Depending on what difficulty you’re playing on, healing yourself in Resident Evil 7 can be either slightly frustrating or a desperate struggle to get the first aid items you need. Knowing the best times to heal and how much each item heals is essential to make sure you survive. This guide contains the info you need to keep in good health and how to best utilize your healing items.

Healing Mechanics in Resident Evil 7

Ethan starts each difficulty mode with the same amount of health. The difference between the difficulty modes when it comes to healing deals with the regenerating health mechanic.

Regenerating Health

Depending on which difficulty mode you’re playing on, your character can regenerate an amount of health as long as he’s not attacked again.

• Easy Mode: Your health regenerates quickly and between one-third and one-half of your total health can be recovered.
• Normal Mode: Your health regenerates much slower than on Easy Mode, and you’ll only get between one-fourth and one-fifth of your total health back.
• Madhouse Mode: I haven’t noticed any health regeneration in Madhouse mode. Either health doesn’t regenerate at all, or you recover so little as to be unnoticeable.

Healing Items

There are three levels of first aid item in Resident Evil 7. Each of them heals more than the last level. However, the more an item’s ability to heal, the rarer it, or the materials needed to craft it are.

List of First Aid Items in Resident Evil 7

Herb: This Resident Evil series mainstay can heal around one-fourth of your total health. Although Herbs are worth using in a pinch, they have a major drawback. When you press the healing shortcut button, your character won’t use a Herb even if you have one in your inventory. To heal with a Herb, you must manually use it from the inventory. Herbs are best kept to be mixed into more powerful healing items.

First Aid Med: This will more than likely be your most used healing item during your playthrough of Resident Evil 7. The First Aid Med restores between one-third and one-half of your total health and can be utilized with the healing shortcut that saves precious time compared to having to use an item from the inventory. This item can be created from a mixture of a Herb and a regular Chem Fluid.

Strong First Aid Med: As the name suggests, this First Aid Med is stronger than the regular First Aid Med. The Strong First Aid Med will heal your character completely, and therefore should be coveted. A good strategy for this item is to leave it in your item box unless you know you’re about to go into a hard fight. If you keep it in your inventory, you may accidentally use it by pressing the healing shortcut button. Both the item in its regular form and the Strong Chem Fluid that can be combined with the Herb to make it are rare, so you’ll want to hoard them until you’re sure you need them.

Alternate Healing Items

There is one additional item besides the three First Aid items that can heal your character. The Steroid upgrade raises your character’s max health, and when you use it any damage you may have sustained at the time is healed as well. If you run into a Steroid upgrade, you may want to hold onto it until you need a free full heal.

If you need more guides, walkthroughs, and strategies, check our Resident Evil 7 guide hub. There you can get more info on items, weapons, and combinations that will help you make the most of your RE7 experience.