Last updated: October 12, 2026
To complete the Open Arc Probes trial in Arc Raiders you need to find an ARC Probe — a small hovering survey drone that flies a fixed patrol route on the surface — destroy it, then interact with the shell it leaves behind to “open” it. The reliable method is to hunt probes in the low-traffic outer ring of a map during the first few minutes of a raid, drop them with a suppressed weapon from 40–60 m, and be gone before the noise or the loot pulls in a third party. Probes respawn on a timer inside the same raid, so a clean run can bank two opens instead of one.
- What an Arc Probe is, and what “opening” one actually means
- Where to find Arc Probes
- How to open an Arc Probe safely, step by step
- The trial objectives, tier by tier
- Loadout: what to carry on a probe run
- A realistic time budget for the trial
- Extraction tactics that get the shell out
- Common mistakes that cost the trial
- Frequently Asked Questions
What an Arc Probe is, and what “opening” one actually means
An Arc Probe is a small ARC drone that does not engage Raiders directly — it patrols, scans and relays. Because it is not shooting back, players treat it as free loot, and that is exactly how probe runs go wrong: the drone itself dies to two or three hits, but the sound signature and the interaction window are what get you killed.
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View on AmazonOpening is a hold-to-interact action on the shell the probe leaves behind. It takes a few seconds of uninterrupted interaction and it is cancelled the moment you take damage, which is why cover matters far more than firepower. The shell does not sit there forever — per the in-game codex it despawns after a short window — so a probe you kill and walk away from is a probe you wasted.
Where to find Arc Probes
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Probe spawns are semi-random but constrained. They favour open ground with long sightlines and a relay or power structure nearby, and they rarely appear in the dense interior clusters where ARC units stack up. Full spawn tables are not published, and the weighting shifts between seasons according to the game’s official patch notes, but the area types below hold up across map rotations on the launch maps.
| Map | Highest-probability area | Typical probes per raid | Player traffic | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dam Battlegrounds | Outer catwalk ring and the north spillway approach | 2–4 | Medium | Long sightlines make probes easy to spot and easy to be spotted from; watch the eastern ridge |
| Spaceport | Perimeter taxiways and the fuel farm edge | 3–5 | High for the first 8 minutes, low after | Best density on the board, worst opening traffic; land late or push the far perimeter |
| Buried City | Rooftop terraces and the elevated rail line | 2–3 | Medium–High | Verticality helps you find probes but breaks line of sight during the open |
| Blue Gate | Coastal service roads and container yards | 2–4 | Low–Medium | Quietest option; longer rotations between spawn points |
How to open an Arc Probe safely, step by step
- Mark two extractions before you engage anything. The open takes seconds, but the walk out after a noisy kill is where runs die. Knowing your nearest and second-nearest exit lets you leave immediately rather than standing still reading the map.
- Approach from the side with the fewest sightlines. You are looking for a position where the probe is visible but you are not skylined. Reason: every extra angle of exposure is an angle a third party can watch you hold a stationary interaction.
- Kill it from 40–60 m with a suppressed weapon. At that range a light- or medium-ammo weapon still drops a probe in two or three hits, and suppression keeps the shots off the audio compass of anyone roughly 80 m out or further.
- Close the distance immediately — do not loot the body first. The shell timer is shorter than most players assume. Get to the shell, then interact.
- Open from the far side of cover, facing away from the map’s hot zone. Damage cancels the interaction, so a single stray round from a distant fight undoes the whole trip. Crouching behind hard cover turns a three-second open into a guaranteed one.
- Loot only after the open completes. The trial credit is tied to the open action, not the contents. Looting first risks the shell timing out while you are in an inventory screen.
- Re-scan the same area after roughly four minutes. Probes cycle on a respawn timer, and staying inside one low-traffic zone beats sprinting across the map chasing sightings.
- Leave after two opens, or after your first shield break. Greeding for a third is the single most common way players lose a completed trial tier.
The trial objectives, tier by tier
The tracker breaks the trial into tiers. Each tier asks for a set number of opens and most tiers add a modifier that changes how you should route the run. Counts and modifiers are rebalanced between seasons, so treat the structure below as the current shape of the trial and confirm the exact requirement in the in-game tracker before you commit a kit.
| Tier | Typical requirement | Modifier | Practical implication |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tier 1 | Open 3 probes | None | One Spaceport run with a good route |
| Tier 2 | Open 6 probes | Probe kills must be within a set distance of a relay structure | Restricts you to the industrial edges; plan the route before landing |
| Tier 3 | Open 10 probes | Multiple probes in a single raid | Forces you to use the respawn timer instead of one-and-done runs |
| Tier 4 | Open 15 probes | Extract with the shell contents in your inventory | Survival becomes the objective, not the kill |
Loadout: what to carry on a probe run
The goal is a kit you can afford to lose twice in an evening without re-farming. Expensive loadouts make players cautious in the wrong way — they avoid the open ground where probes actually spawn.
| Slot | What to take | Why | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Primary | Suppressed light- or medium-ammo SMG or carbine | Kills a probe in 2–3 hits and stays quiet beyond ~80 m | Loses straight-up fights against armoured Raiders |
| Secondary | None, or a cheap pistol | Frees carry weight for shells and loot | No backup in a close-quarters ambush |
| Gadget | 2 smoke grenades | Breaks line of sight for the interaction window | No lethal utility if you get pushed |
| Consumables | 3 shield cells, 2 bandages | Enough to survive one exchange and disengage | Occupies slots that could hold loot |
| Utility | A movement gadget (zipline or equivalent) | Repositions you between spawn points without crossing open ground | One less slot for high-value items |
| Armour | Mid-tier body armour with a shield rating | Survives a first contact, which is all a probe run needs | Still expensive to lose on a bad route |
A realistic time budget for the trial
Most players underestimate how long the trial takes because they count raid time instead of cycle time. A full cycle is roughly 18 minutes in-raid, about 2 minutes matching and loading, and about 2 minutes in the stash re-kitting and stashing — call it 22 minutes per cycle. A prepared player averages around 1.5 opens per raid: one probe in the first four minutes, a second around the eleven-minute mark, and a third only when the spawn route lines up.
That works out at roughly 2.7 raids per hour and about 4 opens per hour. A 10-open tier is therefore close to two and a half hours of clean runs — or about 75 minutes if you chain three-probe routes and never die. The number that matters most is death cost: losing a kit adds roughly 10 minutes of re-gearing plus the raid itself, so a single death per hour cuts your throughput almost in half. If you are on a deadline, the correct decision is almost always to extract early with two opens rather than push for a third.
Extraction tactics that get the shell out
- Leave on the first shot you hear that is not yours. A firefight nearby means someone is close, and probe shells are a known draw.
- Take the second-nearest extraction, not the nearest. The nearest exit is where other players expect traffic, especially in the final minutes.
- Stash the shell contents immediately on return. Trial progress is tracked, but the loot is not protected — bank it before you queue again.
- Watch your six for 30 seconds before opening a shell. The most common death in probe runs is a player who followed the gunfire and waited for you to stop moving.
- If your shields are gone, walk out. A probe run with no shields is a loot delivery service for whoever finds you first.
Common mistakes that cost the trial
- Shooting a probe with an unsuppressed weapon at close range, which puts you on the audio compass of the entire surrounding area.
- Opening in the open instead of behind cover — one stray round from a fight 100 m away cancels the interaction.
- Looting the shell before opening it and letting the timer expire.
- Treating the trial as a kill objective rather than a survival objective, especially in the tier that requires extraction.
- Running an expensive kit, which makes you play passively in exactly the open areas probes spawn in.
- Not checking the in-game tracker before a run, then discovering the tier requires a modifier you did not route for.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many Arc Probes do I need to open for the trial?
The trial is tiered, and the total across all tiers is typically in the range of 30 to 35 opens, with individual tiers asking for 3, 6, 10 and 15. Exact counts are rebalanced between seasons, so check the tracker in-game before you plan a session. The later tiers also add modifiers, so the last few opens take considerably longer than the first few.
Do Arc Probes respawn during the same raid?
Yes. Probes cycle on a respawn timer within a single raid, which is why staying in one low-traffic zone beats sprinting across the map chasing sightings. The practical pattern is to clear a cluster, spend roughly four minutes looting and repositioning nearby, then re-scan the same area. That rhythm is what produces the two-opens-per-raid average most prepared players hit.
Can I open an Arc Probe without firing a shot?
You still have to bring the drone down, so a ranged weapon is effectively required. A suppressed weapon is not mandatory, but an unsuppressed kill broadcasts your position to anyone within audio range and turns a quiet two-minute stop into a fight. If you genuinely cannot run suppressed, kill the probe and open it as fast as possible, then leave the area entirely rather than looting around it.
Which map is best for the Open Arc Probes trial?
Spaceport has the highest probe density, at roughly 3–5 per raid, but it also has the heaviest traffic in the opening minutes. Blue Gate is the quietest and is the better choice for the tier that requires you to extract with the shell contents. Dam Battlegrounds sits in the middle: good sightlines, moderate traffic, and a reliable outer ring of spawn points.
What happens if I die while carrying an opened probe’s contents?
Anything in your inventory at the moment of death is lost, including shell contents. Trial progress for opens you already completed is tracked separately and is not lost, so the tier that requires extraction is the only one where dying actually sets your objective back. Bank the contents in your stash before queuing again.
Is the trial easier in a squad or solo?
Solo is faster for the low tiers because you are not waiting on teammates or sharing spawn routes, and a solo player draws less attention. Squads become better from the extraction tier onward, because a two- or three-player group can hold a perimeter while one person opens the shell. Either way, the run ends the same way: two opens, then out.
