FF7 Remake Guide: Essential Materia You Can Easily Miss

Throughout Final Fantasy 7 Remake's 40-plus hour playtime, you'll go from dungeon to dungeon, completing some side-missions along the way, while pushing the story forward and rarely looking back. If you allow yourself to be swept up in the momentum of your mission to liberate Midgar, it can be easy to miss valuable collectibles accidentally. Some of the most important is Materia, which are colored orbs you can equip to characters to beef up their base attack skills by providing them spells, abilities, and summons.

Below, we've detailed the easiest ones to miss, which includes info on what they do and how to find them. With this guide, you'll be able to find Materia like Revival, Elemental, HP Up, Magnify, and more.

Be sure to check back often as we update this feature with even more essential Materia you might've missed. For more about Materia, you should also read our Materia explainer detailing the basics around these orbs, as well as our Materia loadout guide about how to build the proper set for your party. Otherwise, read our FF7 Remake Intergrade review to see how the PS5 version stacks up.

HP Up

The HP Up Materia is one of the easiest you can miss early on. As you're exploring the streets of Midgar Sector 1 during Chapter 2, you'll come upon soldiers guarding a checkpoint with a white van on the other side, and beside it is a purple orb of HP Up Materia. Unfortunately, you can't grab it, so keep moving until you hit a cutscene, followed by an attack by Shinra Security Officers. Before going further, head back east towards the checkpoint, and then grab the Materia.

Deadly Dodge

From a tactical perspective, the Deadly Dodge combat Materia is essential for early fights as Cloud. It allows you to dodge towards enemies with an area damage attack, which is excellent for opening up most battles.

You can purchase a Deadly Dodge Materia from the item shop later in Chapter 3, but you can get one for free during Chapter 2. Continue heading south from where you got the HP Up Materia we mentioned above. Just before the fountain plaza, you'll fight off three more troopers. Once they're dealt with, check beside the car for a Deadly Dodge Materia.

Auto-Cure

Auto-Cure is an excellent safeguard for keeping a party member healed during a tough encounter. At its base level, it's capable of healing weakened party members up to three times per battle. However, it won't activate if you don't have not enough MP or ATB Charges to go around or if you're controlling the character in need of emergency curing.

To get the Auto-Cure Materia, sync up with Chadley, the weird kid in the Sector 7 Slums, who wants your help developing new Materia. He'll give you the Assess Materia when you take on the quest; use it on any enemies you fight in Scrap Boulevard to get the data you need. Later, he'll give you Battle Intel assignments with a variety of objectives to unlock additional Materia--some of which we highlight later in this guide--that you'll generally want to prioritize completing on the side to gain more access to varying Materia types. For this report, return when you've analyzed two different types of enemies to buy the newly-developed Auto-Cure Materia at a discounted rate.

First Strike

Completing Chadley's third Battle Intel Report nets you a First Strike Materia. It's not too hard to miss, but it's worth mentioning just in case you don't check in with Chadley often. First Strike is super handy for boosting the amount of ATB you naturally earn at the start of a battle. You'll want to consider equipping it onto Tifa if you've made her your party leader, as her Unbridled Strength ability is good to start building up as soon as possible during a battle. After purchasing an Iron Sword for Cloud during Chapter 3, you should have no trouble earning First Strike from Chadley, as completing the associated Battle Intel Report simply requires that you use different abilities on enemies while they're staggered.

Cleansing Materia

Cleansing Materia is foundational. With this handy orb of Materia, you can heal the poison status effect with MP--eliminating the need to use antidotes. After earning enough AP from using it numerous times, you can use Esuna, which heals all status conditions.

To get yourself a Cleansing Materia, you need to complete the Rat Problem side mission during Chapter 3. To do so, talk to the Item Store owner once the game tells you you're free to tackle optional quests. Then take the path going north that's on the west side of Seventh Heaven. Duck through the pipe to enter a vacant lot full of rats. Take them out and open the chest on the east side of the area for three grenades.

Return to the lot and fight the Doom Rats. They're pretty quick, so try using Punisher mode's counter attack to whittle down their health, and use magic to hit them at a distance. If you can do some sustained damage, you'll Stagger rats, which allows you to knock them out. When you return to the Item Shop owner, you can buy a Cleansing Materia for a discounted price.

Revival

Phoenix Downs are expensive, and while you can find them in the occasional chest, your supply of them is mostly limited. So why not have a Materia on hand that'll help bring your friends back from the dead with MP? Revival is a must-have that you can get relatively early on, but end up missing if you're not paying attention.

After beating the boss in Chapter 4, follow the objective back to the Sector 7 Plate Edge. Just before the first right turn, grab the Revival Materia lying on the ground to your left just before the walkway.

Chocobo And Moogle Summon Materia

After getting your first Summon Materia at the start of Chapter 4, you're probably going to be champing at the bit for the next one. The next Summon Materia is available during Chapter 6 and is pointed out to you by Tifa as you're slowly passing by some industrial ventilation fans. Unfortunately, you can't access it until after you power down two out of the three sunlamps in the area.

Once that deed is done, return to the H-01 section to use the gondola that will take you back toward the ventilation system. On the far side, take the ladder up to a service room where you activate a console that orders you to do some cleaning maintenance in the next room within a minute. Kill all the enemies and press the button on the console at the end of the room in time to complete the job. Don't worry if you fail to kill everything within the time limit, though. You can double back out of the room and hit the console again to start a new, easier fight with some weaker enemies.

Once you activate the other console, you can head into the fan corridor and snag the Chocobo and Moogle Summon Materia. It's a useful one to have equipped when up against enemies weak to the Wind element.

MP Up

If you're in the market for another MP Up Matera, but would rather not fork over the 2,000 Gil needed to purchase a new one, then you can snag yourself a freebie during Chapter 6. The positive effects of this Materia are apparent, and you're likely going to want a couple for a special somebody who'll inevitably end up joining your party later on.

Return on the second gondola to the area you entered when you climbed down the ladder from Sunlamp 2. Go around the cargo containers to find a ladder down, leading to another platform where you'll fight two Queen Grashtrikes. Dispatch them, then use the control panel to lower the walkway ahead. Don't align it with the gate so you can cross; instead, keep lowering it until the MP Up Materia sitting on top of the frame is low enough for you to grab.

Elemental Materia

The Elemental Materia is a handy way to imbue a party member's melee attacks with elemental power when attached to a weapon or increase their magical defense against a particular element when attached to armor. To explain, weapons and armor feature sockets that you place Materia into, and there are two variants of sockets: single, isolated ones and joint ones. The joint sockets are what you can use to activate Elemental on weapons and armor. We highly recommend you give this one to Cloud, but try to be cautious when you face an enemy whose elemental affinity matches the current element of whoever is using this Materia.

To get yourself an Elemental Materia, follow the directions we detailed above about how to get MP Up during Chapter 6. After manipulating the walkway to get the MP Up Materia, put it back in place so you can cross it. Head to the far end of the next platform to grab the Elemental Materia.

Binding

Binding Materia is a must for party members you're speccing to become powerful mages. It allows you to cast status ailment spells like Sleep, Silence, and Berserk. It's possible to purchase one at the Wall Market Materia shop during Chapter 9, but that's 3,000 Gil, and who wants to burn that much hard-earned cash on something you can get for free?

A Binding Materia is up for grabs earlier on during Chapter 9 when you need to use a robotic hand to pick up some cargo containers. Right after fighting three Terpsicolts, look for a ramp heading down on the east side of the area where you'll find a split path. Head up the path with the slope to find controls for the big robot hand. Use the hand to pick up the cargo container and move it to the right, so that it makes a path with the wood walkway nearby, which has the Binding Materia on top of it. When Aerith heads down, pick her up, and place her on top of the cargo container. She'll then run over and grab the Binding Materia for you.

Magnify

The Magnify Materia works much like Elemental in that it's one you attach into joint slots. When you connect a spell Materia to Magnify, you can cast that respective spell onto multiple targets. So, if you have Magnify attached to the Healing Materia, it will cure multiple characters instead of just one. It also works the same way for offensive spells, but it's important to note that the primary target receives the bulk of the damage, and those around them get a reduced amount.

You can find a Magnify Materia not long after you get Binding during Chapter 9. After you've first confronted a fella named Beck and his goonies, proceed until you reach another section with a robot hand you can operate to move some containers around. You can grab the Magnify Materia by moving the first container up and to the right to make a path to it, then dropping Aerith off on tor for her to procure it in your stead.

Warding

Warding Materia is handy for how it grants resistance to the linked materia's status ailment. For example, if you link it with the Poison Materia, the impact of an enemy casting Poison upon you will be debuffed. So you'll definitely want to grab this one to ensure you're prepared against enemies that threaten to cast status ailments upon your party.

You can find a Warding Materia near the end of the sewers dungeon during Chapter 10. You'll find a path that will fork to the north and south after getting past the sluice gate area. Head south first, through a round room with a smattering of enemies. At the bottom of the next ladder, turn right and take the pathway north to its end to find the Warding Materia.

All The Summon Materia From Chadley's Intel Reports

If you're gunning your way through FF7's story, you're guaranteed to miss the majority of the game's Summon Materia. Because if you're not talking to Chadley, then you're going to lock yourself out of getting these powerful battle allies--for a while, at least.

To start the process of getting more Summon Materia, talk to Chadley again as early as Chapter 8 to access your first VR Mission, which is a unique challenge where you fight a summon creature to earn its respective Materia.

Make it a rule of thumb to find Chadley every time you come upon a new semi-open area where you can explore and do side missions because chances are he'll have a new VR Battle for you to complete. Pivotal moments where you can talk to him to get a new VR Mission include Chapter 8 (Shiva), Chapter 9 (Fat Chocobo), and Chapter 14 (Leviathan). There is another one you can earn, but you can only access that by completing all of Chadley's Battle Intel Reports. We've listed their identity under this spoiler tag: Bahamut.