The Long Dark Achievements Guide: All 87 Achievements and the Route to Collect Them

The 87 achievements break into three natural groups. Survival milestones reward time and skill in the sandbox: surviving 1 night (Night Walker), 1 day (The First of Many), 10 days (You Made It!), 50 days (Ready for when the SHTF!), 100 days (Centurion), and 500 days (The Will to Live), plus milestones for hunting, fishing, harvesting, crafting, and surviving without a gun (Silent Hunter, 50 days) or without killing (Pacifist, 25 days). Story achievements follow the five Wintermute episodes and are mostly hidden, so they unlock as you play rather than as a list to chase. Tales DLC achievements, 12 in the DLC01 set, reward Far Territory exploration and Tales questlines, including the buried-machine and signal quests.

The route that wastes the least time is: first, a long Survival run on Pilgrim or Voyageur that collects day-count milestones and skill milestones naturally while you learn the map. Second, a full Wintermute playthrough in episode order for the story achievements, including Episode 5, which has 12 achievements of its own. Third, a Tales run in the Far Territory for the 12 DLC achievements. That order matters because each stage teaches the next: Survival teaches systems, Wintermute teaches regions, and Tales demands both.

The Will to Live, surviving 500 days, is a long-run goal, not a sprint: it needs a stocked base, a renewable food loop of hunting and fishing, and the discipline to turn back from risky trips, because one death ends the run. Faithful Cartographer needs you to survey locations across the base regions with charcoal, location by location, and it rewards a mapped, methodical player rather than a fast one. Far Territory regions do not count toward it, so do not waste survey effort there for this achievement. Challenge achievements, including Challenge Mastery for completing challenge modes, are best attempted after the basics, when you know how to survive a set goal under set rules.

Many Wintermute achievements are hidden on Steam until unlocked, which is deliberate: the story achievements are meant to be discovered by playing, not by reading a list. This guide therefore names episode achievement counts and themes without listing hidden story beats, and it keeps Episode 5 spoiler-light. If you are a completionist, play the story blind first, then use the in-game stats and the Steam achievement list after finishing to find any episode achievements you missed, and replay the relevant episode from a checkpoint.

Three achievements deserve dedicated runs because they change the rules. Silent Hunter asks for 50 days without firing a gun, which teaches bow hunting, trapping, and avoidance. Pacifist asks for 25 days without killing, which teaches pure looting, fishing, and evasion. No-gun and pacifist runs feel restrictive at first, but they are the fastest way to learn the non-combat survival systems, and they make normal runs feel easy afterwards. Do them after your first 50-day run, not before it.

As of October 25, 2026, no Iron Road achievement list has been officially published, and this guide does not guess one. The 87 total counts the base game, Wintermute, and Tales achievements verified from the Steam API. When Iron Road launches on October 27, 2026, its achievement list, if any, will be added to this guide after it is verified from the Steam API, and the total in this guide will be updated with it.

A completionist checklist in order: survive 10 days, then 50, then 100; finish Wintermute episodes 1 to 5; complete the Far Territory Tales questlines; survey the base regions for Faithful Cartographer; do Silent Hunter and Pacifist runs; then settle into the 500-day run with a stocked base. Tick them in that order and no achievement requires a wasted run, because every run on the list teaches the next one.

87, verified from the Steam Web API on October 25,

2026. That total covers the base game, Wintermute, and Tales, and it will be updated if Iron Road adds achievements after launch.

Most unlock through normal episode progress, and episodes can be replayed from checkpoints, so a missed story achievement is recoverable without restarting the whole story.

Yes, for the full 87: 12 Tales achievements require the Tales from the Far Territory DLC and its regions. The base game and Wintermute achievements do not need it.