Cheapest 99s in OSRS
- Theoatrix
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
What's going on guys, my names Theoatrix and today I'm going through all of the buyable skills in Oldschool Runescape, and I've calculated the cheapest semi efficient training pathways.
Guide Outline
If you would prefer to watch a video-version of this guide, I have linked that below. Otherwise, continue scrolling to read the written-version of this guide.
Non-Combat Skills
These are all of the buyable skills in the game, and I'll be starting with the non-combat skills, then ill get into the buyable combat skills. Lets get into it….
Crafting
Crafting is a skill that has become a lot cheaper over the years. It used to be a skill where you had to spend a lot of money to reach 99, but nowadays, its a fast, cheap, and even free 99.
In particular, water battlestaves are very cheap, mainly because water orbs have been added to the drop table of a range of new monsters, and the price of battlestaves has decreased.
With water battlestaves, you can get 245k XP per hour, while profiting on your journey to 99. At this point in time, you’ll profit around 6 mil GP, and its going to take 50 hours to reach 99.
If you're after a bit more profit while getting 99 crafting, making bracelets is your best bet. With diamond bracelets, you can earn 26 mil going for 99, while still getting over 100k XP per hour.
With green dhide bodies, it only takes 40 hours to reach 99… however, green bodies will cost 20 mil, so you essentially save yourself 10 hours compared to water battlestaves, but at a cost of 20 mil, which still isn't that expensive.
Smithing
Now another skill that has become cheaper, is smithing, and making adamant platebodies is actually profitable, and provides 240k XP per hour.
This makes it the fastest profitable smithing method in the game, taking only 45 hours to reach 99, although, the profit is very minimal.
The giants foundry can be another place to train smithing for a profit, and with mithril adamant alloys, you can get 200k XP per hour while profiting 8 mil getting to 99.
Firemaking
Firemaking is considered to be a buyable skill since you can buy logs to train, but training at the Wintertodt is an excellent way to level while making a profit.
Your income can range from about 5 to 10 mil while getting 99, depending on your stats. Getting 99 here can take 40 to 50 hours depending on whether you fletch, and training at the Wintertodt is the fastest 99 in the game without any starting capital.
If you really want to train firemaking the normal way - I'm not sure why you would - but maple logs are quite cheap for the amount of XP they give. You get 200k XP per hour, while only losing 1.3 mil getting to 99.
Farming
If you want to get 99 farming for free, you can plant papayas, maples, celastrus and calquat trees to break even.
Doing these trees is obviously a little slower than doing the top tier trees, but for the reduced cost, it can be worthwhile. Overall, the celastrus trees will give the most XP per tree, and will only bring in a profit if you ultracompost the patch.
Cooking
Cooking is another buyable skill that can be trained for cheap. The fastest method in the game, 1 tick karambwans, is actually a profitable method at higher cooking levels.
Although, training by making jugs of wine is very cheap too, and is a lot more relaxed. Making wines will cost only 3 mil getting to 99, with XP rates nearing 500k.
Also, most fish that you can cook is profitable, so with sharks or anglerfish, you can get high XP rates with long afk times, while still making a profit. Those only really work at higher levels though, since you’ll burn a lot at lower levels.
Fletching
Fletching is a skill that you can train really fast and spend a lot of money, or you can train it semi fast while profiting.
For example, tipping dragonstone bolts will bring in 23 mil in profit on your journey to 99, while giving 245k XP per hour.
Also, a more Oldschool method is stringing magic longbows, which still provides high XP rates of 224k XP per hour. Going from 85 fletching to 99 will net 11 mil in profit from stringing.
Herblore
Now herblore is one that is a little harder to make a profit out of, where nowadays, even super combat potions don't make a profit.
Although, with herblore, you can take advantage of new items and methods to make big money, like if you made goading potions right now, you could profit over 30 mil getting 99 herblore, while getting 330k XP per hour. But the prices are pretty volatile, so a more reliable way to train herblore for cheap is through cleaning herbs.
Most of the herbs are profitable to clean, however Torstols give the most profit and XP per hour, with 35 mil in profit to 99 and 150k XP per hour.
Construction
I’ve left the most expensive non-combat skill to last, and you guessed it, its construction.
The absolute cheapest possible way to reach 99 construction is going to cost you 46 mil, and that's through adept mahogany homes contracts. The XP rates for Mahogany Homes are pretty low though, only 200k per hour, even with the plank sack.
So a faster construction training method, that doesn't cost as much as the traditional training methods, is constructing mythical cape racks in your player owned house. This requires Dragon Slayer 2, and is going to cost 105 mil to reach 99, which is a lot of money. The XP rates are 430k XP per hour though, so more than double the speed of adept contracts.
Combat Skills
Now lets talk about the combat skills, and technically the only buyable combat skills are prayer, ranged and magic.
Prayer
Prayer is similar to construction, where the only way to train it is to spend a lot of money.
The best semi efficient way to train is by reanimating ensouled dragon heads, which is going to bring in 340k prayer XP per hour, and at a cost of 40 mil. That sounds like a lot of money, but its considerably cheaper than other methods.
A slightly cheaper way to train is with ensouled abyssal heads, costing 35 mil for 99 with about a 15% reduction in XP rates.
Ranged
Ranged can be a cheap combat skill, or an expensive one if you use chins, but probably the most relaxed, decently fast way to train is with a Venator bow.
If you sit in the nightmare zone all the way to 99 ranged, you're going to lose about 2 mil if you use amethyst arrows. You still get competitive ranged XP rates with the venator bow, over 120k XP per hour, but the bow itself does cost 80 mil.
There’s also cannoning and ranging the locust riders under Sophanem, and this requires a decent defence level. Fighting these will net over 50 mil in profit on your journey to 99 but does require a lot of focus, and its slower.
Magic
Now the final buyable combat skill, is magic, which is probably the cheapest and most profitable one.
There's a broad range of profitable magic methods out there, but one that gives semi efficient XP rates is the plank make spell. Doing this to 99 will bring in 35 mil in profit with 200k magic XP per hour.
Tan leather is another option, bringing in over 100 mil GP profit when getting 99, although at slower XP rates. The XP sits at around 125k XP per hour, so almost half the speed of plank make.
Overall, using the methods I've shown in this video really comes down to the trade off between profit and time. If you're after the fastest 99s you generally need to spend more money.
Thanks for reading.