Temporary skill boost

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A temporary skill boost is a feature that can temporarily raise a player's level in one or more skills by consuming foods or potions, equipping certain weapons, executing special attacks, or being in a specific area. Use cases include increasing skilling success chance or performing actions above the player's current level. For example, a magic potion, which boosts a player's Magic level by four, will let a player with level 51 Magic cast High Level Alchemy which usually requires 55 Magic.

There are several restrictions to these temporary boosts. Note that they do not work on certain quest and diary requirements, and do not work on minigame requirements at all. Temporary skill boosts do not allow the player to equip items that require a level higher than their current base level. However, skill decreases below a certain level do not prevent the player from equipping items they normally can equip at base level (e.g. if a player with 60 Attack drinks beer to lower their level below 60, they can still wield dragon weapons).

When logging into or world hopping to a free-to-play world, all current stat boosts are reset, except for boosts to Prayer, Mining, and Smithing. Visible temporary boosts do not stack - for example, a dwarven stout provides +1 Mining and Smithing, and a mature dwarven stout provides +2 to the same skills; using them together will not produce +3, but +2, as that is the maximum boost.

Boost cycle

Skills that are temporarily boosted will decay at a rate of 1 level per minute without the aid of the Preserve prayer. However, this timer does not start when you receive the temporary boost but is a continuous cycle running in the background. Therefore, the first level of the boost will almost certainly decay faster than subsequent levels.

Note: Combat skills are on a separate timer to non-combat skills.

The cycle is split into five 12 second segments. The segment you are in when you log out (or switch worlds) is the segment you will be on when you log back in however the segment will restart. For example, if you log out after 10 seconds of a boost with 50 seconds remaining, you will have 60 seconds when you log back in as you will be reset back to the beginning of segment 1.

Knowing this, players can maintain a boost infinitely as long as the action can be completed within 12 seconds. This is useful for activities such as Achievement diary tasks that may require a player to boost with Spicy stew next to a stat restoration pool which may be located far from the location of the diary task itself.

To do this, the player must eat the stews until they have their required level and then make as much progress towards their required location as they can within 12 seconds before logging out or switching worlds. As long as the logout was before the end of the segment, the player will have another 60 seconds to get to their location instead of whatever remaining time they had when they logged out. This method can be done within any segment but segment 1 allows for more mistakes in case the player accidentally stays logged in for longer than 12 seconds at a time.

The Preserve prayer can be used to extend the cycle from 60 seconds to 90 seconds. Although the prayer point drain of Preserve is slow anyway, player's can further reduce the drain by only activating it just over 15 seconds before the end of the cycle (Preserve requires it to have been active for 15 seconds before affecting a boost) and then deactivating it once the level decays. This gives the full 90 seconds of boost whilst reducing the time Preserve is active by however long the player waited before activation. For example, waiting until 20 seconds of a boost remain before activating the prayer will give the full 90 seconds while being active for 40 fewer seconds.

Uses

• Entering a guild that requires a certain skill level, such as drinking a dwarven stout to enter the Mining Guild. This does not work for the Warriors' Guild.
• Doing an action that requires a higher level than the player is currently at, such as using a fishing potion to fish sharks.
• Meeting the skill requirements of some quests. Players should keep in mind that temporary boosts do not work on all quests.
• Increases the effect of combat skills (i.e. damage output, accuracy, defence), depending on the type of skill that is enhanced. Combat boosts will also give benefits from boosting beyond level 99.
• Increases speed of gathering skills slightly, but visible skill boosts for these skills have no effect after level 99. For example, the dragon axe special boosts the visible Woodcutting level to 102 from 99, but players will not gain any benefit from this; level 102 is the same as level 99 in terms of gathering speed.
• Conversely, invisible boosts do have an effect on gathering skills after level 99. For example, an invisible +7 boost to your Fishing level inside of the Fishing Guild or a +4 invisible boost to Mining from the celestial ring will have an impact on those respective skills.

Note: Every visible stat that is boosted will decrease 1 level every minute. For example, using a botanical pie gives a player 4 levels in Herblore but decreases in the next minute, giving the player only 3 levels. This length of time can be increased to 90 seconds by using the prayer Preserve.

The first boost will last less than a minute, with all subsequent drains occurring in exact 1 minute intervals on some increment of 15 seconds since login. In order to check when your stats will go down again, one of the simplest methods is to drink a very cheap boost (such as beer), wait for it to decrease 1 level, then quickly use the desired boost. Combat and non-combat skills use different timers, so make sure to use an appropriate boost when checking the drain time.

The only two methods of stopping or pausing a stat decrease is either by logging out every 15 seconds or less of game time, or through a divine potion. Skill boosts through these potions will persist at the boosted level for 5 minutes. Once the 5 minutes are over, the player's boosted skill will be reset to the base level. Preserve will not affect this duration.

Invisible boosts

Invisible boosts are not visible on the player's stats screen, and most of them cannot allow a player to perform activities above their base level (an exception is the crystal saw). For example, the Woodcutting Guild provides an invisible Woodcutting boost of seven levels, but does not allow a player with 68 Woodcutting to chop magic trees, which require 75 Woodcutting; instead it allows the player to chop trees with the same speed as if they were seven levels higher. Unlike visible boosts, invisible boosts do stack with other invisible boosts. For example, the Mining Guild gives a +7 invisible Mining boost and the celestial ring or celestial signet gives a +4 invisible Mining boost, granting the player a combined +11 invisible Mining boost if they wear the celestial ring or signet inside the Mining Guild. Invisible boosts also stack with visible boosts below level 99.

Items that give temporary boosts

• Potions, such as the hunter potion which boosts a player's Hunter level by three.
• Food, such as the garden pie which boosts a player's Farming level by three.
• Drinks, such as the Wizard's mind bomb which boosts a player's Magic level by two or three depending on the player's Magic level.
• Spicy stews - can only be accessed with completion of Evil Dave's section in the quest Recipe for Disaster. These are random and can boost OR lower a skill by up to five.
• Crystal saw, which provides an invisible boost of three to a player's Construction level. It allows players to build items as if their Construction level was three levels higher; this is an invisible boost and so can be used in conjunction with tea or stews.
• Capes of Accomplishment boost the corresponding skill level to 100/99 when the cape is equipped or operated. Prayer and Hitpoints skillcapes have a cool down period of one minute.

List of temporary boosts

Free-to-play boosts

The following boosts are available to free-to-play players. Click the skill name to jump to the relevant skill section on this page.

• Attack, Strength and Defence: Kebab
• Defence: Draynor Manor cabbages
• Magic: Wizard's mind bomb
• Mining and Smithing: Dwarven stout
• Strength: Beer and Strength potion

Trivia

• Prior to the update which released the Preserve Prayer, players who had temporarily boosted a stat were able to log out before a stat would be restored towards its base level, allowing players to keep the boost for another 60 seconds.