Factorio 2.1 goes stable with mixed rockets, Space Age without Quality and a native ARM64 Linux build

Wube Software marked Factorio 2.1 stable on 23 October, in the week Space Age turned two. It is a polish update, and it brings the game natively to ARM64 Linux, Steam Frame included.

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Factorio 2.1 is now the stable version of the game. Wube Software made the switch in Friday Facts #449 on 23 October 2026, the week that the team says marks exactly two years since the Space Age expansion came out. The update had been in experimental all summer, and the studio says a lot of the changes since its first 2.1 build came straight from player bug reports.

Don't expect a new planet. In the studio's words, 2.1 "isn't about new planets, enemies or research trees". It calls it "a big collection of quality of life, small features, polish, and the things we wanted to do for 2.0 but didn't have time for". Wube also updated its classic Factorio trailer for the occasion, and says this is the last time it will do so.

Space platforms do more

Most of the headline changes are for Space Age players. Rockets can now carry several different items in one launch, so building a small platform no longer means sending up a full stack of everything. Leaving the "Import from" slot blank pulls items from every location, which Wube suggests for fuel, ammo and repair packs. Platforms can request items from, and supply items to, other platforms in orbit, and a new Radar Universe mode passes circuit signals between planets and platforms on a shared channel.

How platforms fly has changed too. Asteroid damage now depends on how much health the asteroid has left rather than how fast it is going, the platform hub is tougher, and drag is worked out from mass rather than width. Wube says that last one means the long, thin "pencil ship" is no longer the only way to go fast. A new unloading bay lets inserters take items straight out of a landing pad into trains, chests or belts.

Quality becomes optional

Space Age can now be played without Quality. The Recycler has been split into its own mod, and Quality is listed as a recommended dependency that stays switched on by default. For those who keep it, locomotives and wagons now come in quality tiers, and quality modules can no longer go in asteroid reprocessing, which the studio sums up as the "space casino" being closed.

Elsewhere, circuit reads and writes can be sent to different wire colours, labs can pick research from circuit conditions, and boilers, heat exchangers and pipes can be wired up. Pipelines carrying different fluids will no longer merge, pumpjacks and burner miners can be flipped, and biter expansion groups now grow with evolution instead of spreading as lots of small nests. There is also a last big graphics pass, with new assembling machines, oil refinery, rocket silo and heat exchanger, and planets in the background of space platforms.

Native on ARM64 Linux

The other big change is where the game runs. According to Wube, Factorio now runs natively on ARM64 Linux, which covers the Steam Frame, Raspberry Pi as a headless server, Asahi Linux on Apple Silicon MacBooks and "the free VPS you claimed from Oracle that one time". GamingOnLinux lists the game as Verified on both Steam Deck and Steam Frame.

One warning before you update. Saves from 2.0 will load, but Wube says some changes, such as the circuit input and output split, may break existing factory designs, and once you move to 2.1 your saves and blueprints cannot go back to 2.0. The studio recommends backing up anything you care about first. Most popular mods were updated during the experimental period, but some may not be ready yet.

Sources

Image: Image: Wube Software

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