Glossary

Every Build an Ant Empire term in plain words: what it is, what it does and where to read more. New to the game? Start with the basics.

Basics

Ant: Your workers. Each ant you place in the nest walks to the food tree, takes a bite and carries the food home. Every ant has a rarity, a level and an EFF value; better ants bring back more food per trip. More
Ant Queen: The giant ant beside your nest. Press Roll and she lays eggs onto the podiums; her look changes (on fire, then all gold) as you upgrade Egg Luck. More
NestAlso: Ant Nest, base: The pyramid-shaped colony on your plot. It is built from floors, and each floor has slots where you place ants. More
SlotAlso: doorway: A place for one ant on a nest floor. New slots must be unlocked with cash before you can use them; costs run from $50 to $600T.
Food treeAlso: apple tree: The tree your ants eat from — an apple tree at first. Tree skins replace it and add a food bonus. More
FoodAlso: apples, boxes: What your ants bring back. Cart ants stack it into storage boxes, and you carry the boxes to the merchant to sell them for cash. More
Cart ant: The small worker ants that haul food from the nest to your storage boxes. They work automatically.
EFF (efficiency)Also: efficiency: Roughly how much food an ant brings back per trip, shown on its nest slot. It rises with the ant's level and is multiplied by its mutation, Food Gain, jelly, pets and skins. More
Equip Best: A button that automatically fills your nest with your strongest ants, so you do not have to drag them in one by one.
Trash can: Next to the nest. Throwing an ant in deletes it and returns nothing — the Resource Converter is usually the better place for spare ants.
K, M, B, T, Qa, Qi, SxAlso: number suffixes: Short forms for big numbers: thousand, million, billion, trillion, quadrillion (Qa), quintillion (Qi), sextillion (Sx) and so on. Each step is 1,000 times the last. More

Rolling and eggs

Roll: Asking the Ant Queen for eggs. Rolling is free and unlimited; you only pay for the ants you choose to buy from the podiums. More
PodiumAlso: egg podium: Where each rolled egg lands. It shows the ant's name, rarity and price, with a cash and a Robux buy option. Ants left on the podium are lost on the next roll or a disconnect.
Egg Luck: A multiplier on the upgrade board that pushes every roll towards rarer ants. It starts at 1×; about 40× is typical in mid game and 80–100× in the late game. More
Egg Rolls: How many eggs the queen lays per roll, upgraded on the board up to a maximum of six. More
Egg tiersAlso: Mythic Egg, Exotic Egg, Secret Egg, Divine Egg, OP Celestial Egg: Upgrade Ant Queen unlocks better eggs in order: Mythic, Exotic, Secret, Divine and OP Celestial. Each new tier adds rarer ants to your rolls without removing the lower ones. More
SUPER rollAlso: Super egg, rainbow egg: A long SUPER animation before an egg is revealed. It can reveal anything from an Epic to an OP ant, and at moderate luck it is where most secrets and divines come from.
Luck boost eggAlso: 2× / 4× / 8× luck: A roll that counts up 2× → 4× → 8× luck before revealing the ant, giving that egg a better chance at a rare result.
Event StarAlso: star event item: A free item that sometimes drops from a roll instead of an ant. Thirty stars placed at the Starfall altar open the Starfall boss fight; extras can be stockpiled. More

Rarities

Rarity: An ant's tier, shown by the colour of its card and slot ring. From lowest to highest: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, Legendary, Mythic, Exotic, Secret, Divine, OP and Celestial. Rarity is the biggest driver of income. More
Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, Legendary: The five rarities in the starting egg. Prices run from $45 for a Common Ant to tens of millions for a Legendary such as the Phantom Ant. More
Mythic: The first rarity behind a queen upgrade (the Mythic Egg). Mythics cost about $700M to $2.8B; the Flying Saucer Ant is also a free early reward. More
Exotic: Ants from the Exotic Egg, costing about $60B to $800B. This is where income jumps from millions to billions per second. More
Secret: Ants from the Secret Egg, from about $29T (Sawmill Ant) to $800T (Pirate Ant). Several also come from Robux packs. More
Divine: Ants from the Divine Egg (about $2T to unlock), priced in the quadrillions to quintillions, such as the Super Ice and Super Flame Ants. More
OP: The second-highest rarity, from the OP Celestial Egg or the Demon Ant Pack — for example the Boxer, Thunder and Belial Ants. Prices reach the quintillions. More
Celestial: The top rarity. The Starwing Ant can be bought with Star Coins from the Starfall event; others, such as the Angel Ant ($10Sx), roll very rarely from the OP Celestial Egg. More
Eternal: A new rarity announced for the October 2026 update. Its ants and prices have not been published yet. More

Upgrades and the nest

Upgrade board: The board next to the Ant Queen with Egg Luck, Egg Rolls, Ant Speed, Food Gain Multiplier, Expand Ant Nest and Upgrade Ant Queen. All upgrades cost cash and eventually max out. More
Food Gain MultiplierAlso: Food Gain: An upgrade that increases the food every ant brings back, shown as a percentage (+420% by mid game). It is the default place for spare cash. More
Ant Speed: An upgrade that makes every ant walk faster, so each one makes more trips per minute. It stacks with speed jelly. More
Expand Ant NestAlso: floor: Adds a new floor to the nest with more slots. Floor costs climb from $50 to $50T, where the nest maxes out. More
Upgrade Ant Queen: Unlocks the next egg tier: Mythic (about $26K), then Exotic, Secret, Divine (about $2T) and OP Celestial (about $30Qa or 100 Robux). More
Ant level: Every placed ant can be levelled from its slot to raise its EFF. Early levels are cheap; on rare ants a single level can cost a fortune, so level only your best few.

Selling and cash

MerchantAlso: sell spot, Ant Captain: The ant you carry your food boxes to. Selling there turns food into cash at the current sell multiplier. More
Sell multiplierAlso: price multiplier: The price the merchant pays, which changes about every 20 seconds, usually between 0.6× and 2× (never above 2×, occasionally as low as 0.3×). Waiting for 1.6× or more before selling is the easiest free boost. More
Offline earningsAlso: AFK: Ants keep working while you are away, but the stockpile stops growing after about four hours. More
Cash multiplierAlso: 2× Cash, 4× Cash: Robux passes that multiply all the cash you earn from sales, bought in order from 2× (9 Robux) up to 30×. More
Leaderboard: Leaderboards rank colonies by EFF and by cash, and show your own position directly.

Mutations

Mutation: A permanent multiplier on one ant's EFF, shown as a visual effect on the ant. Each ant can hold one mutation; there are six, from Leaf (1.35×) to Starlight (5×). More
Leaf: The weakest mutation at 1.35×. It is free from the Vine event and Index rewards, and the potion costs $1M. More
Bubblegum: A 1.75× mutation. The potion costs $5M, and free ones come from Index rewards — the best-value mutation for most of the game. More
Candy: A 2× mutation. It comes from the Strawberry King wheel, the Candy Rain event, rolls, or a $50B potion. More
Rainbow: A 2.25× mutation with a rainbow sheen, mostly found on rolled ants; the potion costs $100B. More
Petal: A 3× mutation. The potion costs $500T and also appears on the Strawberry King wheel. More
Starlight: The best mutation at 5×. Every Robux pack ant comes with it, the Alien event can give it for free, and the potion costs $5.1Qi. More
Mutation potion: An Item Shop consumable that applies one mutation to an ant. It cannot be used on an ant that already has a mutation. More
Mutation Removal Potion: A $100K potion that strips an ant's mutation so you can apply a better one. More
Mutation Index: A second Index that lists every mutation and its multiplier. More

Items and jellies

Item Shop: The shop in the middle of the map that sells speed jellies and mutation potions for cash. Stock is limited and restocks over time. More
Speed jellyAlso: jelly: A consumable that makes one ant walk faster for a while: Normal 1.3× for 5 minutes up to Prismatic 2.5× for 15 minutes. Feed it from the ant's slot with Use Jelly. More
Auto-feed: A jelly setting that feeds the ant a new jelly when the old one runs out, for as long as you have stock.
Resource Converter: A machine (unlocks for $100K) that turns spare ants into jellies and potions. Higher-value ants give better results; in the endgame it can even give a Starlight potion. More

Events

Event: A timed activity announced with a banner across the top of the screen. Events are free to join and give cash, potions, mutations or special ants. More
Starfall: The biggest event. Thirty Event Stars at the central altar open a boss fight against a giant star; the fight pays Star Coins for the Starfall shop, where the Celestial Starwing Ant costs about 2,400. More
Star Coins: The Starfall currency, earned by fighting the Starfall boss (about 100–160 per fight) and spent in the Starfall shop on the Starwing Ant, a Mythic, cash packs and the Starfall Land skin. More
Starfall altarAlso: wishing pool, fountain: The altar in the middle of the map where Event Stars are placed. It is shared by the whole server and needs 30 stars to open each fight. More
Strawberry King: An event where a giant strawberry scatters Strawberry Coins for about four minutes. The coins pay for spins on his wheel, which gives potions, jellies, cash and — at 0.1% — his throne. More
Strawberry Coins: Coins picked up during the Strawberry King event; 10 coins buy one wheel spin and 100 buy ten. More
Vine: An event that grows a giant beanstalk. At the top, a special podium rolls ants with a guaranteed Leaf mutation. More
Travel Snail: A giant snail that visits your plot. Click it for cash until it leaves; the payout grows with your income. More
Food BuyerAlso: Food Market: A van that buys food at 2.5× for about five minutes — keep a stockpile ready for it. More
Alien event: UFOs fly over the plots and can abduct one of your ants, returning it with a random mutation such as Starlight. More
Candy Rain: A weather event in which falling candy can give ants in your nest the Candy mutation (2×). More
Bubblegum event: A short event themed around the Bubblegum mutation. Its exact reward is not confirmed yet. More

Dungeons and combat

Dungeon: A boss fight that opens on a timer ("A dungeon has appeared"). Every ant you own attacks automatically; rewards are Pet Coins and a chance at that boss's pet egg. More
Round: Each time a boss falls it returns with more HP. Fights continue round after round until the timer runs out or you exit; Starfall stops at round 30. More
Attack barAlso: attack speed: The bar on the right of the fight screen. Clicking fills it and raises your colony's attack speed up to 4×; it drains when you stop. More
+15 seconds: A pickup that drops during fights and adds 15 seconds to the timer.
King of Spider, Snail, Ladybug and Mantis: The four dungeon bosses. Each drops its own pet egg — Spider, Snail, Ladybug or Mantis — with the Mantis as the last and hardest. More

Pets

Pet: A companion that boosts your whole colony while equipped — for example more ant luck (Snail), faster ants (Spider), more food value (Ladybug) or a chance to double food (Mantis). More
Pet egg: Dropped by dungeon bosses, bought at the Pet Exchange or sold for Robux. Place it at your base and it hatches after about five to ten minutes. More
Pet CoinsAlso: pet tokens: The currency earned in dungeons and spent at the Pet Exchange. More
Pet Exchange: The shop in the middle of the map that sells pet eggs for Pet Coins: 40 for a Snail Egg, 150 for a Spider Egg, 400 for a Mantis Egg and 800 for a Ladybug Egg. More

Mounts

Mount: An ant you can ride to move around the map faster. Mounts do not earn food, but they make the Vine climb and collecting Strawberry Coins much easier. More
Mount Trainer: The cowboy ant near the Item Shop who turns an ant into a mount. Training can fail and the ant is then lost; rarer and flying ants fail more often. More

Skins

Nest skin: A new look for your nest. Some add a cash bonus, such as Starfall Land (+60%) and the Robux Demonic Fortress. More
Tree skin: Replaces your food tree and adds a food bonus, from Honey Flower (+30%) up to the Chocolate tree (+100%). Most are bought with cash. More

Robux shop

Fixed PriceAlso: VIP price: A 799-Robux pass that locks the sell multiplier at 2.5×, so you never have to time your sales. More
Auto Sell: A 299-Robux product that sells your food automatically; it can be switched on and off. More
Ant Pack: A 99-Robux pack that gives one random Exotic or Secret ant with Starlight, worth at least $800B (usually the Void Ant). More
Demon Ant Pack: A 199-Robux pack that gives one random Secret, Divine or OP Demon ant with Starlight, such as the Bale, Abaddon or Belial Ant. More
Starter Pack: A one-off 3-Robux pack with cash, three Bubblegum potions and a Big Head Ant — the best-value purchase for a new account. More
Food Pack: Instant food equal to 20 minutes (29 Robux) or 80 minutes (99 Robux) of your colony's collection; sell it at a high multiplier. More

Index and free rewards

Index: The collection book of every ant, shown as silhouettes until you buy one. Completing a rarity row gives a permanent sell bonus, and discovery milestones pay cash, jellies and potions. More
Playtime rewards: Rewards that unlock on a timer while you play — cash, jellies, sell bonuses and ants such as the Basic Flame Ant. Leaving the game resets the timer. More
Daily rewardsAlso: check-in: Login rewards; the daily reward can include a Flying Saucer Ant, and a 14-day check-in streak gives a golden Ladybug pet. More
Codes: Text codes redeemed in Settings for timed cash boosts or Star Coins. They expire without warning. More