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Destiny 2 has a lot of resources you gotta manage. There are Legendary Shards, Enhancement Cores, Enhancement Prisms, Recon Data for Season of the Hunt, Herealways Pieces introduced in Beyond Light, and a specific resource for each of the game’s many destinations.
But the thing you’ll always need is Glimmer. Glimmer is as close as Destiny 2 comes to cold, hard cash. You need Glimmer to buy bounties, Glimmer to slot mods, Glimmer to upgrade your arms and armor, and Glimmer to do just about anything. When you run out of Glimmer, your game grinds to a complete standstill.
Keeping up your Glimmer supplies is a necessary thing in Destiny 2, but not something you want to spend too much time on. Here’s every way you can earn Glimmer in Destiny 2 and some of the fastest Glimmer farms you can use.
Updated April 15th, 2022, by Charles Burgar: The Spider has decided to shift his resource exchange secrets to Master Rahool at the Tower, allowing Guardians to purchase Glimmer without having to leave the City. We've updated this guide to include Rahool's new Glimmer bundles, and we've changed the Season Pass section to include Year 5's reworked pass rewards.
How To Get Glimmer
Virtually everything you do in Destiny 2 will grant Glimmer. Defeating enemies, completing activities, and speaking to certain vendors will be your main sources of earning Glimmer. Notable methods of earning Glimmer is listed below:
| Method | Type | Glimmer Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Killing Enemies | Activity | Miniscule |
| Dismantling Rares And Vanity Items | Misc. | 100 |
| *Planetary Chests | Activity | 400 |
| **Lost Sector Chests | Activity | 1,800 |
| Playlist Match Completion | Activity | 2,500 |
| Rahool's Resource Exchange | Vendor | 10,000 |
| Season Pass | Season Pass | 110,000 |
*Chests taper your Glimmer rewards when farmed. You'll gain less Glimmer as you open chests in a short time span.
**Only grants 1,800 for the first five Lost Sector chests that session (excluding Dreaming City and Moon chests).
Credit to Pyro Gaming for most of the Glimmer values listed above.
Season Pass
Each Season Pass will grant Glimmer during certain ranks, both for the free and premium tracks. Assuming you own the current season, you can earn 110,000 Glimmer from the Season Pass. Glimmer bundles are given at the following ranks:
| Rank | Track | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Rank 3 | Free | 8,000 |
| Rank 6 | Free | 8,000 |
| Rank 9 | Paid | 10,000 |
| Rank 12 | Free | 6,000 |
| Rank 16 | Free | 6,000 |
| Rank 17 | Paid | 10,000 |
| Rank 23 | Paid | 10,000 |
| Rank 37 | Paid | 10,000 |
| Rank 42 | Paid | 12,000 |
| Rank 82 | Paid | 30,000 |
New Lights can get up to 28,000 Glimmer from the Season Pass. Season owners get significantly more, up to 110,000 Glimmer upon reaching rank 82.
Lost Sectors
If you’re less inclined to run laps in patrol to farm chests, there’s another option. Pick a short Lost Sector and farm it. Widow’s Walk in the EDZ's Trostland is an ideal choice because—with the right build—you can walk in, kill the boss, loot the chest, and leave within seconds. Any Dreaming City and Moon Lost Sector will work too.
To do this, your best option is to bring a high-damage Heavy weapon of some kind, but any high-damage elemental weapon should be fine. Go in, quickly take down the boss before other enemies can overwhelm you, and then take your Glimmer and leave. Even if you die at that point, it’s fine because you can just head outside of the Lost Sector to do it all over again.
Keep in mind that this “farm” can’t be used too often. After multiple runs, the Glimmer rewards will taper off until it’s not really worth doing anymore. But this is another option to make some quick Glimmer thanks to your Glimmer Booster mods.
Boosting Glimmer Gains With Ghost Shells And Rainmaker
Those planning to farm for Glimmer should consider modding their Ghost Shell and using the Rainmaker consumable item. Here's what they do:
- Glimmer Boost (1-6 Energy, Ghost Mod): Increases Glimmer gains by 5-65%.
- Rainmaker (Consumable): Precision kills have a chance to create a shower of Glimmer. Effect lasts for 4 hours.
Ghost Shell Glimmer Boosts can increase your Glimmer gains by up to 65%. This includes all Glimmer sources that drop in the world, so virtually everything except bounties and the Season Pass. Rainmaker dramatically increases the amount of Glimmer enemies drop, so consider using this item if you start to run low on Glimmer. If you've been playing Destiny 2 for a few dozen hours, you should have quite a few of these in your inventory.
Glimmer Farm #1: Talk to Rahool
Now that the Spider no longer exists, Rahool has taken his place as the resource exchange vendor. Each day, Rahool will sell three resource types for Legendary Shards and three Glimmer bundles. Each bundle costs 25 of a particular resource.
If you run out of resources and can't buy Glimmer from Rahool, look at the resources he's selling. There's a good chance one of those Glimmer bundles cost the same resource he's selling, allowing you to convert Legendary Shards into Glimmer.
Glimmer Farm #2: Farm Planetary Chests
Still not enough Glimmer? Here’s a quick combo to use with your Ghost’s Glimmer Booster Mod. In the second slot on your Ghost will be a mod called Expert Hunter, allowing you to scan chests up to 75 meters away from you. Apply it to your Ghost Shell, then head to your planet of choice. Most prefer the EDZ since it's jam-packed with chest spawn locations.
That’s not bad, but we can do a lot better. It’s unknown if this is a bug or a feature, but peering through the scope of a sniper rifle extends that 75-meter radius to basically the entire map. Suddenly, every treasure chest in your current area will be visible, with the only caveat being you have to now have to painstakingly correct your Sniper Rifle’s aim to be in the general direction of the chest to spot it.
Honestly, that doesn’t take very long, and you can easily whip out your Sniper Rifle, spot a chest, hop on your Sparrow, open that chest, and repeat for all remaining chests in the region until you’ve made a few thousand Glimmer in just a few minutes. Then all you need to do is speed off to the next area to repeat the whole process over again. Just keep in mind that these chests will stop granting Glimmer if you open too many of them in a short timeframe. If your Glimmer starts to taper off, consider farming Public Events or Patrols for a few minutes.
Glimmer Farm #3: Farm Resources
This sounds counterintuitive, but Rahool's resource exchange is so good that farming activities for Glimmer isn't as time-effective as just farming for the resource Rahool is asking for.
Check which resource is tied to Rahool's Glimmer exchange, then head to the destination tied to said resource. For example, if Rahool is selling 10,000 Glimmer for 20 Dusklight Shards, then you'd head to the EDZ.
When you arrive at the destination, speak to the planetary vendor. Grab any bounties that grant resources. Equip the Wombo Combo mod on your Ghost, your favorite Sniper Rifle, then hunt down some chests in your area. These will grant Glimmer and the occasional resource. Complete any resource bounties you've purchased while you're doing this.
Once the chest rewards start to taper off, look for Patrols and Public Events in your area. These will grant Glimmer and resources when completed. Do these until you either have enough resources or the Glimmer penalty on chests gets lifted. Repeat this strategy until you can purchase enough Glimmer.
