¶ Research
Research is how your empire unlocks new buildings, ship components, and other capabilities. Every week your planets generate 
science points, those points pay for technologies in your queue, and finished technologies hand you the things they "provide" — usable immediately, empire‑wide.
You'll find the research view under Research in the top menu.
¶ What a tech gives you
When a tech completes, you receive everything listed in its provides section. There are three kinds of rewards:
| Provides | What it means |
|---|---|
| Building | A new building you can place on planets (e.g. Nuclear Power Plant, Cultured Protein Facility). |
| Ship component | A new component you can fit into ship designs — engines, weapons, shields, armor, scanners, specials. |
 Authority bonus |
Some techs grant permanent authority (more headroom for ministers, ships, etc.) on top of buildings/components. |
A single tech can provide multiple things. Once granted they're yours permanently — there's no way to "lose" a researched tech.
¶ The tech tree
There are 65 technologies organised into three Eras:
| Era | Theme | Techs |
|---|---|---|
| Era I — Foundation | Early industry, energy, basic combat | 17 |
| Era II — Expansion | Mid‑game power: better ships, advanced buildings, terraforming | 21 |
| Era III — Ascension | Late‑game superstructures, exotic physics, dreadnoughts | 27 |
Eras are purely informational. Nothing prevents you from chasing an Era III tech early — if you can satisfy its individual prerequisites, you can research it.
¶ Prerequisites
Most techs require one or more earlier techs. Requirements are AND — all listed prerequisites must be completed before a tech can be the active research target. If you queue a tech whose prerequisites aren't done yet, the system automatically inserts the missing prerequisites into your active research, working its way down the dependency tree first.
¶ Science: where it comes from
Science is produced by your planets, summed across your empire, and applied once per week to whatever tech you're currently researching.
A planet's science output is shaped by:
- Workforce — population you've assigned to science.
- Buildings — research-related buildings add bonuses; tax rate reduces the output.
- Planet match bonuses — ±50% if a planet's size or type matches your homeworld's.
- Special worlds — your Ferion homeworld doubles output; a completed Ringworld is a 6× science multiplier.
- Alliance science bonus — underdogs in an alliance get up to +40% science, scaled by alliance size. See Alliances for the full formula.
Costs range from cheap starter techs (~10 science) to the late‑game monsters at 1,000,000 science. Expect a steep ramp as you move from Era I to Era III.
¶ The research queue
You can queue as many techs as you like. Each week:
- Your empire's science is added to your science pool.
- If you're researching a tech and your pool covers its cost, the tech completes — its rewards are granted, the cost is deducted, and leftover science carries over to the next tech (no overflow loss).
- The next item in the queue becomes the active research. If it has unmet prerequisites, those prerequisites are pulled in first.
You'll see a news item when a tech finishes, and the Research view shows an ETA in weeks based on your current average science income.
¶ Switching mid‑research
You can change what you're researching at any time. Switching does not lose progress — your accumulated science points stay in the pool, ready to be spent on whatever you research next. This means there's no downside to reprioritising as the game evolves.
¶ Tips
- Queue ahead. The queue auto‑resolves prerequisites, so you can target the late‑game tech you want and let the system fill in the path.
- Don't sit on science. Unspent science isn't lost, but it isn't earning you anything either — keep something in the queue.
- Era I techs are dirt cheap. Several cost just 10 science. Grab the obvious wins early; they pay off all game.
- Watch the alliance bonus. A small alliance of underdogs can pull in a huge science bonus — see Alliances.
- Match your planets. Settling planets that match your homeworld's size and type gives a stacked +50%/+50% science (and other yields) — worth steering colonisation toward your match.
¶ Related
- Stats reference — what science and the other empire stats mean.
- Alliances — the science bonus formula.
- Ship designs — many techs unlock new components.
- Days and weeks — when science is collected and applied.