Sandustry Updates and Patch Notes

Sandustry entered Early Access on 13 August 2026. This page tracks what has actually changed since, from the developer’s own announcements — not a copy of the patch notes, which are worth reading in full on Steam.

v0.5.3 — 14 August 2026

Billed as a hotfix, and the developer describes most of its fixes as theoretical: the aim was to get diagnostics out so the real crash work has something to go on.

What it added

• Logging and diagnostics, written to a file you can find and send. On Windows that is %AppData%\Roaming\sandustry\logs\main.log; the Mac and Linux paths are on the crash and FPS fixes page.
• A new launch option, --sandustry-no-overlay-gpu-flags, that may prevent crashes. It comes with a documented cost: the Steam overlay will likely stop working. Achievements keep working.

What it fixed

• Instructional videos now unmount properly, which was exhausting the video decoder.
• The clouds drawn when steam condenses into rain use much less memory.
• When a factory tier is blocked by an objective, the game now tells you why, and special objectives are visually clearer. Translations for that text were still pending at release.

What it did not do: touch balance. Nor did either patch after it — no costs, yields or recipes have changed across 0.5.3, 0.5.4 or 0.5.5, which is why the figures elsewhere on this site still hold.

The developer stated at the same time that work was ongoing on a larger patch targeting “the various crashes and problems people are reporting”. That work landed in v0.5.5 below.

v0.5.4 — 16 August 2026

Billed by the developer as “a smaller update with some bug fixes and QoL”, and the one worth knowing about if you were stuck.

• The Tier 5 softlock is fixed. “Fixed a softlock causing you to get stuck with Tier 5 being blocked even after the anomaly investigation.” Saves “should be repaired automatically”, so a save that was already stuck does not need restarting — see why your research is locked for what that gate is.
• Filters are editable in place. You can press the filter overlay label or “Edit last placed” to change a filter instead of overriding and replacing it, and Allow versus Block is now visually distinct.
• Red blocks can be removed. A root-cause fix “touches a lot of the core paths”, so rather than ship it early the developer made the blocks removable — though only when you delete 256 tiles or fewer, because scanning for orphans costs the demolisher something. On puzzle doors, closing and opening the door should restore them.
• The reset button in puzzles can no longer be deleted, and it comes back on reload.
• Zoom In and Zoom Out are rebindable, on the two keys left of Backspace. Zooming out past the default view is not supported yet.

v0.5.5 — 19 August 2026

The stability patch the hotfix promised.

• Much more logging, with the paths written out: %APPDATA%\sandustry\logs\main.log on Windows, /Users/<username>/Library/Logs/sandustry/main.log on macOS, and /home/<username>/.config/sandustry/logs/main.log on Linux.
• Optional Crashpad diagnostics. Crash dumps can carry sensitive information, so it is off by default and the developer approaches affected players individually about enabling it.
• Instruction videos are animated images now, which fixes GPU crashes and the loss of the OBS capture hook when hovering previews. The cost is stated: slightly lower quality and a somewhat larger install.
• Alt+Enter toggles fullscreen, and the game remembers which monitor you last used.
• A workaround for the right mouse button sticking on macOS — the Vacuum spraying forever. The proper fix is still pending.
• The tutorial radial menu can no longer softlock you.
• Aura Extractor controls have clearer hover guidance and swarm targeting indicators.

28 August 2026 — “Modding & What’s Next”

Not a patch, but the developer’s first status post since v0.5.5, and it sets the shape of the next one.

• v0.5.6 is in progress, with the same focus as the last two patches: “fixing bugs, improving stability, optimizing performance and working through requested features”. New content is explicitly deferred — “I don’t want to start piling new content on top until the foundation feels solid.”
• Modding now lives on two experimental branches. The updated framework and a new API document at sandustry.com/sandkit.html are on a 0.5.5 branch; a 0.5.2 branch stays for mods that have not been updated. What that means for installing mods is on the mods page and the mod loader page.
• The roadmap is still unpublished, on purpose. “I don’t want to commit to or promise things I won’t be able to deliver.” Requests go to the suggestions board, where upvotes set the priority.

Before Early Access

The game’s public history goes back further than launch week, and it is useful context for how quickly fixes land:

Date	What happened
Feb 2025	A run of demo hotfixes, through Demo Hotfix 8
17 Jun 2025	Sandustry joins Hooded Horse as publisher
25 Jun 2026	Release date announced for 13 August 2026
13 Aug 2026	Early Access launch, with a 35% launch discount
14 Aug 2026	v0.5.3 hotfix
16 Aug 2026	v0.5.4, Update #1
19 Aug 2026	v0.5.5, Update #2
28 Aug 2026	“Modding & What’s Next” — v0.5.6 in progress, mod branches split

What Early Access is meant to add

The developer’s own answers on the store page set the shape of what is coming, and they are the only forward-looking statements this page treats as reliable:

• Early Access is planned to run for about a year, subject to change based on how development goes.
• The procedural generation will be refined further so generated content is more detailed.
• As players explore deeper, the plan is to add buildings, resources, production chains, quests, biomes and technologies.
• Feedback from the Steam community hub is explicitly what the additions will be shaped around.

No dates are attached to any of that, and none are invented here. The 28 August post narrows the near term without changing that list: v0.5.6 is a stability release, and new content waits until the developer judges the foundation solid.

How this page is kept

It is worth saying plainly, because an updates page that quietly goes stale is worse than none:

• Sources: the developer’s Steam announcements, linked individually above rather than to the feed they sit in, plus the store page for the Early Access commitments. Nothing else.
• Checked: on every version change, and at least once a fortnight otherwise.
• Scope: summaries and links. Patch notes are not reproduced in full here.

The date at the top of this page is when it was last verified against those sources.

Related

• Sandustry Crash and FPS Fixes — the launch option and the log paths
• Sandustry Beginner Guide — what to do with the version you have
• Sandustry Research Planner — costs, unchanged across all three patches
• Why Your Sandustry Research Is Locked — the Tier 5 gate v0.5.4 unstuck