The general guideline for when to ascend in Cookie Clicker is to wait until you have accumulated at least 100 to 200 prestige levels (heavenly chips), which usually corresponds to baking several trillion cookies. Many experienced players recommend waiting to ascend at around 440 prestige levels for optimal benefit, as this gives a significant boost (1% increase in cookies per second per prestige level) and more heavenly chips to spend on permanent upgrades. Ascending too early, such as at the minimum threshold of 1 trillion cookies, is usually not efficient because the buffs gained are very small. You ascend by clicking the Legacy tab at the top right of the game once you have enough prestige levels, which resets your current progress but grants heavenly chips and prestige bonuses that massively increase your cookie production in subsequent runs. Ascending with a good number of prestige levels will speed up your progress significantly after reset due to the permanent buffs. In summary:
- Minimum to get prestige is baking 1 trillion cookies.
- Community popular advice is to ascend when you have 100-200 prestige levels.
- Optimal for many players is waiting to around 440 prestige levels for better long-term growth.
- Each prestige level adds 1% to your cookie production rate.
- Use heavenly chips gained from ascension to buy powerful heavenly upgrades for faster cookie production.
This balance helps avoid resetting too early with small gains, or too late where progress slows unnecessarily.
