The Upgrade Facility is the console directly behind the main holotable in The Den’s Command Center — walk up to it and interact to open the Den Upgrades menu.
Between missions in Star Wars Zero Company, your squad returns to The Den, and one of the first objectives Republic Intelligence hands you is to visit the Upgrade Facility. It isn’t a separate room you fly to — it’s a console tucked into the back of the same Command Center that holds the holotable. Getting there takes about ten seconds; the part worth thinking about is what you queue once the menu opens.
How to reach the Upgrade Facility in Star Wars Zero Company
The whole trip is a short walk across one room, so this is really about knowing which console to interact with once you’re standing in the Command Center.
STEP 1/4
Open the Den map to find it
The Den map labels every facility, and the Upgrade Facility sits in the main Command Center — in-game it’s described as where you “purchase improvements for other facilities and roster-wide weapon upgrades.”
STEP 2/4
Enter the Command Center
This is the room built around the central holotable and the galaxy map, the hub your squad drops back into after every mission.
STEP 3/4
Walk to the console in the back-right
The Upgrade console is directly behind the holotable, set against the back-right wall of the same room.
STEP 4/4
Interact to open the Den Upgrades menu
This brings up the upgrade screen, where you can queue a project such as unlocking the Black Market for 1,000 Credits.
Video help
What the Upgrade Facility does at The Den
| Upgrade tree | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Facilities | Black Market, Black Market Quality, Droid Repair Bay, Medbay, Networking, Zone Influence (Core / Mid / Outer) |
| Crew | Teamwork, Utility Items, Combat Readiness, Crew Quarters, Crew Focus, Weapon Mods |
| Weapons | Roster-wide modifiers such as Longarm Damage and Longarm Range & Overwatch |
Key The Upgrade console funds two things: structural improvements to The Den itself and roster-wide bonuses that apply to every Operator you field. Everything you queue costs Credits (some upgrades also want Influence), consumes an available Build Slot, and takes at least one Cycle of in-game time to finish. You begin with a single effective slot and unlock more as you progress, so eventually you can have several projects researching at once. Over the course of the game those Den upgrades can also grow your roster from around seven Operators to roughly twenty.
The projects are split across three trees. The Facilities tree is where the big structural stuff lives — including the Droid Repair Bay, which you must build before you can recruit Astromech Operators at all. Networking raises the Intel you pull from Contacts, and the Zone Influence nodes hand you Intel across Core, Mid, and Outer planets. The Crew tree sharpens how your squad performs, and the Weapons tree applies flat modifiers to whole weapon types.
Where to spend your first Credits
| Early upgrade | What it does |
|---|---|
| Medbay (Medical Bed II) | Removes operator injuries between missions |
| Black Market Quality (Quality Goods I) | Improves the gear and mods the shop stocks |
| Droid Repair Bay | Unlocks Astromech droid recruitment |
| Networking / Mid Zone Influence | Boosts Intel from Contacts and zone rewards |
Queue Medical Bed II from the Medbay tree first — it’s the only place to clear operator injuries, and healthy Operators are far less likely to be lost on the next drop.
Early Upgrade Facility mistakes to avoid
The biggest one is treating the console like something you can fiddle with on the way out. Loadouts and Den upgrades all have to be finalized in the base before you deploy — there’s no changing them once a mission starts. So make the Upgrade Facility part of your routine: check it every single time you get back, because an empty Build Slot is research you’re not getting for free.
Two more traps catch new players. Astromech droids aren’t a default roster option, so don’t count on droid support until you’ve funded the Droid Repair Bay. And it’s easy to sink everything into gear from the shop while ignoring Black Market Quality and the Influence nodes — the upgrades that make your long-term loot and mission rewards better rather than just topping you up for one fight.
Related Star Wars Zero Company guides
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you have to unlock the Upgrade Facility first?
No. It’s part of The Den from early in the campaign — the opening missions bring your squad to the base, and a Republic Intelligence objective literally points you at the console. It’s available between every mission, not gated behind a separate unlock you have to earn.
How long does a Den upgrade take, and can you run several at once?
Each project takes at least one Cycle to finish and ties up one Build Slot while it researches. You effectively start with a single slot, and additional slots open up as you progress, letting you run multiple upgrades in parallel — though the exact Cycles and missions that grant extra slots are still being tuned, so treat the timing as approximate.
Why can’t I recruit Astromech droids yet?
You have to build the Droid Repair Bay in the Facilities tree first — Astromechs aren’t available by default. Once it’s up, they’re a build-your-own droid support class: they carry three utility slots and get extra uses out of each utility item, can donate AP directly to allies via Comm-Link, and their Enhanced Scanner raises enemies’ chance to be hit.
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