Ensouled Heads vs Gilded Altar: The Main Account Prayer Speed Showdown

Game screenshots and facts are cited from the Old School RuneScape Wiki (strategy, equipment, drops, and related pages). Writing is original editorial, not a copy of the wiki article.

Prayer training on a main account always comes down to a simple question: how much are you willing to spend to skip the slow methods? Two popular options dominate the conversation for players who want real progress without living at the Ectofuntus. The first is the classic gilded altar with dragon bones, the long-standing speed benchmark. The second is reanimating ensouled heads at the Dark Altar, which trades pure Prayer efficiency for a hefty Magic XP side bonus and a very different rhythm.

Both methods have their fanatics, and both can be optimized or botched depending on your setup. This guide breaks down the actual requirements, mechanics, XP profiles, common mistakes, and the honest time-versus-gold tradeoffs so you can decide which path fits your account, your attention span, and your bank value.

The Two Camps of Main Account Prayer Training

Main accounts have a luxury that ironmen do not: the Grand Exchange. That means every Prayer training method is really a question of buying an item, processing it into XP, and repeating until you have the level you want. The two methods in this guide take opposite approaches to that loop.

The gilded altar method is all about raw Prayer XP per hour. You buy dragon bones, light two incense burners in your house, and sacrifice the bones at a 350% experience rate. Each dragon bone worth 72 base XP becomes 252 XP when offered at a lit gilded altar. The method is fast, consistent, and requires constant clicking. It has been the default answer for main accounts for years.

Ensouled head reanimation is the newer contender. You buy ensouled heads from the Grand Exchange, cast a reanimation spell from the Arceuus spellbook, and then kill the reanimated creature for Prayer XP. The method also grants Magic XP for every cast, which gives it a unique dual-skill appeal. However, the Prayer XP per head is lower than an equivalent-cost bone offering, so you are trading some Prayer efficiency for Magic XP and a more interactive combat loop.

Requirements and Setup for Each Method

Before you buy a single bone or head, make sure you can actually use the method. The gilded altar has a construction barrier, while ensouled heads have a spellbook and favour barrier. Both also have several small efficiency upgrades that can meaningfully change your cost per XP.

For the gilded altar, the most common setup uses a house teleport, noted bones, and a butler to unnote them while you stay at the altar. This allows near-continuous offering without running to a bank. Alternatively, you can use a mounted glory or house tabs if you don't have a butler, but that slows you down. The construction cost to build a gilded altar is significant, but it is a one-time investment that pays off across every future Prayer grind.

For ensouled heads, the Dark Altar is the standard training spot because it allows quick access to the Arceuus spellbook and sometimes a prayer altar to restore Prayer points. You will need a stack of ensouled heads, runes for the reanimation spell, and possibly a rune pouch to save inventory space. The reanimated creatures must be killed with combat, so you need decent melee, ranged, or magic gear depending on the head tier. Some players bring a spec weapon to speed up kills.

Gilded Altar Dragon Bones: The Baseline Speed

The gilded altar has one job: convert bones into Prayer XP as fast as possible. With both incense burners lit, it grants 350% of the base burying experience. For dragon bones, that is 72 × 3.5 = 252 XP per bone. This number is fixed, which makes cost planning easy. If dragon bones cost X coins each, your gp per Prayer XP is simply X divided by 252.

The real variable is how many bones you can offer per hour. The fastest recorded methods use a butler to unnote bones continuously, allowing 1,000+ bones per hour. At that rate, Prayer XP per hour can exceed 250,000. However, most players without a butler or with imperfect clicking will land in the 150,000 to 200,000 XP per hour range. The method demands constant attention: click the bones, use them on the altar, repeat. It is the opposite of AFK.

Cost is the biggest drawback. Dragon bones are one of the most traded items in the game, so their price is stable but high. The total cost to go from 70 to 99 Prayer using dragon bones can easily run into the tens of millions of GP, and it all leaves your bank in a single, uninterrupted session. That is why many players look for a method with a side benefit, even if the raw Prayer rate is lower.

Ensouled Heads at the Dark Altar: Prayer Meets Magic

Ensouled heads flip the script. Instead of buying bones that are consumed with a single click, you buy heads that require a multi-step process: cast the reanimation spell, kill the resulting creature, and collect the Prayer XP. The Magic XP from the cast is a genuine bonus, especially for accounts that are not yet 99 Magic. For a main trying to train two skills at once, this method can be macro-efficient even when the Prayer rate looks worse on paper.

The Dark Altar is the traditional location because it allows immediate spellbook switching and offers a bank nearby. The flow is simple: bring a full inventory of ensouled heads, cast the appropriate reanimation spell on each one, kill the reanimated creatures, and repeat. Some players use a cannon or a high-damage spec weapon to speed up the kills. The Prayer XP per head varies widely by tier: low-level heads like ensouled goblin heads give almost nothing, while ensouled dragon heads give a much larger chunk of Prayer XP and a correspondingly larger Magic XP drop.

One important synergy: reanimated monsters count toward Slayer tasks for many creatures, with the exception of reanimated dragons. If you are assigned Bloodvelds, Abyssal Demons, or similar monsters that drop ensouled heads, you can reanimate heads on the same task for extra Prayer and Magic XP without leaving the area. This passive training angle makes ensouled heads attractive even outside dedicated Dark Altar sessions.

The cost per Prayer XP for ensouled heads is not fixed, because the GE price of each head tier fluctuates and the Magic XP value is subjective. Players who value Magic XP at any reasonable gp/XP will find ensouled heads far cheaper than the straight Prayer cost suggests. But if you only care about Prayer XP, the gilded altar usually wins on cost per Prayer XP for high-level bones, particularly when prices spike.

Side-by-Side: Attention, Rates, and Cost

Choosing between these two methods is easier when you see the tradeoffs laid out. The table below summarises the key differences based on the research. Exact numbers for ensouled heads depend on the specific head tier and current GE prices, so treat the cost column as a starting point and verify with the wiki's calculator before committing.

If you are still deciding, ask yourself two questions. First, do you value Magic XP? If yes, ensouled heads become much more attractive. Second, can you tolerate continuous clicking for hours? If no, the gilded altar will burn you out quickly. The ensouled head loop includes combat, which breaks the monotony and can be done at a slightly slower pace without feeling as repetitive.

The Magic XP Bonus You Shouldn't Ignore

On a main account, Magic training is often an afterthought until you need high Magic for teleports, enchants, or endgame PvM. The reanimation spells used for ensouled heads are a legitimate Magic training method in their own right. Each cast gives a fixed amount of Magic XP, and because you are casting hundreds or thousands of times per hour, the XP adds up quickly. For an account that is still far from 99 Magic, this dual-skill value can shift the entire cost equation.

Think of it this way: if a method gives you 100,000 Prayer XP and 50,000 Magic XP in an hour, you are effectively buying two skills for the price of one inventory. Gilded altar gives you 200,000 Prayer XP and zero Magic XP in the same hour. If you were going to train Magic anyway, the ensouled head route may save you a separate Magic training session later. That opportunity cost matters more than most players realise.

If you want a deeper breakdown of pairing Magic with skilling, our OSRS Superheat Gold at Blast Furnace: Magic + Smithing XP Guide applies the same cost-per-XP logic to a different dual-skill method.

Common Mistakes That Destroy Your Efficiency

Both methods have failure points that can silently double your cost or halve your XP rate. Avoid these if you want the numbers from the table to hold up in practice.

• Gilded altar without both burners lit: A single unlit burner drops the experience multiplier from 350% to 300% or lower. Always check both burners before you start, and relight them the moment the timer ends.
• Forgetting to unnote bones efficiently: Running to a bank between every inventory kills your XP/hr. Use a butler or a mounted glory to keep the bones flowing. Every minute spent running is a minute not offering bones.
• Using the wrong reanimation spell for your head tier: Each ensouled head requires a specific spell. Casting a lower-tier spell on a high-tier head wastes runes and gives no XP. Double-check the spell before you start a long session.
• Bringing a full inventory of heads without prayer restore: Reanimated creatures can hit hard, and if you need protection prayers, running out of prayer points mid-inventory means banking early or dying. Bring a prayer potion or use the nearby altar between kills.
• Ignoring market volatility: Dragon bone and ensouled head prices can shift 10-20% in a week. Buying a huge supply at a spike locks in a worse gp/XP ratio. Watch the GE over a few days or use a price graph before committing millions.

Time vs Gold: When Buying Supplies Beats Grinding

Every training method has an invisible cost: your time. A gilded altar session that costs 50 million GP for 70-99 Prayer might take 20 hours. An ensouled head session might take 30 hours but save you 10 hours of separate Magic training. If you can make more GP per hour at your current money-making method than the cost difference per hour, the more expensive method is actually the efficient choice.

This is where buying gold becomes an honest shortcut. If you have a real-life job or limited playtime, spending a few dollars on OSRS gold to fund a faster training method can be the difference between reaching 77 Prayer this month or next month. The gilded altar in particular is a pure GP sink: the only barrier to top XP rates is having enough dragon bones. Buying gold removes that barrier without breaking any in-game rules.

That said, never buy more gold than you need for the immediate goal. Prices on dragon bones and ensouled heads change, and you don't want to sit on a huge stack of supplies that lose value while you are still mid-grind. Buy in batches, use the items, and reassess the market between sessions. The wiki's Prayer training calculator is the best place to get a live gp/XP number before each purchase.

Practical Next Steps

If you want a simple action plan, start here. First, decide whether you value Magic XP. If the answer is no and you just want Prayer levels as fast as possible, build or use a gilded altar and buy dragon bones. Second, if you have an Arceuus spellbook unlocked and enjoy combat, buy a small batch of mid-tier ensouled heads and test the loop at the Dark Altar for 20 minutes. Measure your Prayer and Magic XP per hour, then compare the gp/XP using the wiki's calculator.

Finally, if the numbers look good but your bank can't fund the full grind, check live gold rates to top up your GP. A well-funded main account can use either method without compromise, but the honest shortcut is to use gold to remove the supply barrier and then choose the method that fits your playstyle.

Sources

• Pay-to-play Prayer training - OSRS Wiki
• Pay-to-play Magic training - OSRS Wiki