Fishing in Runescape 3 is a fantastic gathering skill, often praised for its afk-friendly nature and decent money-making potential. As you increase your Fishing level, you’ll gain access to better fishing spots and catch higher-value fish, directly translating to more gold per hour. Beyond the economic benefits, a high Fishing level is essential for numerous quests, unlocking various aspects of the game.
Why Train Fishing in Runescape 3?
Leveling up your Fishing skill in Runescape 3 unlocks a wealth of content and advantages. Firstly, higher fishing levels mean access to more lucrative fish, significantly boosting your Runescape gold per hour. This makes fishing a viable and relaxing way to earn in-game currency while engaging in other activities.
Beyond money-making, Fishing is crucial for completing a significant number of quests. Here’s a list of quests that require specific Fishing levels, highlighting the importance of this skill for quest cape completionists:
- Tai Bwo Wannai Trio – Fishing level 5
- Fishing Contest – Fishing level 10
- Land of the Goblins – Fishing level 36
- Rum Deal – Fishing level 50
- Heroes’ Quest – Fishing level 53
- Swan Song – Fishing level 62
- Some Like It Cold – Fishing level 65
- Deadliest Catch – Fishing level 70
- Crocodile Tears – Fishing level 72
- Head of the Family (miniquest) – Fishing level 90
To achieve a Quest Cape, a minimum of level 90 Fishing is required. Furthermore, those aiming for complete aerial achievement tasks will need to reach at least level 96 Fishing, showcasing the skill’s importance for end-game content completion.
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Essential Items and Boosts for Efficient Fishing
Before diving into the optimal training methods, understanding the various items and buffs that can significantly enhance your fishing experience is crucial. Utilizing these effectively can dramatically increase your experience rates and overall efficiency.
Fishing Outfits
Investing in fishing outfits is a great way to passively boost your experience gains.
Fishing Outfit
This set is obtainable from the Fish Flingers minigame reward shop, costing 560 tokens in total (140 tokens per piece). Each piece and the full set bonus provide a 1% experience boost while fishing.
- Fishing hat – 1% Experience boost
- Fishing jacket – 1% Experience boost
- Fishing waders – 1% Experience boost
- Fishing boots – 1% Experience boost
- Set bonus – 1% Experience boost
Wearing the complete Fishing Outfit grants a valuable 5% experience boost, making it a worthwhile early investment.
Shark Outfits
Shark Outfits, starting from level 70 Fishing, offer more advanced bonuses. There are three tiers: Shark, Burnt Shark, and Tiger Shark. Combining all three creates the Fury Shark Outfit. Fragments for these outfits are obtained at 5-minute intervals after level 70 Fishing and can be crafted at level 80 Fishing and 20 Invention.
The Fury Shark Outfit provides significant advantages:
- Toggle to receive or destroy caught fish.
- 7% increased chance of catching fish.
- Living rock creatures are non-aggressive.
- 5% fishing experience boost.
- 10% chance of catching two fish at once (doubling experience).
- 60-70% chance of not consuming bait when catching fish.
The Fury Shark Outfit is a powerful end-game fishing set, offering a multitude of benefits for serious trainers.
Call of the Sea Auras
Call of the Sea auras significantly increase your fish catching rate. Available in five tiers, each aura lasts for one hour and can be extended using vis wax.
- Call of the Sea – 3% Catch rate increase
- Greater Call of the Sea – 5% Catch rate increase
- Master Call of the Sea – 7% Catch rate increase
- Supreme Call of the Sea – 10% Catch rate increase
- Legendary Call of the Sea – 15% Catch rate increase
These auras are essential for maximizing your catch rate, especially at higher fishing levels.
Summoning Familiars
Summoning familiars provide invisible fishing boosts, increasing catch rates without granting access to higher-level content.
Granite Crab, Ibis, and Granite Lobster
- Granite crab (Summoning level 16) – +1 Invisible boost
- Ibis (Summoning level 56) – +3 Invisible boost
- Granite lobster (Summoning level 74) – +4 Invisible boost
The Granite Lobster also forages fish, granting you 10% of the fishing experience for the foraged fish in addition to its catch rate boost.
Waterfiend
The Waterfiend familiar offers a 5% chance to duplicate caught fish. It stores the duplicated fish, which can be teleported to your bank using a waterfiend scroll, increasing your yield.
Urns
Urns are stackable items that provide bonus experience while fishing. They fill automatically and, when full, can be teleported away for 20% of the experience gained while filling them. You can hold up to 10 full urns at a time. Different tiers offer varying experience rewards upon teleportation:
- Cracked fishing urn (Level 2 crafting) – 150 Experience
- Fragile fishing urn (Level 15 crafting) – 350 Experience
- Plain fishing urn (Level 41 crafting) – 500 Experience
- Strong fishing urn (Level 53 crafting) – 600 Experience
- Decorated fishing urn (Level 76 crafting) – 1,900 Experience
Urn Enhancer
For players with level 24 Invention and completion of Nomad’s Elegy, the Urn Enhancer provides a 25% bonus experience when teleporting full urns, further maximizing experience gains.
Skillchompas
Skillchompas are consumable items that replace traditional fishing equipment. They increase catch rates and eliminate the need for bait. While consumed per fishing attempt (successful or not), they provide a 10% bonus experience on successful catches and 5% experience even on failed attempts. Different tiers offer increasing catch rate bonuses:
- Cobalt skillchompa (Fishing level 31) – 1% Catch rate increase
- Viridian skillchompa (Fishing level 41) – 2% Catch rate increase
- Azure skillchompa (Fishing level 51) – 3% Catch rate increase
- Crimson skillchompa (Fishing level 61) – 4% Catch rate increase
- Crystal skillchompa (Fishing level 71) – 5% Catch rate increase
Skillchompas are a fast but potentially costly way to boost your fishing experience.
Whopper-Baiting Scrimshaw
Whopper-Baiting Scrimshaws offer a chance to gain additional experience while fishing. The inferior version provides a 15% chance, while the superior version offers a 20% chance for bonus experience, making them a valuable passive experience boost.
Aquariums and Prawn Perks
With level 63 Construction, you can build aquariums in your Player-Owned House. Fishing grants golden fish eggs, which unlock prawn perks in your aquarium. These perks offer various benefits, indirectly enhancing your fishing efficiency.
Serene Spells and Prayers
Utilizing Ancient Magicks and Curses after completing “The Light Within” quest unlocks powerful experience-boosting combinations.
Crystallise and Light Form
Crystallise spell cast on a fishing spot increases experience by 50% but prevents resource gathering. Combining it with the level 80 Prayer, Light Form, further boosts the experience to 87.5%, offering incredibly fast experience rates.
Torstol Incense Stick
Burning Torstol Incense Sticks grants a 0.5% bonus experience per potency, increasing every 10 minutes up to a maximum potency. Each stick lasts 10 minutes, and using multiple at once is recommended to quickly reach higher potency.
Perfect Juju Fishing Potions
Each dose of Perfect Juju Fishing Potions lasts for an hour, providing a 5% increase to your catch rate, contributing to faster fishing.
Fishing Boosts
Various consumables offer temporary fishing boosts.
Visible and Invisible Boosts
Fishing potions, admiral pies, fishing pies, and spicy stews provide visible fishing level boosts. The Ring of Whispers offers an invisible +3 fishing boost, stacking with other boosts for enhanced catch rates.
Crystal Fishing Rod
Requiring 93 Fishing, 90 Agility, 90 Ranged, and 90 Strength, the Crystal Fishing Rod provides a 5% increased catch rate, a solid upgrade for high-level fishers.
Taiva’s Fishing Rod
Considered the best fishing rod, Taiva’s Fishing Rod is obtained from Tavia’s Island after finding a red uncharted island map from deep sea fishing or purchasing from other players. It offers a 10% catch rate increase and chance-based perks:
- Barrel of bait: 10% chance to catch additional fish.
- Tangled fishbowl: 5% fishing experience boost.
- Broken fishing rod: Additional 10% bonus catch rate.
Taiva’s Fishing Rod is a top-tier tool for maximizing fishing efficiency.
Augmented Tools and Gizmos
Players with level 22 Invention can create the Fishing rod-o-matic and augment Crystal Fishing Rods. Augmenting itself adds a 5% catch rate. Tool gizmos provide further benefits. Recommended gizmo perks include:
- Furnace: 5% chance per rank to consume a resource for 100% bonus experience.
- Honed: 2% per rank increased success chance.
- Wise: +1% per rank bonus experience, up to 50,000 daily.
Augmented rods and gizmos offer significant customizable boosts for dedicated fishers.
Fishing Accumulators
Created at level 60 Invention, Fishing Accumulators gain charges when you fail to catch a fish. Once full, studying them grants 2,500 fishing experience, a small but passive experience source.
Relic Powers
With level 117 Archaeology, activating the “Inspire Effort” relic power provides a permanent 2% fishing experience boost, a passive but valuable increase.
Fishing Cape
Wearing a Fishing Cape grants a 5% chance to catch an additional fish (without bonus experience), slightly increasing your catch yield.
Dwarven Fish Extractor
The Dwarven Fish Extractor, a Treasure Hunter reward, can be used at any fishing spot. It has two modes: one catches two fish (no experience), and the other destroys fish for double experience, offering versatile training options.
1-99 & Beyond: The Optimal Runescape 3 Fishing Leveling Guide
This section outlines efficient methods to level your Fishing skill from 1 to 99 and beyond, maximizing your experience gains at each stage.
Levels 1-20: Raw Crayfish
Fishing Raw Crayfish is the fastest method for the initial levels. This quick start will take approximately 25 minutes.
XP/H: 11K
Levels 20-70: Fly Fishing (Trout and Salmon) & Barbarian Fishing
At level 20, fly fishing for Raw Trout and, from level 30, Raw Salmon becomes available. Experience rates increase as you level up. From level 58, consider switching to Barbarian Fishing. While experience rates are similar, Barbarian Fishing provides Agility and Strength experience alongside Fishing.
Fly Fishing XP/H:
- Level 20: 17K
- Level 25: 19K
- Level 30: 30K
- Level 35: 34K
- Level 40: 36K
- Level 45: 39K
- Level 50: 42K
- Level 55: 46K
- Level 60: 50K
- Level 65: 55K
- Level 69: 57K
Levels 70-93: Crystallise Fly Fishing
If you have access to Ancient Magicks and Curses and have completed “The Light Within,” Crystallise Fly Fishing becomes incredibly efficient. Using the Crystallise spell and Light Form prayer can boost your experience rates up to 118K per hour.
Levels 70-72: Crystallise Barbarian Fishing
Alternatively, Crystallise Barbarian Fishing is viable from level 70. It requires decent prayer gear and partial completion of barbarian training, yielding around 63K experience per hour.
Barbarian Fishing XP/H (Crystallise): 63K
Levels 72-93: Menaphos Fishing
Requires “The Jack of Spades” quest completion. Menaphos fishing, while not as fast as Crystallise methods, offers reputation gain and conveniently located bank deposit boxes. Higher reputation levels increase catch rates.
Levels 92-99+: Croesus Front
Croesus Front is an extremely afk method, recommended from level 92 (though accessible at 88). It shines with the Fury Shark Outfit and Pontifex Shadow Ring. At level 99 Fishing, expect 120K-220K experience per hour.
Levels 93-94: Waterfall Fishing (Prifddinas)
Prifddinas waterfall fishing area becomes available at level 93. It’s relatively afk with a bank chest nearby. You’ll catch small crystal urchins at 93, medium at 95, and large at 97. Expect 130K-200K experience per hour at level 99.
Levels 94-99+: Deep Sea Fishing (Fishing Frenzy)
Deep Sea Fishing Hub’s fishing frenzy spots become available at level 94. This method involves a streak mechanic requiring constant clicking on moving spots. Each 10-streak grants a 1% experience boost (up to 20%). Expect over 285K experience per hour at level 99, making it one of the fastest methods.
Levels 96-99+: Uncharted Isles (Wobbegongs)
Uncharted Isles offer Raw Wobbegong fishing from level 96. Complete “Flag Fall” and “Impressing the Locals” quests to effectively utilize this method. These quests allow daily free voyage supplies and island marking, crucial for consistently accessing islands with 3 Wobbegong spots. Each spot yields around 100 Wobbegongs daily.
Conclusion
Leveling Fishing in Runescape 3 offers both profitability and access to essential game content. By utilizing the right boosts, outfits, and methods outlined in this guide, you can efficiently reach level 99 and beyond. Whether you prefer afk methods like Croesus Front or active methods like Deep Sea Fishing Frenzy, Runescape 3 offers diverse paths to master this valuable skill. Start your fishing journey today and reel in the rewards!