ZZZ Polychrome Farming — Best Ways to Get Polychrome Fast & Pull Value | Zenless Zone Zero

Polychrome is the currency you use to pull in Zenless Zone Zero. You don't pull with it directly — you convert it into tapes: 160 Polychrome = 1 Master Tape on the standard banner, or 1 Encrypted Master Tape on limited banners. In short: 1 pull = 160 Polychrome, and 10 pulls = 1,600 Polychrome.

There is a second currency, Monochrome — this is the paid currency (real money), and it converts 1:1 into Polychrome. So every number below is expressed in Polychrome so you can compare everything on the same scale.

This is the part to do every day because it stacks up fast:

• Daily missions: do a few small tasks (buy coffee, scratch a card, tidy the video store...) to fill the daily activity bar → 60 Polychrome per day, about 1,800 per month.
• HoYoLAB check-in: check in daily in the HoYoLAB app for extra rewards (Polychrome and tapes) without even opening the game.
• Redeem codes: every new-version livestream drops codes for free Polychrome — enter them early, since codes expire.

These are the big Polychrome chunks; they reset on a cycle, so don't miss them:

• Shiyu Defense: up to about 2,340 Polychrome per cycle on a full clear (the Critical Node alone is ~720), resets every 14 days. The max varies with how deep you clear.
• Deadly Assault: around 900 Polychrome per cycle, also on a biweekly reset.
• Hollow Zero: about 160 Polychrome per week for clearing the weekly target.
• Version events: every patch runs reward events; many hand out up to ~1,000 Polychrome just for basic participation.
• Achievements & exploration: raising your Inter-Knot level, opening new map areas, and clearing achievements all pay one-time Polychrome.
• Signal Search Shop: residual signal built up from pulling, plus spare Master Tapes, can be exchanged for Agent/W-Engine selectors and materials in the shop — don't let it sit unused.

F2P bottom line: stacking every source above, a single patch (~6 weeks) usually leaves a free player with about 9,000–13,000 Polychrome — roughly 90–130 pulls per patch once free tapes are counted. The exact figure swings with how loaded the patch is (big events, anniversaries, new areas).

If you want to spend, here's the best-value order:

• Inter-Knot Membership monthly card (~$4.99): get 300 Monochrome upfront + 90 Polychrome/day for 30 days (2,700). Total 3,000 Polychrome (~18–19 pulls). This is the best value per dollar — buy it first if you have a budget.
• Battle Pass (paid tier): rewards Encrypted Master Tapes and Monochrome, i.e. it converts straight into pulls (not loose Polychrome).
• Direct Monochrome top-up: buy a Monochrome pack in the Shop → it converts 1:1 into Polychrome. Your first purchase of each pack doubles the Monochrome, so first-time buys are the best deal; repeat buys give only the base amount.

Top up safely: pay inside the game or via HoYoverse's official top-up page; avoid sketchy discount sites so you don't lose your account.

Everything in pulls so it's easy to picture:

Pity mechanics: the limited Agent banner has a hard pity of 90 that guarantees an S-Rank Agent; that S-Rank is a 50/50 for the featured character — if you lose, your next S-Rank is guaranteed to be the featured one. So 180 pulls is the absolute worst case. The W-Engine banner has an 80-pull hard pity with a 75/25 chance for the featured engine — note that 80 pulls does NOT guarantee the limited W-Engine itself: lose the 75/25 and only the next S-Rank is guaranteed, so the true worst case is 160 pulls. Soft pity (a sharp odds spike) starts around pull 74 per community stats.