How To Edit Blueprints In Factorio

How To Edit Blueprints In Factorio

As a seasoned Factorio enthusiast who’s spent countless hours constructing intricate factories and mastering the art of blueprint management, I can confidently say that blueprints are the backbone of any successful factory operation. They allow for the easy scaling and replication of setups, making the process of building and optimizing factories a breeze, even for the most complex mid to late-game setups.


In the game Factorio, blueprints serve as indispensable resources, enabling you to easily duplicate and repeat pre-existing factory layouts, thereby facilitating seamless expansion during gameplay. By using these blueprints, you invest time and thought into designing a setup just once, and then can employ it repeatedly in your gaming sessions, even transferring them between different save games.

As a gamer, I’ve found one thing that can be challenging as I progress through the game: The blueprints I used during the early stages might not cut it for my expanding and sophisticated factory. Luckily, in Factorio, you can effortlessly modify blueprints, swapping outdated designs with more recent ones. Additionally, external websites can help you create, import, and edit blueprints even when you’re on the go. With that in mind, here’s a guide to mastering blueprint management in Factorio, including an overview of the helpful tools at your disposal.

How To Manage And Edit Blueprints In Factorio

How To Edit Blueprints In Factorio

In the game Factorio, blueprints can be accessed from the Blueprint Library using the keyboard shortcut CTRL+B. Inside the Blueprint Library, locate the blueprint you wish to modify by scrolling through them, and right-click on it to open its interface. Factorio provides a comprehensive interface for managing your blueprints, with various editing options displayed at the top of this interface. These features are clearly marked with distinct icons, and hovering over them displays their description, helping you understand what each one does. Here’s an overview of how every feature in Factorio helps you manipulate your blueprints:

To prevent accidentally discarding your blueprint while editing, remember to save a copy first before making any modifications. This way, if you happen to leave the Blueprint Library without saving, you’ll still have a safe version of your blueprint available.

  • Modify Blueprint Content: This option allows you to manage blueprint content individually, enabling you to remove or replace items like furnaces, automation assemblies, inserters, etc.
  • Create Copy: As the name suggests, the copy option duplicates a blueprint and rename it. As mentioned earlier, it’s always a good practice to create blueprint backups before editing one.
  • Upgrade Items & Entities: Use this option to upgrade every applicable item and entity in a blueprint to its next tier. Selecting this option with the right click allows you to downgrade the items to its previous tier.
  • Parameterize Blueprint: The Parameterize option allows for nuanced adjustments to your blueprints, such as changing automation recipes, adding filters to logistics, and even modifying circuit logic.
  • Export Blueprint: If you wish to export a blueprint and share it with others, you can use the Export Blueprint String option to generate a unique string of code. This code can be imported into any instance of Factorio to generate the exact blueprint you built.
  • Delete Blueprint: This self-explanatory option allows you to delete any unwanted blueprint from the Blueprint Library.

Based on your desired modifications to blueprints, you can employ the features provided to customize and control blueprints within Factorio.

How Rotate & Flip Blueprints In Factorio

Besides adjusting the details of each item and entity within a blueprint, you’re also able to alter their positions within the factory itself. When choosing a blueprint for your factory setup, you can employ these handy shortcuts to turn or invert the blueprints as needed:

  • Keyboard Shortcut R: Pressing the R key allows you to rotate a blueprint in clockwise direction at 90 degrees.
  • Keyboard Shortcut H: With the H key you can flip blueprints horizontally. This can come in handy when you’re planning a setup that feeds a single conveyor belt from both sides.
  • Keyboard Shortcut V: To flip blueprints vertically, you can use the V key. Vertical flipping can be used to achieve symmetrical designs.

How To Edit Blueprints For Factorio With Third-Party Tools

How To Edit Blueprints In Factorio

Due to the intricate design of the game, the Factorio community has developed numerous online resources, such as Factorio Prints, Autotorio, and various useful mods. Notably, the Autotorio website facilitates the import of blueprint strings, enabling users to customize each component prior to incorporating it into the game.

In much the same way, the Factorio Blueprint Editor is an outstanding tool for creating blueprints, boasting a sleek and user-friendly interface. This editor enables you to construct blueprints from the ground up, even utilizing the very control scheme found within Factorio itself. After crafting a blueprint using Factorio Blueprint Editor, simply employ the CTRL+C command to copy the blueprint string before importing it into your Blueprint Library.

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2024-10-29 09:03