While the best prefix for mining in general is Light, certain tools will achieve the same speed with lesser prefixes due to rounding, which means it is much easier (and cheaper) to reforge these tools, since there are more prefixes that tie for "most optimal." This is complicated by the fact that tool speed is halved and floored when hammering, but the long and short of it is this:

If the tool is a pickaxe: 4. Add up all the bonuses to mining speed from buffs and items. 5. Use 70% if the answer was anything higher than 70%. 6. Multiply the number from step 3 by [1 - the number from in step 5]. 7. Round down.

Modifiers aside, all chainsaws which have a corresponding axe are functionally identical to that axe and have therefore been omitted, except for the Chlorophyte Chainsaw.

In particular, a tool's mining speed is independent of how quickly it swings, which is the speed visible in the in-game tooltip (e.g. "Copper Pickaxe—Fast Speed") which can also be referred to as "use time." Speed-modifying prefixes affect both mining speed and use time, potentially leading to the misconception that "melee speed" bonuses from armor and accessories improve mining speed. In truth, melee speed bonuses affect only use time, which is useful for combat but has no influence on mining speed.

Mining speed (also known as "tool speed") is an invisible statistic that determines how fast the player can mine (or break walls, or chop down trees/cacti). Its value shows the time per hit in 60ths of second. It is therefore something of a misnomer: it is presented in the form of the amount of time taken for a certain event, whereas speed is the number of events that take place in a certain amount of time (or, in mathematical terms, the number that is seen is the reciprocal of the speed). This means that faster tools have smaller numbers, not larger. For example, a mining speed of 15 means that the tool will hit the block every 15/60 of a second, or four times per second. A mining speed of 20, on the other hand, means that the tool will hit the block every 20/60 of a second, or three times per second.

1. Start with the tool's base tool speed (as documented on its page on this wiki). 2. Multiply by [1 - speed modification from tool prefix]. 3. Round to the nearest whole number.

Performance will be one hit every 6/60s, or 60/6 = 10 hits per second. Trees have 500% hit points and the Pickaxe Axe has 110% axe power, so it will take CEILING(500%/110%) = 5 hits to chop down a tree, which will take (6×5)/60 = 0.5 seconds.

When breaking walls, its value is cut in half, then any numbers after the decimal point removed (e.g. 2.8 would be rounded down to 2). Thus, walls break at least twice as fast as blocks.

Example A: digging a tunnel with a Light Shroomite Digging Claw, having drunk a Mining Potion and wearing a Celestial Stone.

Step 3 illustrates why some tools do not have their speed improved by some prefixes. The Mining armor was a red herring: it has no effect on The Axe. Since the bonus it provides is mining speed, and axes are not affected by mining speed Performance will be one hit every 3/60s, so it will break 60/3 = 20 walls per second.

Pickaxes (including the Pickaxe Axe, Shroomite Digging Claw, and Picksaw), axes, hammers, and hamaxes (including The Axe) can be reforged with speed bonuses to improve their mining speed. Drills (including the Drax), chainsaws, and the Chlorophyte Jackhammer cannot. The speed-increasing modifiers are displayed in the following table.