quests.

On horde side the quest density is so high that it's almost ridiculous. I can't imagine that Alliance is much different since most of the zone is neutral. Cata revamped a lot of the vanilla quests to make them more streamlined too.

The zone is perfect for 60-62 when you have flight.