Build a Phone Empire Research and Tech Tree

Research in Build a Phone Empire is the year-by-year unlock system that turns a garage phone maker into a device company: RP — Research Points — buys new tech, and the official roadmap runs from tablets and smartwatches to earbuds, foldables and laptops. This page covers how RP flows, what the tree holds, and a priority order that keeps your company solvent while it climbs.

The official description sets the frame: "RESEARCH new tech year by year and unlock tablets, smartwatches, earbuds, foldables and laptops." Research is the long game inside the tycoon loop — every other system (design, pricing, marketing) produces income, and research is where that income becomes permanent capability.

How RP Flows Into the Tree

RP is the research currency, and it reaches your account through two verified channels:

• Gameplay. Launching devices and running the company generates RP alongside Cash — the exact rates are not officially documented, but every launch contributes.
• Codes. The active codes explicitly bundle RP with their Cash rewards; Pro Game Guides describes the current set as "Cash and 1RP" codes, with LAPTOPS the largest. For a system measured in yearly unlocks, free RP is a genuine head start.

RP purchases are permanent unlocks: once a tech is bought, it stays bought — including through the Legacy rebirth loop, which is precisely why research is the long-game investment in this game.

Official source: Build a Phone Empire on Roblox — the device list in the official description (tablets, smartwatches, earbuds, foldables, laptops) is the confirmed shape of the tree; RP generation rates are not published.

RP's role as the research currency is corroborated by Pro Game Guides, whose codes coverage confirms RP as a code reward alongside Cash.

The Device Families, In Unlocks

Each family on the tree widens what your company can design and sell:

• Tablets — the classic second product line: bigger screens, same design logic, a new market segment for your brand.
• Smartwatches — small-form devices with their own parts pool; a brand play as much as a revenue one.
• Earbuds — the accessory category, typically the cheapest new family to enter.
• Foldables — the premium-tier phone evolution; the fan wiki catalogs a device family list for the current build, and foldables sit at the flagship end.
• Laptops — the wide-screen endgame category, and the one the biggest current code is named after (LAPTOPS).

The order the game presents them in is not necessarily the order you should buy them — that depends on your Cash flow, and the next section is the priority logic.

A Priority Order That Keeps You Solvent

Community wikis publish research-priority guides, and they disagree in the details; the durable logic underneath them is simpler:

1. Unlock what your Cash flow can design. A new device family is a promise to fund its parts. The first model in any new category has the worst margins, so unlock a family only when the current one is profitable.
2. One branch at a time. RP spread across five pending unlocks delays all of them. Finish a branch, ship its first device, let that income fund the next branch.
3. Match unlocks to market years. The game's year counter advances as you play; the tech that sells in each era changes. A tablet unlock lands hardest when your phone brand has the reviews to launch one credibly.

The update cadence that moves the tree rides on the same rhythm Destructoid's codes guide documents for the codes — roughly every three to four days.

RP Generation: What's Verified and What Isn't

Honesty section, because research guides live and die on numbers: the official documentation names the currency and the tree, not the rates. How much RP a launch generates, how year length affects income, whether any gamepass accelerates RP — the fan-maintained wikis propose answers (their research guide discusses RP costs, prerequisites and a "Lab Grant" gamepass), but none of it is officially documented and the two competing wikis do not fully agree.

What you can verify yourself in one session: ship two launches, compare RP deltas. Your own numbers beat any wiki for the build you are actually playing — and with the developer updating every three to four days, any hard-published rate would age badly anyway.

Research and the Legacy Loop

The rebirth system — sell your company for permanent Legacy bonuses — interacts with research in the way that defines long-term play: tech unlocks persist across resets, so every branch you finish is a head start you keep. Late-company research spending is therefore never wasted, even when the sell button is close.

That symmetry shapes the endgame: experienced players spend their final pre-Legacy years cashing in accumulated RP on the most expensive branches, entering the next rebirth with the tree already open behind them.

The Year Counter and Your Research Budget

Research cost scales against the game's internal calendar, which turns the year counter into your budgeting tool. Early years generate thin RP — enough to open one branch and no more — while mature companies with steady launches can fund a category unlock and a generation of devices inside the same span. The practical read: your research pace is your launch pace. Companies that stall on shipping stall on the tree, because RP follows revenue.

That coupling also defines the failure mode worth avoiding: unlocking a premium category in a fat year, then failing to fund its parts in the lean ones that follow. The tree never refunds, so the unlock sits idle while your Cash recovers — the one outcome the priority section's "solvent first" rule exists to prevent. Budget the unlock and its first device together, or don't budget it yet.

Cross-Category Synergies

The tree is presented as five families, but the returns compound across them: a company selling phones, tablets and wearables simultaneously gets brand effects no single category generates. Each family's reviews feed the same company reputation, and buyers acquired in one category cross-shop the others. That synergy is the quiet argument for broad unlocks once Cash flow supports them — the fifth device family is worth more than its own sales because it multiplies the four it joins.

The practical sequencing consequence: priority logic based purely on per-category margin undervalues the categories that complete a set. When two branches cost similarly, the one that diversifies your catalog usually wins the long game, because the market you are building is a brand with range, not a specialist with one good product.

FAQ

What does research do in Build a Phone Empire?

Research spends RP to unlock new device categories and tech year by year — the confirmed families are tablets, smartwatches, earbuds, foldables and laptops. Unlocks are permanent and widen what you can design and sell.

How do I earn RP in Build a Phone Empire?

Through gameplay (launches and company progress) and through codes — the current active set bundles RP with Cash rewards. Exact gameplay rates are not officially documented.

What should I research first?

The device family your Cash flow can actually fund. A new category is a parts-cost commitment; unlock what your current brand can launch credibly, one branch at a time.

Do research unlocks survive a Legacy reset?

Yes — that is the core of the rebirth loop's appeal. Tech you unlock stays unlocked, which is why the fan wiki treats Legacy as "permanent account perks" and why late-company RP spending is never wasted.

Is there a gamepass that speeds up research?

Community wikis reference a "Lab Grant" gamepass in that role, with fan-listed prices around 79 Robux. It is a community-documented extra, not an officially documented one — check the in-game store for the current list and prices.

Related Guides

• Phone design guide — what you can build once the tree opens a category.
• Codes (October 2026) — the free RP that front-loads this whole page.
• Legacy: rebirth guide — why finished branches outlive the company that funded them.
• Beginner guide — where research sits in the full loop.