Final Fantasy 7 Remake best Materia guide: Combos, Materia builds and setups explained

Publish date: 2023-05-16

Materia returns in the Final Fantasy 7 Remake and it's more important than ever.

Not only is it an important part of the story - it's made up of crystallized Mako, itself the lifeblood of the planet upon which Final Fantasy 7 Remake is set - but it's key to how you upgrade abilities, imbue weapons with elements and use magic powers.

This page explains how Materia works in Final Fantasy 7 Remake, the best Materia across the game, as well as the best Materia combinations and Materia builds to use.

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How Materia works in Final Fantasy 7 Remake

You'll get access to Materia as soon as you first get control of Cloud in Final Fantasy 7 Remake when you leap from the train car.

It is represented in-game as small brightly coloured balls that look like marbles. You'll see them everywhere, sometimes in the environment with a trail of light notifying the player that they can be picked up, otherwise they will appear in cutscenes or be embedded into the weapons of the main cast once attuned to their equipment.

Once you've picked up some Materia, you'll need to carefully study each weapon's attunement slots. You can do this by opening the start menu and heading to the Materia and Equipment menu. Once there, if you pick out a piece of armour or a weapon, you should see that there are open circular slots underneath the ability descriptor.

This denotes your weapon's Materia capacity and will tell you how many you can slot into your item. You can use the Upgrade Weapons menu and pick the equipment upgrades that give you extra Materia slots to expand this pool.

Now you've got that figured out and picked your weapon and equipment of choice, if you back out to the menu there will be an option to press Triangle and 'Set' your Materia. This will open up another menu full of the Materia you own, and you can pick and choose which of them you'd like to be slotted in your weapons.

Materia types and colours in Final Fantasy 7 Remake

There are five Materia types, as listed below:

Out of the above, you can pick and choose which Materia you want to equip. If you'd like to use Fire spells, equip the Fire Materia and so on and so forth.

How to pair and link Materia in Final Fantasy 7 Remake

One part of the system that is well worth explaining is how to pair materia with one another. Some weapons will have two slots that aren't disparate circles but linked together by an opening.

If you put a Green Magic Materia and a Blue Support Materia side by side here, you will access special benefits.

For example, if you paired a Fire Materia with an Elemental Materia in the connected slots, you could imbue the user's weapon with that element in each attack.

So if Cloud's Buster Sword has this equipped, you will be able to perform Fire spells, but you'll also deal Fire damage with regular attacks, which is even more devastating against an enemy who is weak to Fire.

Other Support Materia pairs allow you to absorb HP or ward off damage when the attached element is used against you. Others let you expand the range of your spells to hit multiple users or synergize with other characters in battle. Experiment with this to create a killer build.

How to 'Master' Materia and benefits of doing so

Materia can be levelled by earning AP, and if you spend your time farming to finish mastering your Materia, you'll notice that with each star level upgrade they'll see a statistical improvement.

For example, Poison Materia starts out as the simple Bio spell, but if you upgrade it to level three, you'll unlock Bioga, which deals a lot more damage over time.

Elemental Materia at first only adds 8% of damage from the linked element, but at the third level, it adds 23%, and you'll absorb any damage taken from the attached element.

Suffice to say, you can see how worthwhile it is to master your materia throughout the game, as it will strengthen your build significantly. Mastering all Magic (Green) is also one of the Battle Intel Report requirements, so doing those along the way might save you some time and effort.

Best Materia recommendations in Final Fantasy 7 Remake's early game

Here's our choices for the best Materia in the early hours of Final Fantasy 7 Remake:

Deadly Dodge

Auto-Cure Materia

First Strike Materia

ATB Boost Materia

Poison Materia

Elemental Materia

Best Materia recommendations in Final Fantasy 7 Remake's end game

Here's our choices for the best Materia in the end game of Final Fantasy 7 Remake:

Magnify Materia

Elemental Materia (Second Set)

Synergy Materia

Item Master Materia

Chakra Materia (Second Set)

AP Up Materia

Looking for more help with Final Fantasy VII Remake? Learn how to get the Best Materia, which can be levelled with easy AP sources. There's also Summons to unlock, most of which you get from completing Intel Battle Reports. Once you've finished the game, it's worth unlocking the remaining Final Fantasy 7 Dresses by choosing the correct options during the Johnny, Heads or Tails and Madam M massage course choices, and finding any weapon locations or Music Discs you left behind. And if you've just started, then learn what to do during the timer choice and the Lost Friends quest.

Best Materia combos, buildings and pairings in Final Fantasy 7 Remake

Here are a few builds which should help you in a variety of situations. (Materia + Materia denotes a paired slot.)

High damage Materia build

This build will deal massive elemental damage and ensure you've always got enough ATB to use abilities consistently and keep enemies pinned down. Of course, swap out Fire with another element to exploit weaknesses.

Best support Materia build

This will allow party members to follow up your elemental attacks with a poison tick, as well as giving their basic attacks a potential weakness exploiting buff. They'll also be able to heal you without command and increase the efficiency of your potions.

Best Grinding Materia build

This should keep you alive whilst you're grinding and make battles as fast and efficient as possible. Hit large enemies with poison first then wear them down with your elemental strikes.

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