Decide what the warehouse is for
Use a warehouse when your design needs storage or a handoff between transport services. For the whole route rather than the facility itself, start with cargo network planning.
The official Warehouses manual says road access is not required for the warehouse itself: transfer with a vehicle depends on station catchment. That does not remove the need for a valid operating route to the station.
Write a simple facility brief before construction: which item arrives, which item leaves, which services handle it and who consumes it. If the brief stops at “store fish near town,” you have not yet planned final delivery.
Universal or specialized storage?
| Choice | Documented role | Configuration check |
|---|---|---|
| Universal | Flexible mixed-cargo storage | Does flexibility solve the planned handoff? |
| Specialized | Faster handling and paused delivery timer in storage | Is the module assigned to the exact item? |
Specialized modules cover Liquid, Bulk, Flatbed or Goods, but each module stores one cargo type at a time. Crude oil and fuel require separate assigned modules even though both belong to Liquid. Use the item icons in the warehouse Stocks section to confirm the assignment.
Do not specialize solely because the alternative looks more advanced. The developer's cargo article describes tradeoffs between flexible handling, speed, cost and environmental impact. Choose for the cargo and problem you actually have.
Inspect the handoff in two directions
For a proposed ship-to-truck transfer, check both services rather than treating the warehouse as the end of the chain:
- Confirm the incoming service reaches its cargo station.
- Inspect whether the warehouse is in the relevant catchment.
- Check that the chosen module supports the incoming item.
- Observe whether stock appears there.
- Check that the outgoing service collects that item and delivers it to the intended consumer.
This is a planning checklist, not a tested ship-and-truck build. A warehouse full of stock proves only that stock reached storage. The manual states that factories and town buildings do not directly access its contents.
Read Stocks before adding capacity
The warehouse window lists supported cargo, stored quantity and average remaining delivery time per module. Use those observations to decide whether the issue is assignment, accumulation or an onward service. A larger building does not, by itself, create a delivery route.
Keep this observation sheet alongside the route plan:
| Observation | Record before making a change |
|---|---|
| Stored item | Does it match the receiver's requested item? |
| Incoming movement | Does stock increase when the incoming vehicle visits? |
| Outgoing movement | Does stock decrease when the outgoing vehicle visits? |
| Remaining time | Is timing the problem even when cargo moves? |
For a failed pickup or unload, use cargo fault isolation. For cargo that moves but arrives too late, use delivery-time diagnosis.
Sources and testing status
Checked October 8, 2026: the linked official Warehouses manual and developer cargo article. No capacity, cost, queue-time or profitable-layout measurement is claimed.
Watch the official Industries and Cargo video. The cover previews cargo systems; it does not show a tested warehouse configuration.
