EDIT: This guide should be up to date relative to UPDATE 10, as of 4/8/2024. I will absolutely need to update this guide in light of all the work the dev has done in 2025, because man has there been a lot!
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I made this guide because there doesn't seem to be one for Under The Sand just yet. I'm open for corrections and may at some point remove it if it becomes too out of date or if someone else posts a better one.

It is not meant to be a complete tutorial or walkthrough, just some assistance in getting started.

Before you start playing Under The Sand proper, take a moment to go through the settings and turn on VSync and set the FPS limit. This will help to prevent physics issues when you want to shove 40 different items into the back of your truck and pointedly DON'T want it to all explode upward and outward all over the countryside.

From the title screen, click on Settings:

Then Video: top bar, center option:
Then the 3rd and 4th option from the top, being VSync and FPS Limit, are what you want. Set VSync ON and the FPS Limit to whatever ends up working well for your particular setup, though 60 will do just fine for UTS.

All other settings you can opt to set as you wish; I have found Under The Sand to have relatively forgiving system requirements as long as VSync is on and the FPS Limit is set. Even some non-gaming laptops are able to run this as long as the settings are kept low.

When you first start or End Trip, you'll be standing next to this lovely piece of furniture in your home: a bed.
One of the needs you'll have to take care of is sleep, and barring certain drink items, a bed is the only way to deal with it. The one at your home is one of the nicer looking kinds you'll find, but they all perform as well as this one.

This is what the starting area looks like from your front door as of 12/24/2023, Terrain Generation 3.0

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On the left is the big blue shipping container. Their yellow open-top counterparts exist at any Market locations while on the road that you can find. If you want or need to end a trip but want to keep your loot, find a Market location and throw your loot into their yellow shipping container, then close its door once you've loaded everything in. Items that you keep in your truck bed or in your hand-inventory will vanish if you End Trip. Do note that These containers tend to cost money to use.

Across the road is the Starting Parking Lot, where you'll find the starting vehicles and the starting Market. If you End Trip, the position your truck started in before you left is where it will be when you wake up at home, in the state it was last before you ended the trip.

Here they are: FARMER on the left, RANGER on the center, WRANGEL on the right, all in their new game pre-assembled state.

Scattered around the starting town are the doors and tailgates of the trucks, as well as a few other bits of supplies like fuel, water, and oil. Some of these are in your starting home, some are in the buildings, one or two are leaning against the fence of the parking lot.

The CO-BR4 will park itself next to the WRANGEL if you retrieve it and end a trip inside it. The vehicle you leave to return home in the CO-BR4 will also return to the parking lot, so don't worry about losing it. Try to find the CO-BR4's engine hood at the same lot you find the CO-BR4 if it isn't already attached.

The Starting Market is unique among markets! It is the only market guaranteed to have certain items in certain quantities, and items you find on the road that it doesn't have available at the start will be available for purchase afterward.



Of the four engines currently available, all can be purchased from the starter Market. Engines have durability and need oil to keep from melting themselves, represented in-game by durability loss. Water is also needed to keep the engine from overheating and melting itself, applied through a water tank.

There are also steering wheels. Of the four models currently in the game, three must be found or purchased on the road to unlock them at the starting Market. They allow you to steer, which is important because none of the drive-able vehicles start with their own steering wheels. New Game start does supply you with one, but you'll need at least two more if you want to max out every truck.


These are air filters. At the start, not all are available for purchase; they have to either be found or bought from markets on the road. The higher the cost, the more durability the filter has. The Higher the durability, the longer the filter lasts, which is better because air filters are not repairable.

Also shown are the battery and water tank. The battery is repairable and is needed to start a vehicle. The water tank does not currently have durability as a concern, but water will be used up while driving, so keep on top of it.



These are tires, smooth road tires on the left and more expensive offroad tires on the right. Tires are not repairable, but they last a while and you get a starting road set for a new game. Also shown are Rooftop Lights, both in conventional fog and law enforcement colors and arrangements.



On the left are front bumpers, which help reduce engine and battery damage from impacts. On the right are rims, more expensive offroaders on the left and normal rims on the right. There may be more technical terms for these, I've no idea one way or the other. These are not repairable, but can easily outlast two sets of tires, three if you're careful. I'm not entirely sure if the offroaders have a particular benefit yet.



Here are the shelves for the water containers (left), oil cans (middle), and fuel cans (right) from the starter Market. Water is both useful for the tank in the vehicles and for drinking. Oil is useful for keeping an engine from quickly destroying itself. Fuel is fuel, you need it because that's how internal combustion engines work.



These are repair kits, paints, and windshield tints. Repair Kits are 3-use items that will restore 20 durability per use to either a battery or an engine. At $300 a pop, you can't afford to be wasteful with them, and it may be worth the gamble to try to scavenge them on the road instead. The more valuable the engine you're repairing, the more value a repair kit will restore to it for resale. On the road Markets used to only have one of these, but now they carry two, and loot-drop rates for them seem to have been increased dramatically.


This guy here and some guys that are very similar looking to him are the operators of the Markets. If you want to get rid of an empty plastic container or can, he'll take it. If it still has gas, oil, or water in it, he'll give you a few bucks for it. If you find little dashboard ornaments, spare tires, spare engines, spare rims, or anything else that you don't intend to use or have a need for, you can sell it to one of these guys for money. Tires, rims, and engines sell for a LOT, but dashboard ornaments (just bobbleheads, so far) also sell for a lot despite being much smaller than the other objects. DO NOT SELL TRUCK DOORS OR TAILGATES, there is not currently a clear way to retrieve them if you do this.

For what it is worth, I prefer the FARMER. The passenger side door doesn't open, but the mirrors are easily the largest and if you have a beefy enough computer to handle reflections, this will make the best use of that feature. It also has the longest and largest truck bed.

Point in favor of the RANGER: it sits high, which may help with heavier loads like loaded barrels of fuel, oil, and water. Point against it: there's some sort of sheet or block of something in the truck bed that sits a bit higher than the rest of the truck bed, which can do some very unkind things with larger items like barrels or tires if the physics get a little crazy.

Bizarre point in favor of the WRANGEL: you can get in and out without opening the door. Its only real downsides appear to be the lack of storage space or a side-mount point for a fuel can. There may be other aspects to it that I'm unaware of, as I normally take the FARMER.

The CO-BR4's addition is cool but not game-changing. It is essentially a classic Willys MB, which had no rear door and, like the WRANGEL, is similarly tiny and offers very little storage space. It completely omits all doors, so that makes getting in and out a bit faster but makes cargo access a bit harder. It also seems to omit the top-bar light space, and though I couldn't find a mounting point for the ornament, patch notes say it is possible to do. The soft-top doesn't seem to be extendable, though that wouldn't make accessing the trunk space any easier if it was. It does have a side-mount for a gas can, giving it a slight leg up on the WRANGEL. It's a cool addition, to be sure, but my preference remains the FARMER for having space to take barrels.

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With Terrain Generation 3.0, I used to favor the VRUM 471, for its balance of power and not-too-high top speed. Playing with a keyboard, this seemed to be a good fit. With the new terrain generation, there seems to be significantly more straightaways and long, gentle, sweeping turns that can safely be taken at much higher speeds. I have tested this with the VRUM-550, which now seems to be a practical upgrade. The 550M, less durable but with a much higher top speed, I haven't tested yet.