Last Updated on by Samuel Franklin
Fallout Shelter Junk Guide – Uses, Keep and Sell List
Our Fallout Shelter junk guide will help you understand what to do with junk (use, keep or sell) that you acquire during your Vault themed adventure. Despite its name junk is one of the most important Fallout Shelter items and is vital to acquiring some of the great equipment pieces that the game has to offer through crafting. With dozens of junk items to encounter as you build towards the best Fallout Shelter layout possible and grow your dweller numbers it can quickly become difficult to make decisions given your limited storage space.
While you can continue to build storage space in your Vault to hold all of these items the cost to do this and Vault space that it occupies rarely makes this the best option. Instead in this Fallout Shelter junk guide we’ll cover what junk to keep, junk to sell and more broadly junk uses to consider.
Fallout Shelter Junk Guide – Overview
The following provides simple tips and a general overview of junk in Fallout Shelter:
- Junk is available from a number of sources although not every piece of junk is available from the same sources. These sources are quest completion rewards (such as the Gauntlet Game Show), finding items while completing quests from the environment or enemies, from dwellers while exploring the wasteland, scrapping weapons or outfits and opening lunchboxes. If you’re wondering how to scrap weapons in Fallout Shelter this is done by entering the storage screen and selecting the recycle icon.
- Junk has three tiers of common, rare and legendary which impacts where it can be acquired and general chance to obtain the item from that source. There are 7 junk items of each tier and the majority of junk items in Fallout Shelter are also seen in in the Fallout 4 crafting system.
- The primary use of junk is to craft weapons or outfits which requires the appropriate crafting room and blueprint. These craftable items have the same three tier system and will generally require junk from their equivalent tier and below to craft. This allows players to craft rare and legendary gear equipment for use on their dwellers.
- Junk can also be scrapped for caps which scales with the rarity of the junk item which is 2 caps for common, 50 caps for rare and 200 caps for legendary junk.
- Each item of junk uses one storage space which can be expanded by building Storage Rooms. It can sometimes be more space efficient to retain rare or legendary weapons or outfits as they only take a single slot but if scrapped may turn into multiple junk items and thus take up additional storage space.
Fallout Shelter Junk To Keep, To Sell and Uses
The below is intended as some general principles that you can apply when determining what to do with junk in Fallout Shelter. If you’ve generally got a reasonable amount of available storage space in your Fallout Shelter vault and want an easy set of rules to reference this section is intended for you. These principles are based on the premise that you’ll want to store sufficient junk to craft items as necessary or might want to complete your survival guide by crafting all items. Having a small stockpile of junk on hand at all times is also useful as you can use it for crafted items to complete vault objectives.
These Fallout Shelter junk principles are:
- Keep all legendary and rare junk items.
- Determine a specific number of common items that you wish to keep based on your storage space, a number between 20 or 30 is usually a good benchmark to aim for. Note that there are 7 common items so this could require anywhere from 140 to 210 storage capacity. Using our full junk list below you can identify some common items you may want to keep more of if
- Keep all legendary and rare outfits or weapons that you don’t need for your dwellers. Do not scrap them as this method generally preserves storage space as noted above.
- Scrap all common outfits or weapons that you don’t need.
Players that want to min-max their available space to a greater degree should refer to the junk list at the bottom of this guide instead as this will let you tailor the number of common junk items you hold based on their Fallout Shelter junk uses.
Fallout Shelter Junk List
The following is a full list of junk in Fallout Shelter with key information to help you decide what to do with the junk you collect. Each item below has the notable uses (outfit and weapons) noted across common, rare and legendary items that are the strongest in their respective category.
Items rated High should be kept and prioritised for storage space. Medium should be similarly retained although have less value than High items. Meanwhile Low should be the first items you scrap for caps and to free up storage space. Note that this priority to keep rating will depend on your current Fallout Shelter progress and goals but is driven by the best outfits and weapons statistically.
| Junk Item | Junk Tier | Notable Uses | Priority To Keep |
|---|---|---|---|
 Alarm clock |
Common | Plasma Rifle | High |
 Baseball glove |
Common | Advanced Jumpsuit (+5A), Sturdy vault suit (+5P) | High |
 Desk fan |
Common | Low | |
 Duct tape |
Common | Naughty nightwear (+5C) | Low |
 Magnifying glass |
Common | Sturdy wasteland gear (+5E), Advanced lab coat (+5I) | High |
 Toy car |
Common | Sturdy wasteland gear (+5E), Officer fatigues (+5S) | High |
 Yarn |
Common | Advanced Jumpsuit (+5A), Naughty nightwear (+5C), Advanced lab coat (+5I), Fancy formal wear (+5L), Sturdy vault suit (+5P), Officer fatigues (+5S) | High |
 Brahmin hide |
Rare | Advanced Jumpsuit (+5A), Sturdy wasteland gear (+5E), Lucky nightwear (+7C), Heavy vault suit (+7P) | High |
 Camera |
Rare | Low | |
 Globe |
Rare | Plasma Rifle, Dragon’s Maw, Heavy wasteland gear (+7E), Commander fatigues (+7S) | High |
 Microscope |
Rare | Plasma Rifle, Vengeance, Advanced lab coat (+5I) | High |
 Shovel |
Rare | MIRV | Medium |
 Teddy bear |
Rare | Naughty nightwear (+5C), Fancy formal wear (+5L), Sturdy vault suit (+5P), Officer fatigues (+5S), Expert jumpsuit (+7A), Expert lab coat (+7I), Lucky formal wear (+7L) | High |
 Wonderglue |
Rare | Low | |
 Chemistry flask |
Legendary | Dragon’s Maw, MIRV, Heavy wasteland gear (+7E), Expert lab coat (+7I) | High |
 Giddyup Buttercup |
Legendary | Vengeance | Medium |
 Gold watch |
Legendary | Low | |
 Military circuit board |
Legendary | Dragon’s Maw, Vengeance | High |
 Military duct tape |
Legendary | MIRV | Medium |
 Tri-fold flag |
Legendary | Lucky nightwear (+7C), Lucky formal wear (+7L), Heavy vault suit (+7P), Commander fatigues (+7S) | High |
 Yao guai hide |
Legendary | Expert jumpsuit (+7A), Heavy wasteland gear (+7E) | High |
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