Kay’s Mining Routes for World of Warcraft

I used to mine almost non-stop whenever I logged into WoW, and thus created a ton of singular posts dedicated to mining each specific ore. However, I’m trying to tidy things up, and in doing so, I’m going to list all of the mining routes of mine on one post instead of many.

This means less information on what the ore can be used for in regards to other professions and whatnot, but I think that’s okay.

If you’re here, you want to know the best place to mine an ore, not the crafting side of things.

Keep in mind, a lot of this information might be out of date, because WoW has been updated many times since I last played it, which was I think patch 9.2. I do want to update the numbers and routes and such but…I also have other things to do with other games, so we’ll see.

No promises.

Quick Links

FAQ

What addons are used for farming ore in WoW?

The addon Routes.
The addon FarmHUD.
The addons Gathermate2 and WoWGatheringNodes.

Is this a mining route for Classic WoW?

No. I play retail, not Classic World of Warcraft, so these routes might not be the ones for you to go by.

How long did you farm each route?

My overall farming time for each zone’s route is 30 minutes.

What race did you use for farming?

Druid, due to quick in-and-out of flight for mining nodes.

Why don’t you have a farming route for certain ores?

I haven’t played World of Warcraft in a while, so if newer materials you can farm came about, I’ve never done a route for them, so won’t be able to tell you the amount of ore you might acquire of them in a given time frame.

Copper Ore

Dismissed Zones

Dun Morogh
I tried making a route for Copper Ore in Dun Morogh, and it sort of worked, because the node respawns were well-balanced and I wasn’t getting a terrible amount of ore, but there are phased areas and alliance patrols. Making it not the most ideal zone for farming in.

Eastern Kingdoms

Elwynn Forest

This is an Alliance zone.

Thus, I tried to avoid any contact with guards in this route. You’ll just need to be careful flying over the road leading to Stormwind. Occasionally patrols wander back and forth. This route can be traveled with a ground mount for lower levels–although there may be some locations you won’t be able to get to.

This zone is normally farmed by a few people at once as it’s closer to the major city of Stormwind and a simplistic route to remember.

Copper Ore – 272

Tirisfal Glades

This is a Horde zone.

At first I didn’t like farming this zone, and I’m pretty sure RNG just wasn’t really on my side, or perhaps I didn’t get the route right, because the last time I farmed the area, the ore accumulated was actually decent. There’s not too much to worry about here when flying around.

Copper Ore – 248

Kalimdor

Azshara

This is a Horde zone.

This is not a ground-mount friendly route due to all the cliffs and such, therefore it’s best to wait until you have a flying mount. There’s also a small phased zone you may enter, where you could find a Copper Ore node, but not be able to mine it. In that case, move on.

Or, y’know, actually do the quests in the zone, you slacker.

Copper Ore – 316

Darkshore

This is an Alliance zone.

This is the best place to farm copper as alliance or horde, in my opinion (especially since there’s typically no competition about). It’s not ground-mount friendly due to all the fissures in the land. Though even if you’re a low level, there’s ore to be had everywhere you go.

Copper Ore – 451

Durotar

This is a Horde zone.

This route does go over a Horde area, so Alliance players beware of that. Also, while a good portion of this route could be followed by ground-mounts, I wouldn’t worry too much if you’re a lower level, because there’s plenty of this ore damn near everywhere. Because the zone’s farming is simplistic, it will be likely farmed by a few different people.

Copper Ore – 383

Mulgore

This is a Horde zone.

This is one of the more simple routes when it comes to mining copper in a zone. It’s not so much that you even need a route to look at, you simply have to follow along the mountain-side. But, just in case…here you go.

Copper Ore – 314

Tin Ore

Eastern Kingdoms

Hillsbrad Foothills

Tin Ore and the Best Routes for Farming Them — Tin Ore mining route in Hillsbrad Foothills

This is a horde zone.

This zone can net you a ton of ore, but in saying that, there’s going to possibly be a lot of competition coming your way. While I don’t personally go into caves, if you find competition on the outside, try going into the caves and nabbing the ore, as most farmers won’t bother.

Tin Ore – 370

Northern Stranglethorn

This is a horde zone.

If you don’t acquire enough ore as it comes up on the route, then the respawn of the nodes you’ve already gotten will take a while longer. So make sure you grab all the ore that shows up. There’s a small section that gives Iron Ore that I added in, only to help with the respawn a bit more.

Tin Ore – 248

Kalimdor

Ashenvale

Worst part about this zone? The trees. Best part about this zone? The amount of Tin acquired. You’ll have less competition here because it’s not much of an open area as Hillsbrad is.

Tin Ore – 333

Stonetalon Mountains

I had to improvise a bit with this map, because I didn’t want to get too close to any faction bases. I like this location due to the fact you’re not flying your way through huge masses of trees. Also: No caves. (I’m looking at you, Hillsbrad.)

Tin Ore – 244

Silver Ore

Eastern Kingdoms

Hillsbrad Foothills

Silver Ore and the Best Routes for Farming Them — Silver Ore mining route in Hillsbrad Foothills

One of the absolute best places to farm both Tin and Silver Ore, and because of this, there are usually other farmers about. Not only that, but during the winter holidays, events take place in this zone, causing more traffic. Aside from all that, a definite go-to area.

Silver Ore – 51

Kalimdor

Stonetalon Mountains

Ironically, I actually found more Silver in this zone than in Hillsbrad in my last route rotation for information, but this rotation didn’t net me much. I might chalk the possibility of more nodes to not having any caves to go into like there are in Hillsbrad. Also, Stonetalon won’t have much of any competition.

Silver Ore – 22

Iron Ore

Eastern Kingdoms

Eastern Plaguelands

At first I was going to make two routes with this zone, but the nodes weren’t respawning fast enough to make it worthwhile. Which means, on top of Iron Ore, you’ll also be getting a decent amount of Mithril Ore as well, in the upper section.

Iron Ore – 262

Western Plaguelands

I had a lot of competition in this zone, but managed to get a good amount of ore from the run. Be on the lookout for rares you may come across. Also, there is that one alliance bit you’ll be flying over. Just keep your distance up ahead.

Iron Ore – 334

Kalimdor

Desolace

The ore in this area is a bit more sporadic than in other zones listed, which is why I wasn’t able to obtain as much. But if you’re finding too much competition in the other places, this one is a good backup route.

Iron Ore – 287

Feralas

Nothing much to say on this route. There wasn’t any competition when I was flying around, and it nets you a nice chunk of this ore as well as a variety of other ore you might be looking for now, or in the near future.

Iron Ore – 356

Gold Ore

Eastern Kingdoms

Eastern Plaguelands

Gold Ore and the Best Routes for Farming Them — Gold Ore farming route in Eastern Plaguelands

There are two specific routes I created for Eastern Kingdoms, with this one focusing on the bottom and the other the top. You’ll be able to check out the upper route and the amount of Gold I gained from it within my In-Depth Farming Guide. But both routes are great for Gold Ore.

Gold Ore – 29

Western Plaguelands

Gold Ore – 28

Kalimdor

Desolace

Gold Ore – 14

Felwood

This route is pretty simplistic with the fact that you just have to stay around the border of the zone to get enough ore to fill your bags. You fly close to a horde area, so alliance need to be careful. You get pretty close to an alliance location as well, but it’s not much to worry about.

Gold Ore – 16

Feralas

Gold Ore – 40

Mithril Ore

Dismissed Zones

Searing Gorge
This zone can net you a decent chunk of Mithril, but not as a standalone mining route.

Eastern Kingdoms

Badlands

I tried slimming the route down by dismissing the right side of the zone, but as a druid, the respawn for the nodes couldn’t keep up with me. No big loss though, more like a win. More chances to get Gold along with your Mithril.

Mithril Ore – 346

Burning Steppes

You get a ton of ore from this place, so it’s super good if you need a ton of Mithril, some Truesilver, and not to mention an arrangement of gems.The only thing you need to look out for is getting near a few horde NPCs as well as a small alliance campsite.

Mithril Ore – 407

Eastern Plaguelands

I’m not a big fan of farming Mithril in this zone. Sometimes there’s a dry spell in the route and it makes me wonder if the respawn is a bit behind me, but then the nodes start appearing. So if you’re a druid, make sure you grab every mining node you see, even the couple that might be in a cave.

Mithril Ore – 197

Kalimdor

Felwood

Mithril Ore – 390

Tanaris

It’s such a desolate zone to do any kind of farming in, really, so don’t expect a fun time. But, it does offer a nice stash of ore from the entire route. Even if the nodes are kind of a good distance apart, leaving you with longer empty moments of flight.

Mithril Ore – 181

Thousand Needles

Mining in this place is even more brutal than picking herbs. Probably because it takes longer to mine a node than pick an herb. Still, it’s a good place for Mithril, if you don’t mind deep-diving.

Mithril Ore – 229

Truesilver Ore

Dismissed Zones

Searing Gorge
This zone can net you a decent chunk of Truesilver, but not as a standalone mining route.

Winterspring
This zone actually has two routes you can take, and the second one didn’t net me a good enough amount to put on this guide, but the first route I made, consisting of the lower portion, netted me a lot.

Eastern Kingdoms

Burning Steppes

Truesilver Ore – 26

Kalimdor

Silithus

I love farming this location because it nets a ton of Thorium, however, there are several ore in underground hives that I don’t go into. Despite this, the amount of ore you can get in this zone is great. Also, you don’t get too close to any opposing faction areas.

Truesilver Ore – 20

Winterspring (Route 1)

Truesilver Ore Farming Route in Winterspring — Truesilver Ore mining route for Winterspring

This route doesn’t differ too much from the upper portion of the farming route I’ve created, but the RNG was on my side on the lower half here. I did run into someone several times mining ore, but since the place is so big, it was never much of an issue anyway.

The only real issue are the trees.

Truesilver Ore – 20

Thorium Ore

Eastern Kingdoms

Swamp of Sorrows

You’re going to want to gather every single mining node you find in this zone, in order for the respawn to kick in after a complete look around the route. Which means you’ll be needing to go into the cave and gather all the ore in there, as well as everything on the outside.

Stay alert for the alliance and horde camps this route comes close to.

Thorium Ore – 218

Kalimdor

Silithus

Thorium Ore – 500

Un’goro Crater

I’m actually surprised Un’Goro didn’t net as much ore as I’d thought it would. The nodes aren’t as clustered and close together as the ones in Silithus, however it’s a very simplistic route that circles the border of the zone. So much so, that you wouldn’t even need to follow a route.

Thorium Ore – 364

Winterspring

This route in Winterspring isn’t a bad one and can net you a lot of ore. This zone has a lot of trees that could get in the way of your finding one of the ore nodes, but that’s the only annoyance. Initially, I’d had three routes to follow–one for the upper area, one for the lower, and the third that connected both–but to simplify it for you, here’s the one.

Thorium Ore – 378

Dark Iron Ore

Dismissed Zones

Blackrock Depths
This is a large dungeon to go through and because of that, I decided to skip out on seeing how much ore you can gather in one run. It wouldn’t be worth it just for mining, seeing as Molten Core is smaller.

Eastern Kingdoms

Molten Core

I don’t have a visual for the raid, since it’s a raid, and if you have to addons mentioned, you’ll see where the possible nodes are at.

As long as you don’t kill any bosses, you’ll be able to reset the raid and keep farming for the ore. The layout is pretty easy, some twists and turns, and there are times when mobs are dense, but not often. Just sneak around them if you can. Your best bet are stealth classes if you’re lower level. But aside from that, things should be fine for you.

Dark Iron Ore – 48

Fel Iron Ore

Hellfire Peninsula

I’ve farmed for Fel Iron Ore in this zone so much that I’m just sick of it. There are a few ups and downs over cliffs and whatnot, and that might be from where some of my frustration also comes from. Even as a druid, it sucks to drop out of flight mode just to fall over the side of a cliff and hop back into flight, and I can’t imagine how much more frustrating it is to those with flying mounts.

Fel Iron Ore – 193

Shadowmoon Valley

Well, I was hoping to get at least 100 of a select ore from farming this route, but that didn’t happen. Due to that, I’ll have to say this zone is a last resort farming route for anyone looking for ore. It’s there, but the nodes are so spread out and not as clustered together as the other zones that it actually becomes monotonous to farm the area for so little.

Fel Iron Ore – 84

Adamantite Ore

Blade’s Edge Mountains

This is a last priority route, but I wanted to throw it in and try it in case it gave more Khorium, since it’s a super short route. While I found some of said ore, I didn’t find much, but the overall ore isn’t that bad.

Adamantite Ore – 111

Nagrand

Route 1 takes over most of the zone, and it’s something to take if you don’t mind skipping out on caves (I normally go in them if I actually see it’s a Khorium node), and there’s really not much of a difference in the amount of ore you get from this route and the other.

Adamantite Ore – 158

Netherstorm

Again, like a couple other zones, it’s not the hottest place to go for ore, but it’s the least likely place others will actually go to. I managed to avoid any of the locations that require you to go inside caves. Yeah, I don’t like caves, can you tell?

Adamantite Ore – 104

Terokkar Forest

It’s not the most generous of places for gathering ore. Not that the numbers are bad, but there are so many cliffs to go up and down, plus the nodes are pretty spaced out with a lot of nothing between.

Also, if you’re using my personal routes, they’ll disappear for a hot minute as you go through Shattrath.

Adamantite Ore – 113

Khorium Ore

Dismissed Zones

Isle of Quel’Danas
This zone doesn’t allow you to have flight, so you’ll gather the mining nodes on a ground mount instead. Technically, this is a good zone to farm Khorium, and the route is simple enough, though I prefer to not mention it here. Many players will come here for Khorium specifically.

Terokkar Forest
Out of the farming route I did, I only obtained 2, so…I just decided to keep it off the list.

Shadowmoon Valley
After 30 minutes of farming this zone, I didn’t get a single Khorium Ore, so it’s been booted off the list. You might have more luck.

Blade’s Edge Mountains

This is a last priority route, but I wanted to throw it in and try it in case it gave more Khorium, since it’s a super short route. I net quite a decent chunk of Khorium, but make sure you dive into every cave you can and mine every node for a higher chance of these nodes to respawn.

Khorium Ore – 8

Nagrand (Route 2)

Khorium Ore Mining Route in Nagrand Outland — Khorium Ore mining route in Nagrand

This is the shorter route I created for Nagrand (Outland), and it’s a lot easier to navigate as it sticks to a smaller portion, but you’re going to need to delve into the caves that you come across. This will help out with the node respawns, especially in getting more Khorium node spawns.

Khorium Ore – 20

Cobalt Ore

Dismissed Zones

Dragonblight
The nodes weren’t exactly close enough for the entire route to net me enough Cobalt in my travels. Thus, it’s been excluded.

Grizzly Hills
You’re not going to get a lot of ore just by skimming the zone with a route. They’re too few and far between for it to be worth your time and effort.

Borean Tundra

Cobalt Ore and the Best Routes for Farming — Cobalt Ore mining route in Borean Tundra

This is more of a relaxing route to take in order to accumulate some Cobalt Ore. Mainly because you’re really not going to get a lot of the stuff, and while you’ll typically have no competition, I can’t believe there was someone else farming ore in the area while I was doing the same one day.

Cobalt Ore – 97

Howling Fjord

I love the background music in this zone while I’m farming. But one of its flaws (the zone, not the music), are the mountains. You can be flying from one are to the next without any ore in sight. However, that doesn’t mean the zone doesn’t offer ore in various clusters.

Cobalt Ore – 176

Zul’drak

While this zone has the ore bunched closer together, I wasn’t able to get as much Cobalt as I would’ve liked. Keep in mind though, due to the simple nature of the zone and how close these nodes are, you’re liable to have competition.

Cobalt Ore – 146

Saronite Ore

Dismissed Zones

The Storm Peaks
I once had created a route in Storm Peaks for gathering ore, but it was never very good. Several locations of the ore landed in caves which I don’t go into, and then there were far too many ups and downs to really justify the amount of ore gained.

Zul’Drak
There are nodes of this ore in Zul’Drak, but they are very few in number compared to Cobalt. Thus, if you’re searching for this ore in this location…you might want to rethink your choices.

Icecrown

As you can tell, this route focuses on one side of Icecrown, thus you can always farm the other side as well–there’s not too much difference between the two, if you map the route correctly. It was a pretty rocky start to this zone. I wasn’t sure if there were others farming the ore, or if it was too spaced, but eventually I obtained a good amount.

Now you’re probably wondering why I don’t have a second route for the other side. Simple: I couldn’t get a decent amount of ore over there as I did with this side. I tested three routes in total, and this one came out the winner of all of them. Maybe it was simply RNG having a bad day, but it is what it is.

Saronite Ore – 373

Sholazar Basin

Sholazar Basin used to net me a lot more ore than it does now days. With so few competition on your tail, the node respawns don’t show up as often. You’ll start to notice that nodes are few and far between, which causes this zone to be a last choice scenario. It still give a good amount of ore, but definitely not the best place, and a rather boring scenic route.

Saronite Ore – 128

Wintergrasp

There was a problem with this zone before, with the time between battles only being ten minutes, which limited the farming. But that is fixed now. Now, your biggest problem will be if there’s actually a battle going on while your farming. If you have instant-cast for flight, you won’t have a problem. Whenever the warning pops up to dismount, just dismount and then mount back up again and continue flying. Rinse and repeat.

Saronite Ore – 252

Titanium Ore

Dismissed Zones

Sholazar Basin
This used to be a good zone for farming this particular ore in when there was a lot of competition for it. But there are so many nodes in the zone and any one of them can turn into this ore that it’s just not worth the search.

The Storm Peaks
After trying to create a good mining route, nothing really worked out to get decent ore.

Icecrown

So I initially had two routes for this zone–left and right. I even made a larger one to encompass some of both sides, but when I tested them, I didn’t get a decent amount of mats. Thus, this is the only route I’ll keep and show for this page. As a Druid, I may have been collecting ore at too fast of a pace, so the nodes were a bit on the slow side when it came to respawning.

Titanium Ore – 13

Wintergrasp

My absolute favorite zone to mine in, despite how annoying the battles can be if they’re going on. If there isn’t a battle, then you should be good to go with no alert yelling at you to dismount. This used to be a heavily populated zone, but not so much anymore. In any case, you still may run into competition.

Titanium Ore – 62

Obsidium Ore

Dismissed Zones

Shimmering Expanse
There is no route that’s good enough to obtain any ore with just the mining profession–the respawn timers just aren’t there.

Deepholm
There’s just so many places that a mining node can spawn, it isn’t worth the effort of scouring the entire map to find them.

Mount Hyjal

There’s a specific area that’s a phased zone, in case you haven’t done the quests. So if the nodes disappear on you, that’s why. There’s also a small section where there are ore inside of a cave–I never went in there for this route.

Obsidium Ore – 236

Elementium Ore \ Pyrite Ore

Twilight Highlands

While the route is insanely long, the nodes are few and far between. Despite this, you do get a lot of Elementium, but there will be times where you’re just flying for a while without actually seeing anything come up.

Elementium Ore – 204
Pyrite Ore – 13

Uldum

I remember when there were a ton of people farming the edges of this zone, because that’s primarily where the ore spawns. They didn’t so much care about the Elementium, but the Pyrite, and the chance to get the Geode pet.

Elementium Ore – 271
Pyrite Ore – 32

Ghost Iron Ore \ Trillium Ore

Krasarang Wilds

This is a zone with a simplistic route to it with no cliffsides you’ll have to fly up and down over. The most you’ll need to do is fly over some water areas, but even then, you might find some nodes spawn underwater. There aren’t too many “dry spell” spots.

Ghost Iron Ore – 388

The Jade Forest

Initially I’d split this zone into two farming routes–one focusing on the upper half and the other on the lower half, which came close to Alliance territory. This was back when there were a lot of people farming this zone due to its abundance of nodes. But since there are less farmers, I created a single route for convenience.

Ghost Iron Ore – 312

Vale of Eternal Blossoms

This isn’t a zone that will get you a lot of Ghost Iron fast like some other places, but it still nets you quite a bit in a short time. Mainly, the reason people come to this zone is to get a combination of both Ghost Iron as well as Trillium Ore, since it spawns more often here than any other zone.

Ghost Iron Ore – 327
Black Trillium Ore – 18
White Trillium Ore – 21

Valley of the Four Winds

A fan favorite of all the miners that come to Pandaria because it nets a ton of ore in a fairly small path for the zone. Just know that there are a lot of ups and downs as well as areas that have a lot of mobs that could surround a single node. Mind you there are also nodes in an underground area, but I ignore them.

Ghost Iron Ore – 502

Kyparite

Townlong Steppes

I’ve never actually farmed this zone before, but I certainly wasn’t disappointed by the amount of rare ore I gathered, along with the amount of Kyparite. The only irritating aspect of the zone are the mobs flying around. You might aggro them, and they can be a nuisance when trying to mount up after gathering ore.

Kyparite – 83

Dread Wastes

I’m not fond of this route, but it can be an alternative for farming Kyparite if for some reason you’re not getting the numbers you’d like in Townlong. There’s just a lot going on in this zone–this route–and it distracts from the actual farming of the ore. Especially when you’re having to dodge flying enemies.

Kyparite – 83

Blackrock Ore

I’ve not done any farming for this specific ore at this time.

True Iron Ore

I’ve not done any farming for this specific ore at this time.

Leystone Ore \ Felslate

Val’sharah

There are quite a lot of nodes that are in caves that I didn’t bother with. Even so, the amount of ore you get is a good bit, and if you know where the cave entrances are for the route and want to go in and get them, you might be able to get more out of the zone. There is two portions that dip into a PvP area, but you shouldn’t be flagged as long as you get the ore and go.

Felslate – 71
Leystone Ore – 276