Connections carry flow between nodes. A connection can be a belt or a pipe.

In detailed mode, a selected connection opens a small card with tier, rate, utilization, and warning details. In compact mode, connections stay lighter and mainly show the current rate.

How connections behave

Connections follow a few simple rules:

• they run from an output to an input
• each handle can only hold one connection at a time
• you cannot connect a node to itself
• solid items stay on belts, while liquids and gas use pipes

If you are not sure what the in-game transport parts are, the closest Satisfactory Wiki references are Conveyor Belts and Pipelines.

What you see by default

In detailed mode, an unselected connection shows a small label. That label tells you the current belt or pipe tier and the current flow rate.

If the planner detects a problem, the label also shows a warning dot. That tells you the connection needs a closer look, but not what the problem is yet.

In compact mode, the label is simpler. It shows Belt or Pipe and the current rate. It does not show the full warning or edit card.

What you see when a connection is selected

Click a connection in detailed mode to open its full card.

That card can include these parts:

• Change Belt Tier or Change Pipe Tier: opens the tier picker from the pencil button in the header.
• current tier and max rate: shown in the colored header.
• Utilization: shows how close the current flow is to the connection limit.
• Satisfaction: shows whether the current flow meets the downstream need. This only appears when the target side has a defined need.
• Items on Belt: appears when a belt is carrying more than one item and breaks the flow down by item.
• Warning panel: appears when the planner detects a problem, or when warnings were ignored earlier.

This card is the fastest way to answer a practical question: is this connection carrying the right amount, and is the chosen tier still enough?

Warning types

The connection card can show three warning labels:

• Belt Bottleneck: the source side could send more, but the current belt or pipe tier is the limit.
• Input Starvation: the downstream side wants more than this connection is currently delivering.
• Oversupply Warning: the upstream side can make more than this connection is actually delivering, which usually means the issue is farther downstream.

You can ignore a warning from the same card. When you do that, the warning block stays visible as Warnings Ignored instead of disappearing completely.

Belt and pipe limits

The planner lets you change transport tier directly from the selected connection card.

Current visible transport limits are:

Changing the tier does not fix a bad layout by itself. It only changes the transport limit on that connection.

Detailed mode vs compact mode

This page only covers the connection-specific difference. For the full planner-wide difference, see Detailed and Compact Mode.

In short: use Detailed when you need to inspect one connection closely, and use Compact when you want a cleaner overview of a larger layout.

How to read a connection quickly

A good quick read usually follows this order:

1. check the current rate
2. compare it to the tier limit
3. look for a warning label
4. if Satisfaction is present, compare current flow to downstream need
5. if the connection still looks wrong, inspect the two nodes at each end

A connection rarely tells the whole story by itself. It is usually the link between an upstream problem and a downstream one.