Best Upgrade Order in Drink the Ocean (All 4 Tracks Ranked)

The Four Upgrade Tracks

The SHOP in Drink the Ocean sells four upgrade tracks, each with multiple levels. They are the entire progression system — there are no skill trees, no codes, and no side currencies (the Sky Duck’s boons are free drops, not purchases; see straws and tools).

Track	What it does	Phase it shines
Bigger belly	More water carried per trip	Minute 1 to the end
Extra straws	Drink faster / more water per second of holding click	Early–mid
Mouth vacuum	Stronger drinking — pulls water in serious volume	Mid
Pocket whirlpool	Portable draining power for big open water	Late

A note on honesty: per-level prices are not yet published anywhere reliable, and we’re verifying them in-game before adding a numbers table. If a site shows you an exact salt cost for “Belly level 7” right now, that number is invented. The order below is based on how each track changes the core loop — see how to play for that loop — not on datamined price math.

Early Game: Belly First, Always

Capacity is king in the opening. Every trip has a fixed overhead — walk to water, drink, teleport home (T), press — and the only variable that changes what that overhead buys is how much water you carry. Belly upgrades are almost certainly the best first purchase in any incremental design shaped like this one, and the game’s opening pacing confirms it: the plastic straw’s slowness hurts, but a small belly caps you harder.

Practical early order:

1. First affordable belly level.
2. First drinking upgrade (next straw).
3. Alternate belly ↔ drinking power, keeping belly one level ahead.

While you’re in this phase, the beginner guide has the full first-thirty-minutes script.

Mid Game: Vacuum Changes the Math

The mouth vacuum is where drinking stops being a “hold click and wait” activity. It pulls water in volume, which makes shoreline trips trivially fast and lets you start working on deeper water — which matters because the sea level only drops when water actually leaves the map. Faster total drainage = faster terrain reveals = the shipwreck, whale bones, and sunken city arriving sooner (the landmark chain is mapped in the sunken city page).

By this phase, salt income from treasure around newly exposed wrecks starts rivaling your press income — don’t skip chests just because the loop feels productive.

Late Game: Whirlpool for the New Oceans

The pocket whirlpool sounds like a joke upgrade and is actually the endgame tool. Once the plug at the ocean floor is pulled (see the ending explainer), you gain access to four new oceans — cola, lemonade, slime, and lava — and these are enormous bodies of liquid compared to the starting sea. Spooning them out with a vacuum is slow; a whirlpool drains open water at the scale those oceans demand.

If you’re pre-planning purchases: keep a salt cushion as the floor reveal approaches so you can grab the first whirlpool level the moment it matters.

Upgrade Order, Summarized

1. Bigger belly — first purchase, keep it a level ahead of everything else early.
2. Extra straws — compress the sip phase.
3. Mouth vacuum — mid-game workhorse, makes deep water viable.
4. Pocket whirlpool — buy when the new oceans open, not before.

Two habits multiply every purchase: full-belly trips only (half trips waste the walk), and T-teleport home every single time. Both are covered in tips and tricks — no upgrade compensates for losing half your loop to walking.