How to Find Floating Islands – Terraria

Explains what floating islands are, what you can find on them, and the best ways to find them.

What Are Floating Islands?

Description:

A floating island is a small area in the sky. It always has a small copper, gold, or brick house with a door on it. Inside the house is a gold chest, which as of update 1.0.6 is locked, and requires a gold key, which can be found in the dungeon. The island will also have a large amount of vines growing from the bottom. Note that the island is susceptible to hallow or corruption once in hard-mode.

Where It’s Found:

In the sky (duh). but more importantly, it’s height varies by map size.

On a small map, it can be found 400 feet above sea level.
On a medium map, it can be found between 400 and 750 feet.
On a large map, it can be found somewhere between 400 and 1,020 feet.
Thus, the best type to look on is the small map.

Contents:

Inside the chest you can find various items like health potions and gold bars, along with the floating island specific items:

The lucky horseshoe (prevents falling damage)
The starfury (a magic weapon that calls down stars upon your enemies)
The shiny red balloon (increases jump height)

Also on the island are normally two to three mineral deposits, causing a floating island to be very profitable to those who can find them.

Dangers

Since floatings islands aren’t their own biome, they use the same enemies as a normal grassland, unless they’re corrupted or hallowed, in which case they use the enemies of that biome.

However, since the islands are located at a high altitude, there are some things to look out for.

Falling:

Obviously, this is the main thing to look out for. If possible, try to get the Lucky Horseshoe or wings as soon as possible to prevent accidental deaths. A feather fall potion can also be handy for this. Finally, if you know that you above water or spider webs, try to fall into them as they will slow your fall speed.

Harpies:

Due to the height involved, these pesky buggers will spawn and both range and melee attack you constantly. However, with a randged weapon and some dodging skills, they can be avoided rather easily. Plus, thanks to the door on the house, you can loot the treasure chest with safety.

Wyverns:

These are mini-bosses that spawn occasionally at high altitudes. Note that they only spawn on hardmode worlds. They have a large amount of health, but with practice, a long pathway to run, and a multihit weapon like demon scythe or a spear-class weapon, they go down quickly, giving you those souls of flight that are useful for getting wings.

Gels, zombies, and demon eyes, oh my!

These normal spawns will come often, but hopefully you can deal with them easily by now.

How to Find Them

What good is all this information if you can’t find them?

Well, first there are some things you may need.

Recommendations:

First, you need to make sure to use a small world. Also, the best weapons and armour available are important, as there will be some enemies to fight. Grappling hooks are very useful, and finding islands is almost useless if you don’t have golden keys. The cobalt shield will prevent you from being knocked off by enemies. Any flying equipment, (Shiny red balloon, cloud in a bottle, rocket boots, etc) will come in handy, as will a depth meter. Health and mana potions as needed. Last, a near-empty inventory is important, so as you can carry all you loot home.

Also, the higher the resolution, the easier it will be to find the islands.

Now, there are many techniques to finding them, based on what equipment you have, skill level, world size, etc. I’ll list them by lowest level of equipment to highest level.

Sand Pile

First, go and mine around 250-500 blocks of sand. The reason for sand is that it’s easier to mine then dirt. Now, make a single-block wide stack of sand while on top of it. Just spam “jump place” over and over, causing you to make a tower of sand with you on top of it. If you see any islands, try to get to them by what ever means necessary. If not, take down the tower and try again some other place.

The Highpoint

This is a rather simplistic way. It requires any item that will negate fall damage. The more high jumping items you have, the better. Simply climb to the top of a tall hill or on the top of the dungeon and jump off to one side. If you see the tip it a islands, or perhaps some vines, then build a sand tower below where you think it is.

The Suicide Ghost – submitted by Acheron

Another method I find pretty good is creating a new character, on hardcore mode, going in your world and dying. This will turn you into a ghost which can fly all over the map. If you find a floating island this way remember to go on the ground and memorize the spot so you can get there with your normal character.

The Skybridge

This one requires a lot of dirt and/or other building materials. Again, you need a fall negation item. Build a very tall tower. If you have a depth gauge, try to build it in the middle range of where you can find it for your world. I.E, if you have a medium world, try to build the tower up to around 620 feet. Once you’ve finished the tower, Start building a long platform out to one of the sides. Just keep building for a long time. now, every once and a while, try jumping off the bridge and look out for low islands. Just keep building until you either run out of materials, or you’re just plain bored. If you did the hight correctly, you should find an island or two. Note that having a skybridge can block meteor falls.

In addition, you can also do this, as suggested by luigiman:

“Another cool technique is build a skiybridge like you mentioned before, and drop blocks of sand continuously as you run across. Then when you return to the ground, run along the ground until you find a spot with no sand. Then you know it landed on an island above.”

World Viewer

This is considered by some to be cheating. However, it’s definitely the easiest way of finding islands. Or any other similar program, and you’ll be able to see your map, including the locations of floating islands.

Mineral Deposits

This is unconfirmed, but some people say that if you see a deposit at the surface, it’s a sign that there is an island above. However, this isn’t proven. It is also said that floating islands are just land ripped off the ground during the build phase. Thus, if you see a lot of aboveground dirt wall, there may be an island above. This is also unconfirmed.

I Shot a Bullet Into the Air…

Like the title suggests, this technique involves firing projectiles into the air.
One way to doing this is to get meteor shot and fire it straight into the air. Wait a couple seconds, and if it bounces back, it means there’s a island above. Using a minishark and necro armour will save you a lot of bullets while doing this.

Another thing you can do is fire any unlimited range projectile into the air and listen. If you hear the sound of the projectile hitting dirt or maybe some vines, then you know there’s an island above you. A magic missle is also handy, as it plays a sound until it hits something. Thus, if you fire it in the air, it will keep playing and then fade out gently, unless it hits an island, in which case the sound will suddenly stop. This is is most useful for those that can’t afford to buy a large amount of bullets, or just plain don’t have any guns (though hopefully, they would have them before exploring islands.) Cursed Flames work, as do Meteor Gun, especially if you have meteor armour.

Water Bolt Ricochet

“On small worlds it works, takes between 10-20 seconds for it to bounce back on screen. You can hear it bounce off the island too. For medium worlds I never tried it, for large worlds I found that even the low islands were so far up that the spell expired before it made it back to your screen, however you could hear it explode when it expired because it bouned back close enough to be in hearing range. Making it useless on large worlds because it takes 28 seconds for it to do that. All in all it’s a painfully slow process but better than using sand blocks. unless your trying to use the gold on the islands to beat the eye, then obviously sand blocks are really your only choice”

Oh, Gravity

The use of a gravitation potion can find an island easily, especially when pared with a depth meter so you know the range to aim for.

I Believe I Can Fly…:

Once you’re near end-game, you should have all the high-jump items (Wings, rocket boots, cloud in a bottle, shiny red balloon.) This deadly combo allows you simply to jump up and land on a island. Thus, finding islands are a breeze. Also, the Ice Rod is very handy. As you’re flying up, right before you stop flying and switch to gliding, drop an ice block below you, and you can start afresh in the air. Use this to stay in the sky for a long time.