Honkai: Nexus Anima Habitat Guide: Unlock and Upgrade

Short answer: a Habitat is a home for wild Anima. You unlock it at a signpost, fill its slots with furnishings you craft, and upgrade it. Each level opens more slots and brings more Anima, and some Anima can only be Bonded there. The closed beta client has seven Habitats.

This guide covers how Habitats work from start to finish: unlocking, furnishings and crafting, upgrades, Comfort, the rewards, and what changes in the Final Closed Beta. Everything comes from the Evolution Test build and its in-game rules text. Habitats arrived there through an event called Where Anima Dwell, so treat the specifics as beta data that can change before launch.

Key takeaways

• Seven Habitats in Iia: two on the Beach, two on the Hillside, and one each in the Lanes, the Old Town and the Park.
• Unlock at the signpost. It lists the requirements and materials for each unlock and upgrade.
• Upgrades need furnishings. Some levels ask you to place a set number of a given furnishing type. Each level opens more slots and lets more Anima appear.
• Some Anima live only in Habitats. The game tags them “Bond in Habitats”.
• Furnishings are crafted from materials found while exploring and in treasure chests.
• Rewards are mostly permanent. Habitat level rewards and Furnishing Catalog milestones (which pay Aspect Gems) stay claimable after the event ends.
• The Final Closed Beta changes it. HoYoverse says you will “build Habitats for your Anima as you explore” from 25 November.

What Habitats are and why they matter

The rules describe the mode in one line: “Animasters can explore and develop Anima habitats, and Bond the Anima that reside there.” A Habitat is a fixed spot in the world, a beach or a park, that you build up so Anima move in.

That matters for collecting. “Different habitats are home to different Anima, and some Anima can only be encountered in habitats.” The game marks where each Anima can be Bonded, and “Bond in Habitats” is one of those tags, next to “Bond in Iia”, “Bond in Ace Challenges” and the rest. Our Bond guide explains every source tag.

If you are filling out the Anima dex, Habitats are not optional. An Anima tagged for Habitats will not turn up on a walk through town.

Closed-beta caveat: the client text names the Habitat tag but does not list which Anima carry it, so we cannot give you a Habitat-only Anima list yet. We will add one once the Final Closed Beta shows which Anima appear where.

Where Anima Dwell started as an event

Habitats launched with a timed event, but the mode outlasts it: “After the event ends, the Where Anima Dwell game mode will remain available. Animasters can still unlock and upgrade habitats, as well as Bond the Anima there.”

Only the event-exclusive rewards expire. The Habitats, their levels and their permanent rewards stay.

All seven Habitats

An NPC sets the count: “Including this one, there are seven habitats on record with the Nexus Association.” The game also has one Comfort mission per Habitat, and those missions name exactly seven places.

The names come in two forms. Missions use a dot (“Beach · Banquet”), while the place labels use a colon and sometimes different wording (“Beach: Feast”). Both are below so you can match whichever one your screen shows.

Habitat (mission name)	Place label	Highest Comfort mission found
Lanes · Blue Brick	Lanes: Blue Bricks	200
Beach · Banquet	Beach: Feast	300
Old Town · Childhood Dreams	Old Town: Childhood Dreams	350
Hillside · Forest	Hillside: Woodland	450
Hillside · Waterfall View	Hillside: Waterfall	450
Beach · Embracing the Breeze	No separate label found	450
Park · Green Space	Park: Greens	500

The Comfort column is the highest target we found for that Habitat, not a confirmed maximum. It is still a useful hint at size. The Lanes Habitat has the lowest target and the Park Habitat the highest, which suggests the Park needs the most furnishing work.

Iia’s coast. Two of the seven Habitats are on the Beach, and the Final Closed Beta showcase builds one there.

Finding them on the map

You do not have to hunt blind. “Iia Town has many themed Anima habitats, which you can find in the map’s Habitat view.” The Habitat Map shows “the location, level, and Anima found in each habitat.”

Once a Habitat is unlocked, it “can be reached directly via Quick Travel”. Our exploration guide covers Quick Travel and the rest of Iia’s map.

How to unlock a Habitat

Unlocking follows the same loop every time.

1. Find the Habitat on the Habitat Map, then travel there.
2. Read the notice board. “Every Habitat has a nearby notice board with details about that Habitat.”
3. Interact with the signpost. It shows “the requirements and materials needed to unlock or upgrade it.”
4. Meet the requirements and hand in the materials. The Habitat unlocks, and “it will attract Anima to settle here.”
5. Claim the level reward. The tutorial prompts you to claim “the Habitat Level 1 reward” right away.

Your first Habitat comes through a short tutorial. A Nexus Association member gives you a piece of furniture: “Place it in your habitat, and it might attract new Anima.” After that, you furnish the Habitat and “observe the ecological habits of the Anima there.”

The in-game tutorial card for unlocking and upgrading Habitats. Every step starts at the signpost.

Furnishings: categories, slots and the catalog

Furnishings are what you place in a Habitat, and they do the real work. A line of in-game dialogue puts it plainly: “The more fully furnished a habitat is, the greater the variety and number of Anima it will attract.”

The four furnishing categories

The rules list four categories: Leisure, Environment, Facilities and Supplies. Upgrade missions use longer names for what look like the same four:

Rules category	Name used in upgrade missions	Example mission
Leisure	Recreational Facilities	Place 2 furnishings from the Recreational Facilities category
Environment	Environmental Facilities	Place 3 furnishings from the Environmental Facilities category
Facilities	Basic Facilities	Place 1 furnishing from the Basic Facilities category
Supplies	Supply Facilities	Place 3 furnishings from the Supply Facilities category

The pairing is our reading of two sets of names, not a labelled list in the game. Upgrade missions ask for one to three items of a category, so a Habitat can stall on a single missing type.

Slots and placement rules

You place furnishings by interacting with “placement spots in the habitat”. Two rules shape how you plan:

• Slots are typed. If the category is wrong, the game says you “cannot place” that kind of furnishing “in this slot”, so a slot takes only certain categories.
• One furnishing, one place. Placing an item you already used elsewhere asks: “This furnishing is already placed elsewhere. Move it here instead?” To furnish two Habitats, you need two items.

The Final Closed Beta showcase shows the placement screen on a beach, with a bar of furniture along the bottom and five tabs above it. That is one more tab than the Evolution Test rules list, and HoYoverse has not explained it.

The Furnishing Catalog

The Furnishing Catalog “lists their types, how many you own, and how to obtain them.” Check it before you craft, since it tells you where each item comes from.

The catalog also pays out. “Collect furnishings and reach collection milestones in the Furnishing Catalog to obtain Aspect Gems and other rewards.” Collection missions in the client step up at 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 45 and 60 furnishings.

Crafting furnishings

“Use gathered materials in the Crafting system to create Habitat furnishings.” The materials come from the open world: “Crafting materials can be obtained through exploring the world, opening treasure chests, and other means.”

That makes Habitats the payoff for exploring. Chests you open while wandering Iia feed your furnishings, furnishings upgrade Habitats, and Habitats bring Anima you cannot Bond anywhere else.

A practical routine:

1. Open every chest you pass. Crafting materials are part of what they drop.
2. Check the next upgrade first. The signpost tells you which categories the next level needs.
3. Craft for that requirement, not for looks. A missing Supplies item blocks the upgrade no matter how many Leisure items you place.
4. Craft extras of common items. Each item can only sit in one Habitat at a time.

The same Crafting menu handles other recipes too. Our beginner progression guide covers the wider levelling loop those materials feed.

Upgrading Habitats and Comfort

Upgrades are where Habitats grow. “Increasing a habitat’s level unlocks additional furnishing placement slots and allows more Anima to appear there.” The upgrade screen shows the requirements and “the content unlocked at each level.”

The rules warn that “Each Habitat requires different types of furnishings to upgrade,” so check the signpost for each Habitat separately. Do not assume what worked at the Beach works in the Park.

What Comfort is

Each Habitat shows a Comfort score, and missions ask you to raise it. General targets run 30, 50, 60, 100, 130, 160, 200 and 230, and the per-Habitat targets in the table above go up to 500.

The client never explains how Comfort is calculated. Furnishings are the obvious candidate, since Comfort missions sit beside furnishing missions, but that is our inference. We will confirm it in the Final Closed Beta.

Habitat rewards

Rewards come in two groups, and only one expires.

Reward source	What it pays	Expires?
Where Anima Dwell event missions	Aspect Gems, Essence of Aspects, Evolith Shard	Yes, when the event ends
Habitat level rewards	Rewards per unlock and upgrade	No
Furnishing Catalog milestones	Aspect Gems and other rewards	No
Special Boost Period Task	800 EXP for “Unlock 3 Habitats”	With the pass period

Aspect Gems are the premium currency, explained in our gacha guide. The Special Boost task comes from the second battle pass, covered in the battle pass guide.

Priority: clear the event missions while the event runs, because those rewards disappear. Level rewards and catalog milestones can wait.

Habitats in the Final Closed Beta

The Final Closed Beta starts on 25 November 2026, and Habitats are one of its headline systems. HoYoverse’s wording: “During this test, you can return to your RV to rest at any time, or build Habitats for your Anima as you explore. You may even receive some unexpected visitors.”

HoYoverse’s Final Closed Beta infographic pairs Habitats with the new RV home.

Two things are new. The RV is a home base you can return to at any time, and “build Habitats as you explore” suggests more freedom than seven fixed spots. HoYoverse has not said whether the seven Habitats stay or how building works now.

What is new in the beta overall is in our Final Closed Beta news post, and the sign-up guide covers access. We will update this page once the beta shows the new system.

Bottom line

Unlock a Habitat as soon as the game offers it, and claim the level reward on the spot. Open every chest you pass, because exploring is where furnishing materials come from. Before each upgrade, read the signpost and craft for the category it asks for.

Then check which Anima moved in and Bond them, since some exist only in Habitats. Plan your team around what you find, and check the tier list for which Anima are worth levelling.