Fletching is the one skill where an ironman can buy most of the XP. Feathers, arrow shafts, broad arrowheads and unfinished broad bolts all sit in NPC shops in bulk, so the hard part is not the method. It is the coins, the bow strings and the logs. Every other input, from dart tips to gem bolt tips, is something you smith, mine, chop or loot yourself.
This guide follows the OSRS Wiki's Ironman Guide/Fletching, Fletching training and Ultimate Ironman Guide/Fletching pages, checked as of 22 October 2026. That includes Vale Totems from Varlamore: The Final Dawn, the Sailing-era wooden blowpipes, seeking arrows from The Blood Moon Rises and the ascension bolts that arrived with The Fractured Archive two days ago.
The three rules of ironman Fletching
- Train it in zero time. Darts, bolts, headless arrows and broad arrows are stackable and take two clicks per set, so they fit into Agility, farm runs, Slayer and questing. The wiki's ironman guide says Fletching is most often trained alongside other skills.
- Broad ammunition is the only XP you can buy in bulk. Broader Fletching turns every Slayer master into a 55-coin arrowhead shop. Everything else is self-made.
- Bow strings are the scarce input. The wiki's ironman guide recommends against stringing maple longbows just for the extra XP. Keep strings for Vale Totems decorations and for bows you will use or alch.
Fletching unlocks that matter on an ironman
- 20 FletchingVale Totems (oak)
- 52 FletchingBroad arrows; The Final Dawn (not boostable)
- 55 FletchingBroad bolts
- 70 FletchingThe Blood Moon Rises (not boostable)
- 76 FletchingAmethyst broad bolts
- 78 FletchingToxic blowpipe (boostable)
- 86 FletchingAscension bolts (boostable)
- 90 FletchingAmethyst darts and dragon arrows
- 95 FletchingDragon darts
- 300 Slayer pointsBroader Fletching unlock
Connect your account in the header to auto-check these requirements.
Levels 1-30: Quests
The wiki's training page lists five early quests that take a fresh account to level 30 with almost no Fletching done. Big Chompy Bird Hunting, Animal Magnetism and Zogre Flesh Eaters together give 3,262 XP, enough for level 18. Temple of Ikov and The Fremennik Trials add 10,812 more for level 30.
| Quest | Fletching XP | Fletching requirement | Other requirements |
|---|---|---|---|
| Big Chompy Bird Hunting | 262 | 5 | 30 Ranged, 30 Cooking |
| Animal Magnetism | 1,000 | None | 18 Slayer, 19 Crafting, 30 Ranged, 35 Woodcutting |
| Zogre Flesh Eaters | 2,000 | None (30 if you fletch your own comp ogre bow) | 4 Smithing, 8 Herblore, 30 Ranged |
| The Fremennik Trials | 2,812 | 25 if you craft your own lyre | 40 Woodcutting and 40 Crafting if you craft your own lyre |
| Temple of Ikov | 8,000 | None | 42 Thieving, 40 Ranged |
| Total | 14,074 |
Cut a few arrow shafts first for Big Chompy's 5 Fletching. Animal Magnetism is also the Ava's device quest, so it is on every ironman's early route anyway; see the Ava's assembler guide.
Two later quests add another 30,000 XP:
- Devious Minds (5,000 XP): 50 Fletching and 65 Smithing (both boostable) and 50 Runecraft (not boostable). The wiki warns hardcore ironmen that the quest travels through the Abyss in level 4 to 7 Wilderness, where you can be killed by other players.
- The Final Dawn (25,000 XP): a Master quest needing 52 Fletching, 66 Thieving and 52 Runecraft, none boostable, plus The Heart of Darkness and Perilous Moons. It also unlocks the Doom of Mokhaiotl.
All seven together are about 44,074 Fletching XP. Our quest order slots them in where their other requirements line up.
Levels 1-52: Shafts, Headless Arrows and Darts
Arrow shafts
Using a knife on logs makes arrow shafts: 15 from normal logs, 30 from oak, and 15 more for each tier above. The XP is per log, not per shaft:
| Logs | Fletching level | XP per log |
|---|---|---|
| Logs | 1 | 5 |
| Oak | 15 | 10 |
| Willow | 30 | 15 |
| Maple | 45 | 20 |
| Yew | 60 | 25 |
| Magic | 75 | 30 |
| Redwood | 90 | 35 |
The training page rates normal-log shafts at about 10,000 XP an hour; 78 logs gets you from 1 to 5. After that, shafts are for feeding arrows, not for XP. The wiki's ironman guide recommends willow logs at 30 Fletching as one of the fastest early shaft sources.
Headless arrows
Attach feathers to shafts for 1 XP per headless arrow, 15 at a time. With materials ready, the ironman guide estimates 45,000 headless arrows an hour (45,000 XP). From 1 to 52 it takes 123,660 of them, and every one becomes a broad arrow later, so this is never wasted time.
Ironmen can buy both halves. Feathers are 2 coins each in fishing shops. Arrow shafts come from Dargaud's Bow and Arrows in the Ranging Guild (40 Ranged to enter): 1,000 in stock, starting at 1 coin and rising as you buy. The wiki's UIM guide puts the average at 4.5 coins each when you buy out a world, and up to 500,000 shafts an hour with no competition.
Metal arrows are faster if you have the tips: bronze (1.3 XP each), iron at 15 (2.5), steel at 30 (5) and mithril at 45 (7.5), at the wiki's assumed 3,000 actions an hour. You smith arrowtips 15 per bar, or buy them from Hickton's Archery Emporium in Catherby.
Iron darts (22-52)
The wiki's ironman guide offers iron darts as the alternative: smith iron bars into iron dart tips, then feather them. It trains Mining, Smithing and Fletching together and gets you toward the 59 Fletching and 59 Smithing for a mith grapple. Each iron dart is 3.8 XP; the guide estimates a realistic 18,000 darts (1,800 sets of 10) an hour, or 68,000+ XP.
Smithing dart tips needs The Tourist Trap. Feathering them does not.
Wintertodt
Fletching bruma roots into kindling at Wintertodt gives 0.6 times your Fletching level per root, at 350 to 370 kindling an hour. That is about 4,250 XP an hour at level 20, 11,000 at 50 and 21,000 at 99. The wiki says to reach at least 20 before relying on it. Our walkthrough already buys feathers before Wintertodt for exactly this reason.
Levels 20-99: Vale Totems
Vale Totems is a Fletching minigame in the Auburn Valley in north-west Varlamore, released in July 2025. The wiki calls it the highest Fletching XP per hour you can get without spending money, and its UIM guide calls it one of the best uses for noted logs.
Requirements: Children of the Sun, 20 Fletching, the short Vale Totems miniquest, a knife and an axe or logs. Each wood has its own level, and boosts work: oak 20, willow 35, maple 50, yew 65, magic 80, redwood 90.
How it works: eight totem sites ring the valley. Build a totem with one log, carve it to match the animal spirits nearby, then decorate it with four fletched items of the same wood: shortbows, longbows, their unstrung versions, crossbow stocks, shields, or redwood hiking staves. Each wrong animal costs 25% of the decoration XP. Ents walk the loop every 80 ticks, admire finished totems and leave vale offerings. Every 100 offerings you collect can be rummaged for one research point and a random reward.
The wiki's ironman guide estimates these rates at maximum efficiency: a stockpile of banked logs, all 8 sites per loop, and fletching and stringing between them.
| Logs | Level | Standard | With log basket | Log basket + bow strings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oak | 20 | 22,500 | 29,000 | 36,000 |
| Willow | 35 | 55,000 | 71,000 | 89,000 |
| Maple | 50 | 87,500 | 120,000 | 150,000 |
| Yew | 65 | 140,000 | 225,000 | 265,000 |
| Magic | 80 | 265,000 | 340,000 | 420,000 |
| Redwood | 90 | 325,000 | 420,000 | n/a |
The page itself flags these as averages that may need updating. Without a log basket you can only carry enough for five totems per loop; with one, all eight. A full loop takes 40 logs.
Vale Totems loop
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FillWear the fletching knife in the off-hand once you have it. The log basket comes from the Forestry Shop for 300 noted oak logs, 300 noted willow logs and 5,000 anima-infused bark.
Getting there: the Quetzal Transport System after Twilight's Promise, the pendant of Ates to Nemus Retreat after The Heart of Darkness, or fairy ring AIS with Fairytale II partly done.
What the reward shop is for
Ranulph's Vale Research Exchange in Auburnvale sells the two tools that change Fletching on an ironman:
- Fletching knife (350 points, or 1/333.3 from rummaging): removes one tick from every item but the first, so unstrung bows go from 3 ticks to 2, about 2,700 an hour instead of 1,800. It works on arrow shafts, battlestaves, bruma roots, crossbow stocks, shields, javelin shafts, redwood hiking staves and the totems themselves. If you wear it, the wiki says you still need a knife in your inventory to start cutting logs.
- Bow string spool (250 points, or 1/200): holds 250 bow strings, rising to 100,000 once six spools are combined, and fills itself as you spin flax. You can string 27 bows per inventory instead of 14. The stored strings are tied to your account, not the item.
At the wiki's top-efficiency estimate of about 8,000 offerings, or 80 research points, an hour, the knife is a little over four hours of play at that pace. The Jagex launch blog says ironmen can sell any item back to Ranulph for points, and spare knives and spools trade in for 175 and 125. The common rummage rewards are dirty arrowtips (26 to 32), ent branches, bales of flax (5 to 6), blessed bone shards, anima-infused bark and feathers (400 to 500).
Levels 52-99: Broad Arrows
This is the wiki's main ironman method from 52 onward. The arrows are almost useless (they are the only arrows that damage turoth and kurask), but the supplies are the only Fletching inputs an ironman can buy fast and in bulk.
Unlock: Broader Fletching, 300 Slayer points at any Slayer master. It is permanent and also covers broad bolts at 55 and amethyst broad bolts at 76. Our Slayer guide covers which point unlocks to buy first.
Supplies: broad arrowheads at 55 coins each, or a broad arrowhead pack of 100 for 5,500 coins, from any Slayer master's equipment shop. Feather packs (100 for 200 coins) from Gerrant's in Port Sarim or the Fishing Guild shop. Arrow shafts from the Ranging Guild, or cut from logs.
XP: 10 per broad arrow (150 per set of 15), 11 including the headless arrow step, or 11.33 if you cut the shafts yourself too.
| Step | XP per hour (wiki ironman guide) |
|---|---|
| Shafts + feathers into headless arrows | 45,000 |
| Headless arrows + broad arrowheads into broad arrows | 450,000 |
| Doing both steps from scratch | 247,500 |
The Broad arrows item page is slightly more conservative: up to 42,800 arrows and 428,000 XP an hour tipping pre-made headless arrows, or 21,400 arrows and 235,000 XP starting from shafts and feathers.
The real cost: about 76.6 million coins
The wiki's ironman guide prices broad arrows at around 5.7 coins per XP. Its UIM guide puts 52 to 99 at 1,174,000 broad arrows, including the headless arrow XP, for roughly 76.6 million coins. On an ironman that money comes from Slayer drops and alching, so it competes with every other coin sink on the account. Plan it against your money making.
For the best efficiency the wiki says to make broad arrows, and the headless arrows that go into them, during activities that leave inventory space and downtime. Its examples are the Hallowed Sepulchre, herbiboar tracking, blood or soul runes in Arceuus, and letting two crewmates salvage shipwrecks while you periodically harvest the crystal extractor (see the salvaging guide). The UIM guide adds stealing artefacts, Wintertodt, chinchompas, Guardians of the Rift, jugs of wine and Pest Control, and chinning maniacal monkeys for darts and bolts only.
Broad bolts (55) and amethyst broad bolts (76)
Unfinished broad bolt packs cost 5,500 coins per 100 at the same shops. Adding feathers gives 3 XP per bolt, 10 at a time, about 90,000 XP an hour at the wiki's 3,000 sets an hour. That is far slower than broad arrows, but the product is useful: broad bolts have the same +100 ranged strength as adamant bolts and need 55 Slayer and 61 Ranged to fire.
At 76, adding amethyst bolt tips to broad bolts gives 10.6 XP per bolt, about 318,000 XP an hour at the same pace. The tips come from your own amethyst (see below), so this is an ammo method that happens to give good XP, not a bulk XP method.
Bows: Logs, Strings and Alchables
Cutting unstrung bows is the AFK option; stringing is faster but needs attention and, on an iron, bow strings. The training page's rates assume 1,800 bows cut an hour, 2,700 with the fletching knife, and 2,450 strung. Stringing gives the same XP again on top of cutting.
| Level | Bow | XP each | Cutting XP/hr | With fletching knife | Stringing XP/hr |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25 | Oak longbow | 25 | 45,000 | 67,500 | 61,250 |
| 40 | Willow longbow | 41.5 | 74,700 | 112,050 | 101,675 |
| 55 | Maple longbow | 58.3 | 104,940 | 157,410 | 142,835 |
| 70 | Yew longbow | 75 | 135,000 | 202,500 | 183,750 |
| 80 | Magic shortbow | 83.3 | 149,940 | 224,910 | 203,350 |
| 85 | Magic longbow | 91.5 | 164,700 | 247,050 | 224,175 |
The ironman angle is alching. The wiki's High Alchemy values are 384 coins for a maple longbow, 768 for a yew longbow or an unstrung magic longbow, and 1,536 for a strung magic longbow. The ironman guide's suggested bow route is maple longbows (u) from Managing Miscellania logs, around 100,000 XP an hour or 150,000 with the fletching knife. The Magic guide covers where the nature runes come from.
Scale matters: 85 to 99 on magic longbows (u) is about 106,840 bows by the training page's count. That is a Woodcutting project in its own right.
Two other log methods:
- Redwood shields (92): two redwood logs per shield for 216 XP. The training page rates them at 168,000 XP an hour, or 193,000 with the fletching knife, and the ironman guide calls them minimal-attention.
- Battlestaves (40): one celastrus bark for 80 XP, 110,000 XP an hour or 143,000 with the knife. Celastrus trees need 85 Farming and are planted in the high-tier area of the Farming Guild, so the bark supply is a farm run, not a shop. The battlestaves are the base for elemental battlestaves in Crafting.
