Recognise the deposit
Compare the cracked patch with the surrounding ground. Ordinary dirt or a riverbank alone is not enough.
Bring: a shovel + an empty sack.
How to get and collect clay
- Bring an empty sack and a shovel. The wiki also describes a trowel or another suitable digging tool.
- Search for a clay deposit. Players report patches near rivers and lakes; a water edge alone does not guarantee clay.
- Stand within reach and right-click the deposit. Choose the available collection action.
- Check your inventory for the collected clay. A player report describes using the filled sack’s Take Clay action to remove its contents.
Use the inventory result to confirm collection. A ground tile that looks promising is not enough.
Where to look first
Deposits: check accessible water edges for the differently coloured earth. Use a Build 42 map rather than a Build 41 map when planning your search.
Foraging: the PZwiki pottery reference also lists foraging as a way to find loose clay. Treat this as a fallback; this guide does not promise a fixed drop rate or an immediate find.
Loot: recent players mention schools and pottery-related buildings. Loot varies by world and settings, so these are leads rather than guaranteed clay spawns.
No option to collect clay?
Check the simplest failure first: open the sack and look inside. A player troubleshooting report found seeds inside what appeared to be an empty sack. Empty it and try again.
- Have the digging tool and sack available to your survivor.
- Make sure you are targeting a clay deposit, rather than ordinary dirt or sand.
- If you use mods, compare the behaviour with an unmodified game of the same version before treating it as a vanilla bug.
The seed-filled sack fix comes from a specific player report. It is a check worth making, not a claim that every failed collection has that cause.
Clay is only the first ingredient
Gathering clay does not automatically unlock a forge or every pottery recipe. Check the recipe’s workstation, tools and skill requirements before collecting a large supply.
The pottery reference describes shaping clay at a workstation and firing suitable unfired items in a kiln. Recipe quantities vary with the build; use the requirements shown in your current game.
See it in the game
Original pottery tutorial by Pirata Pingüino. Spanish narration and UI; earlier Build 42 footage, not a current-version test.
Sources & version notes
Research-based; not independently play-tested on 42.20.4. Core advice cross-checked against the references below.