How to Use Pal Labor Research Laboratory in Palworld

Palworld's Feybreak expansion has introduced the Pal Labor Research Laboratory, allowing players to advance a variety of research trees separate from the standard tech tree that was already in the game. While these research projects can be time and resource intensive, they can also offer a variety of permanent and substantial buffs that make the lab a must for adventuring Pal Tamers.

Unlocking the Pal Labor Research Laboratory

The Palworld tech tree with the Pal Labor Research Laboratory upgrade highlighted.

The Pal Labor Research Laboratory is available at Level 20 for 2 Technology Points. It only takes 10 Ingots and 10 Paldium Fragments to construct, with a small base footprint that makes it relatively easy to construct wherever it would be convenient. You should place the structure somewhere your Pals can access, as the lab requires Pal labor (and significant amounts of labor at that) to advance projects.

While you only need one lab to begin researching and can only work on a single project at once, having multiple stations will allow multiple Pals to work on a project at once. This has the potential to significantly increase the speed at which you finish projects, as the total labor required per project can take a while if you only have one laborer (especially if the Pal's score in that labor type is low). At the very least, consider building at least two labs to keep research times manageable.

Starting Research Projects

The Watering Research Tree from Palworld's Pal Labor Research Laboratory.

Once you have access to a research lab, you will find you can begin researching projects down a variety of tech trees, each associated with a different labor type. To start a project deeper in a given tree, you must first have finished researching the projects linked above it. Note that you don't necessarily need to finish every project at a given level of research to research a project at a higher level, although higher level projects start to require significant amounts of resources and labor to complete compared to earlier projects.

The projects available to you will be obvious, as unavailable projects are darkened out until you've completed the necessary research leading into them. To start a project available to you, you only need to click "Begin Research" with the project selected and the requisite resources on your person or in base containers (these resources are then consumed). A workstation appropriate to the labor type of the project will then appear on the laboratory's slab, which your Pals can work on like any other task of that labor type. This adds to a research project's labor total, slowly building towards completing the project and permanently unlocking the project's associated benefits. You'll ideally want the best Pal for a given labor type available to you to be working on research, unless you have some other essential task that must get done first.

Good Early Projects

The Ammunition Duplication Technology upgrade selected on Palworld's Pal Labor Research Laboratory research tree.

There isn't a singular "right" research path that you need to follow when using the research lab. Many of the early research options offer significant buffs to labor of their type. The initial Handiwork project has a low barrier to entry and is going to help speed up work you may often find you're doing yourself. Another consideration you'll want to make is what future projects you're hoping to aim for, with completed projects unlocking other projects lower on the tree. Many of these later projects can unlock major buffs that almost any player is going to find attractive. Handiwork alone offers projects that give you a chance to duplicate ammunition you make, reduce the cost of making or repairing certain types of items, and more. Unless you want to cheat to get items for free, lab research is going to be key to using your resources as efficiently as possible.

It's certainly worth considering the projects that speed up research, as you're likely to find a major bottleneck of these projects is simply the time and labor involved. For example, the Ammunition Duplication Technology Lv 1 project requires 500,000 labor to be invested before it finishes. Finishing at least the early projects that boost research speed first may not feel as rewarding initially, but it will represent huge time savings if you intend to focus on that particular labor type's tree for more than a few projects.

Ancient Pal Manuscripts

Early into researching projects on the lab's tech trees, you'll notice that you need Ancient Pal Manuscripts (not to be confused with Technical Manuals). Added by the Feybreak expansion, these manuscripts are available through two other additions added by that expansion: Expeditions and Bounty Hunting. By the time you reach Level 20 and unlock the Pal Labor Research Laboratory, you'll be able to try both these methods, as Bounty Hunting is available immediately and the Pal Expedition Station is unlocked earlier than the lab at Level 15 (although admittedly you'll need to spend the requisite Tech Points and construct the rather large station to start using it). Even just routinely sending Pals on the easiest Expeditions as soon as the option is available, you should net enough manuscripts for at least a handful of research projects before you actively need to start farming them if you wish to continue.

At present, the sole purpose of these manuscripts (unless you want to sell them, which would typically be a waste) is as a resource consumed to begin research projects alongside other items typically related to the labor type of the research project. If you intend to dive deep into research lab projects, you'll need many dozens of these manuscripts as you progress. Of the two available ways to obtain manuscripts, Expeditions are a way to farm manuscripts passively using Pals while Bounty Hunting requires you to go out and fight bounty targets and then spend the tokens you earn at the relevant merchants.