How to get more Food and increase population in Civilization 7

Food in Civilization 7 is a yield you’ll get from your settlements that goes right back into growing your population. Food is how you’ll increase your population and select new tiles for your towns and cities to grow into. Our Civilization 7 guide will tell you how to grow your population by increasing your Food yields, and some things that will buff it. Table of Contents How to grow population with Food in Civilization 7 Every settlement in Civilization 7 starts with a population of one and grows as that settlement generates Food. The population doesn’t actually require food, though. Instead, you’ll hit thresholds — once you generate a certain amount of Food, you’ll get a citizen and can grow your settlement. The game calls these growth moments. This means that increasing how much Food your settlement generates determines how fast your settlement grows into more tiles that have other yields like Production, Happiness, or just even more Food. You can track your current population and how long you have until the next growth moment by looking at the numbers next to the settlement’s name. The number in the circle directly right of the name is the current population and the number below that is how many turns before the next growth moment. How to increase Food in Civilization 7 Food and Production are the two most important yields when growing a settlement. And if you want more of either of them (or any yield), you’ll need Food to grow your settlement. You can start improving your Food yield with your choices in starting a game. Leaders like Ashoka, World Renouncer and Pachacuti get an automatic bonus to Food, and the Mississippian civilization gets an extra Food yield for certain tiles. None of those are going to make a huge difference in your yield, though. Let’s talk about the more practical ways to improve your yield. Food tile yields [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/Civ-7-Grow-Settlement-Food-2.jpg?quality=90&strip=all] Like any yield, increasing the amount of Food you get each turn starts with the tiles your settlement expands into. You’re looking for tiles that give you things like farms and fishing boats. As your Tech and Civics improve, and as you grow your settlement and get adjacency bonuses, those early tiles with small yields will only keep improving. Don’t worry about how much the early tiles produce. Just get the farms established. Food Buildings [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/Civ-7-Grow-Settlement-Food-3.jpg?quality=90&strip=all] The first building you unlock will be a granary — your first Food Building. As you continue your game, you’ll unlock more like baths (unlocked with Currency), fishing quays (unlocked with Sailing), and gardens (unlocked with Irrigation). These buildings all generate Food on their own and tend to come with a lot of adjacency bonuses that will keep driving your yield up. Food Tech, Civics, and Policies Researching Tech and some Civics will get you a lot of bonuses to your Food yield. In the Antiquity Age, the first four nodes in the Tech tree — Agriculture, Sailing, Pottery, and Animal Husbandry — all give you more Food. After those, you’ll have to wait for Navigation Mastery before you get another bump. [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/Civ-7-Grow-Settlement-Food-5.jpg?quality=90&strip=all] None of the Civics in the Antiquity Age give you bonuses to your Food yield, but a couple unlock Policies (that you can enact after Celebrations) that do. * Clan Networks from Mysticism Mastery gets you a +2 Food to every settlement * Castes from Citizenship gives you +25% Food in towns Remember that each Age has its own Tech and Civic trees, so check for new ways to produce more Food with each age transition. Food farming towns Once you start expanding your civilization beyond one city, you’ll have another option for feeding your people. Once you grow a town’s population to seven people, that town can focus on producing something. One of the options will be either a Fishing Town or a Farming Town depending on the location. [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/Civ-7-Grow-Settlement-Food-6.jpg?quality=90&strip=all] Selecting this stops the town’s population from growing any further. However, the town gets a bonus to all Food yields and then sends that Food along roads and the coastline to any nearby Cities. For the most part, nearby towns and cities will get connected automatically, but you can also build roads with a merchant unit. For more Civilization 7 guides, see our explainers on how to increase Production, Happiness, and your settlement cap, plus how to set up trade routes and treasure fleets.