How to restore health and spell slots in Baldur’s Gate 3 (BG3)

One of the first things you need to learn in Bladur’s Gate 3 is how to restore your health and your spell slots. It doesn’t matter your class, everybody needs healing every now and then, and all classes that can spell cast, which there are a lot of, need to know how to restore their spell slots. So, without further adieu, this guide will go over short rests and long rests to explain how to restore health and spell slots in Baldur’s Gate 3.

Note: If you really want to enjoy Baldur’s Gate 3 but are nervous because you don’t know anything about D&D, you should read our guide about that exact question.

How to recharge health and spell slots in BG3?

To replenish your health in Baldur’s Gate 3, you can use a potion. However, if you want to make your potions go even further, get your entire party together in a tight circle and then throw the potion on the ground. It will splash and heal everyone which is much better than one person getting the use of one potion. You can also use your two short rests to heal half your HP — do that by clicking the campfire button on the bottom right of the screen and selecting short rest. Use them wisely.

You can also heal all of your health by performing a long rest. And here’s where we get to the interesting part — spell slots. The only way to recharge your spell slots in BG3 is by long resting (unless you’re a Warlock). You can quickly long rest by pressing the long rest button right below the short rest button, or you can visit your camp, end the day by pressing your backpack which is by the fire, and then pressing your bedroll to long rest. You need to have 40 camp supplies to fully long rest, so find camp supplies like fish food, and packs by looting everything.

Sometimes when you’re stuck inside like when you’re trying to complete the Save Mayrina sidequest, you can’t long rest, so be cautious of that.

How do spell slots work in Baldur’s Gate 3?

Spell slots get consumed when you use spells in Baldur’s Gate 3, different than cantrips that you can use an infinite amount of times (for a breakdown of spells and cantrips, check out our guide). I’ve found an easy way to explain spells slots is to think of them as bullets. You can put any spell available to you into the bullet, but once you pull the trigger and use that bullet, it’s gone until you long rest.

If you have two spells slots, two bullets, and six spells, you can use two of any of your six spells, even the same spell twice, two times because you only have two bullets, or spell slots. Every class needs to long rest to replenish their spell slots, except for Warlocks — their special thing is that they get their spell slots back after short rests and long rests. If you’re not sure how to recharge your special class spell slots, things like Ki Points for Monks and Wild Shape Charge for Druid, hover over the icon on your hotbar and read what the recharge conditions are.

Hopefully, this helped you understand short rests and long rests and how to heal quickly and recharge your spell slots. The next complicated thing you’ll likely want to learn in BG3 is the difference between trading and bartering.