How to Get Nail in Palworld 1.0 (& What It's For)
Nail is the material you will craft more of than almost anything else in Palworld, and it is one of the few that never becomes obsolete. It gates the High Quality Workbench, every assembly line, the Weapon Workbench, the Clinic and half the furniture in the game — and unlike most intermediates, the endgame versions of those structures still ask for it. The in-game description is characteristically plain: "Necessary for building various facilities. Can be made with a Primitive Workbench."
Nail at a Glance
| Field | Details |
|---|---|
| Technology Level | 10 |
| Recipe | 1 Ingot → 5 Nail |
| Work amount | 15 |
| Crafted at | Primitive Workbench, High Quality Workbench, Production Assembly Line, Production Assembly Line II, Advanced Workshop, Ancient Workbench |
| Weight | 2 |
| Gold value | 60 |
| Max stack | 9,999 |
The conversion is unusually generous. One Ingot becomes five Nails for just 15 work — a five-to-one multiplication where most Palworld recipes consume several inputs to produce one output. Nails are cheap; the Ingot behind them is the actual cost.
What Needs Nails
Nails are a structure material rather than a gear material, and they run the length of the build tree:
| Structure | Tech | Nails |
|---|---|---|
| High Quality Workbench | 11 | 10 |
| Medieval Medicine Workbench | 12 | 5 |
| Sphere Workbench | 14 | 10 |
| Weapon Workbench | 20 | 10 |
| Fluffy Pal Bed | 24 | 5 |
| Clinic | 24 | 15 |
| Sphere Assembly Line | 27 | 20 |
| Production Assembly Line | 29 | 20 |
| Weapon Assembly Line | 32 | 20 |
| Large Pal Bed | 36 | 20 |
| Sphere Assembly Line II | 35 | 30 |
| Production Assembly Line II | 42 | 30 |
Note what does not fall off. Production Assembly Line II sits at Technology 42 and still wants 30 Nails, alongside 100 Refined Ingot and 10 Circuit Board. A Technology 10 material remains a requirement thirty-two levels later — which is why it is worth keeping a standing stock rather than crafting to order.
The Primitive Workbench makes them at full rate. There is no efficiency gain from crafting Nails at a higher bench; the recipe is 1 Ingot → 5 Nail everywhere. The upper benches simply let a better-suited Pal work faster. If your base has a spare Primitive Workbench and a Handiwork Pal, that is a perfectly good nail factory.
The Weight Problem
Here is the detail that catches people out on build trips: Nail has a weight of 2.
That is heavy for a common material. For comparison:
| Material | Weight |
|---|---|
| Nail | 2 |
| Low Grade Medical Supplies | 0.2 |
| Recovery Meds | 0.2 |
| Polymer | 0.5 |
| Vital Remedy | 1 |
Carrying 100 Nails costs 200 capacity — and your base carrying capacity starts at 500. A stack of Nails, a stack of Ingot and some stone is a full inventory before you have picked up anything worth having.
Two practical consequences:
- Craft Nails at the base you are building at, not at a central base you then haul from. Ingot at weight 1 travels better than the Nails it becomes.
- Weight is the Status Point worth buying, at +50 per point. This is exactly the kind of trip it pays for. The Burden Remedy raises the same stat permanently past Level 80, though at one point per Predator Core it is a trickle rather than a solution.
Keeping Nails Stocked
Since Nails come from Ingot, the real task is automating the chain behind them:
- Ore Mining Site (Technology 24) — 50 Stone, 25 Ingot, 20 Paldium Fragment, 5 Ancient Civilization Parts. Needs a Mining Pal. Produces ore continuously.
- A furnace — the Primitive Furnace at Technology 10 needs a Kindling Pal and turns Ore into Ingot.
- A workbench with a Handiwork Pal, running the 1 → 5 Nail recipe.
That is three structures and three suitabilities, and once it is running you should never think about Nails again.
Two warnings from the wider base economy. First, extraction sites drain Pal SAN at -0.15 per second, the highest bracket in the game — a mining base needs a Hot Spring (Technology 9, +0.50/s) more than a crafting base does. Second, if you would rather buy than mine, Ingot is cheap from merchants and Nails at 60 gold each are rarely worth purchasing directly when the Ingot behind five of them costs less.
Later mining tiers are worth knowing about even though they do not make Nails directly: Ore Mining Site II at Technology 39 adds throughput rather than replacing the first, so running both beats upgrading.
Practical tips
- 1 Ingot → 5 Nails for 15 work. One of the best conversion ratios in the game.
- Unlocks at Technology 10 and is still required by Production Assembly Line II at Technology 42.
- No bench crafts them more efficiently — the Primitive Workbench uses the same recipe.
- Nails weigh 2 each. Carry Ingot to the build site and craft there instead.
- Automate Ore Mining Site → furnace → workbench and stop thinking about it.
- Keep a standing stock. Nails are needed in 5s and 10s early, then 20s and 30s.
Running your own Palworld 1.0 server
Nails are a background production job — an Ore Mining Site feeding a furnace feeding a workbench, all of it running on Pal labour rather than yours. None of that ticks while your game is closed. A dedicated Palworld 1.0 server keeps the whole chain producing around the clock, so the 30 Nails your next assembly line needs are already in the chest when you log in. Full crossplay lets a group share one base across platforms, and one-click backups and automatic updates protect the setup.
Conclusion
Nail unlocks at Technology 10 and converts 1 Ingot into 5 Nails for 15 work — one of the most generous ratios in Palworld, and available at the Primitive Workbench with no efficiency penalty. It is a structure material rather than a gear one, gating the High Quality Workbench, the Sphere, Production and Weapon Assembly Lines, the Clinic and the Pal beds, and it does not stop being required: Production Assembly Line II at Technology 42 still asks for 30. Watch the weight of 2 — carry Ingot to a build site rather than finished Nails — and automate the Ore Mining Site → furnace → workbench chain early so the material never becomes a blocker.
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