Rested XP in World of Warcraft: Forever is a bonus pool of experience that builds while your character rests in an inn or a capital city, logged in or logged out. While you have some, monster kills give double experience, and the bonus drains as you earn it; quests and exploration are not doubled.
It is the oldest leveling bonus in World of Warcraft, and Forever keeps it with a few new ways to top it up. Below is how fast it builds, how to tell when you have it, the new camping and Legacy pieces that change it, and how to plan your logouts around it, as of November 13.
What Rested XP Does
- It doubles kill experience. A monster worth 300 experience gives 600 while you are rested.
- It only touches kills. Quest turn-ins and discovering new areas give their normal amount.
- It runs out as you use it. The bonus experience you earn comes out of the pool, so a full pool does not last forever.
- It shows on your bar. With rested experience banked, your experience bar turns blue instead of purple, and a marker shows how far the pool reaches. Hover over the bar to see the exact amount.
How Fast Rested XP Builds
Rested experience builds while you are in a rest area: an inn or a capital city. Your character portrait shows a “ZZZ” when you are in one, and the pool keeps growing while you are logged out there.
| Where you are | Rate | Cap |
|---|---|---|
| Inn or capital city | 5% of a level every 8 hours | 150% of a level (30 bubbles on the bar) |
| Logged out anywhere else | About a quarter of that | Same |
Filling the pool from empty takes about 10 days in a rest area. The amounts scale with your level: 5% of a level at level 50 is much more experience than 5% at level 10, which is why rested experience matters more as you climb.
Camping, the Camp Tent and the Sleeping Bag
Forever adds two ways to gain rest away from town.
The Camp Tent. Blizzard’s camping post lists the Leatherworking Camp Tent as a camp feature that lets “you and others sitting nearby” increase rested experience “by 5% of a level,” with “no effect if Rested experience already exceeds that value.” Sit at a camp that has one for a minute and you get a quick top-up, which helps most right after your pool runs dry.
The Cozy Sleeping Bag. Lying in it counts as resting, so it builds rested experience the way an inn does. It also gives its own small buff, Well-Rested, worth 1% more experience per minute you lie in it, up to 3%. Our guide to getting the sleeping bag has the quest chain.
One word trips people up: Blizzard also says you “become rested” when you sit by a campfire, which is what turns on the camp’s one-hour buffs. That is the campsite’s own rest. Of the camp features, only the Camp Tent adds to your rested experience pool. Our guides to how camping works and sitting by the campfire cover the rest.
The Well Rested Legacy Perk
Blizzard’s Legacy system overview says the Well Rested perk “increases the rested experience cap and allows rested experience to accumulate faster.” It sits in the Adventure tree, has five ranks, and adds roughly 4% to both the cap and the build rate per rank as of launch. Do not confuse it with the sleeping bag’s Well-Rested buff: one is a permanent perk you buy with Legacy Points, the other a short buff from an item.
It is an alt perk. Your first character usually unlocks the Legacy system at level 25, and by then the perk has less leveling left to speed up. Our guides to the best Legacy talents and to respecing Legacy Points explain when to buy it and when to drop it.
How to Get the Most From Rested XP
- End every session in an inn or a city. It costs nothing and quadruples your rate over logging out in the wild.
- Set your Hearthstone to an inn near where you quest, so getting back is one click. Our Hearthstone guide shows how.
- Spend it on kills. Since quests are not doubled, a rested session is a good time to clear the kill quests in your log, or to run a dungeon.
- Use the Camp Tent after the pool empties, not before, since it only fills you to 5% of a level.
- Rotate alts. A character that sits in an inn for a week comes back with a big pool, which is why rested experience helps alts most.
Rested experience is one of several boosts; our guide to every XP buff covers food, the camp and the dungeon changes, and our time to level 60 guide shows how much they add up to.
RestedXP Is Also an Addon
If you searched “RestedXP” after seeing the name in chat or on a stream, that is likely a different thing: a third-party leveling-guide addon that shares the name. It has nothing to do with the game’s rested bonus. Our best addons that work guide and our guide to using Questie cover the addons we look at. Every WoW guide we have is on our World of Warcraft hub.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is rested XP in WoW Forever? A pool of bonus experience that builds while you rest in an inn or a city. It doubles your experience from monster kills until it runs out.
Does rested XP work on quests? No. Only monster kills are doubled; quest and exploration experience stay the same.
How long does it take to fill rested XP? About 10 days in an inn or a city, at 5% of a level every 8 hours, up to 150% of a level.
Do you get rested XP if you log out outside a city? Yes, but at about a quarter of the rate.
Does the campfire give rested XP? Only the Leatherworking Camp Tent does, worth 5% of a level. The campfire’s other features give stat buffs.