Wormhole Essentials

• they are transient paired objects which connect two systems, temporarily allowing ships to jump between them
• they must be scanned down with probes, except for Unidentified AKA Drifter wormholes (more on those later)
• they have these 5 characteristics (see whtype.info for a visualization):
  1. a Type of 1 letter and 3 numbers, visible in space & on the overview. one hole of a pair is always K162. the non-K162 Type is always the originating side
  2. a lifetime counter which begins ticking down only when someone initiates warp to the wormhole's grid. a hole collapses once its counter reaches 0
  3. a total throughput mass which, if exceeded, causes the wormhole to disappear or "collapse"
  4. an individual ship mass limit. this value is related to Maximum Ship Size, on which more down below
  5. an origin and a destination category. there are 14 possible categories in 6 groups:
     1. 3 categories of Known Space AKA KS or New Eden - 5,201 stargate-connected systems in 65 regions grouped into High-Sec (HS), Low-Sec (LS), and Null-Sec (NS)
     2. 7 of J-Space AKA JS or Anoikis - 2,598 systems grouped into Classes 1-6 and 13, only accessible via wormholes. all named "J" followed by 6 digits (except one)
     3. 1 of Drifter/Uni space - 5 named systems only accessible via "Unidentified" wormholes, the large quantities & unique mechanics of which set these systems apart
     4. 1 of Thera - a single giant system with numerous wormholes. has stations with jump clone & home station functionality. its holes are publicly mapped by EVE-Scout
     5. 1 of Pochven - 27 systems connected in a loop via a separate stargate network. accessible via wormhole or filament. filaments are useful for exfiltrating stuff to Jita
     6. 1 of Turnur and Tabbetzur - Turnur became a mini-Thera in 2022 and EVE-Scout map it. Tabbetzur got a similar treatment in 2025 but EVE-Scout don't map it
        • they're both also in KS. I give them their own group because they share very similar hole mechanics which are unique to them
• they reveal all these characteristics via their visual appearance and/or Show Info windows, so with knowledge, you can know those things before jumping, even at a K162
  • specific KS region destinations can be identified before jumping, too, if you can recognize the nebulae. more on this in the visual appearance ID guide
• their associated Cosmic Signatures always spawn 7 km from the wormhole, so you can generally warp to sigs at 0 without decloaking on the hole
  • you can rarely be decloaked if your warp passes through the hole. if this is a concern, warp at 70/100 km, bookmark the hole, warp to a celestial or probe then to the BM
  • it's customary to BM wormholes rather than their sigs because if you warp to 0 on a wormhole BM, you'll always land in jump range of the hole (if you're not interdicted)
• their jump range is 5 km—double that of stargates & Ansiblexes—and their radius is 3 km, so they can be entered from a 16 km-wide sphere centered on their brackets
  • this is a skosh over half the spawn diameter of the smallest stargates, so wormholes are much easier to interdict than gates
• you can jump a particular wormhole only twice every 5 minutes. you're polarized with respect to a hole you can't jump through due to recent transits
• unlike stargates & Ansiblexes, you can jump wormholes with a weapons (combat) timer
• ~40% of JS systems have 1 of 6 system-wide effects which alter the performance of ships & modules (you can filter for these with anoik.is/systems)
• Local chat in Drifter/Uni space, JS, Pochven and Thera only shows present pilots in the Member List if they send a message. in KS, Local always lists all present pilots

visual appearance ID guide (link to separate page)

text-based Show Info ID guide (Destination/Size/Life/Stability)

• right-click a wormhole and select Show Info. sample text provided here, colored and formatted as it appears in-game:
  
  • An unstable wormhole, deep in space. Wormholes of this kind usually collapse after a few days, and can lead to anywhere.
    
    Destination: Low-security systems
    Maximum Ship Size: Extra large
    
    Lifetime: Less than 1 hour remaining
    Mass Stability: More than 50% remaining
• the top sentences are irrelevant since they're the same on all holes
• Destinations are mostly explicit as of this August 2025 patch. there are 10 possibilities:
  1. Class 1-3 wormhole systems (note: at least one side of all Medium holes will always be C1, Thera, Tabbetzur, or Turnur)
  2. Class 4-5 wormhole systems (note: Larges to C4-5 usually go to C4 whereas Extra larges to C4-5 always go to C5)
  3. Class 6 wormhole systems
  4. Class 13 wormhole systems
  5. Drifter wormhole systems
  6. High-security systems
  7. Low-security systems
  8. Null-security systems
  9. Pochven systems
  10. Thera
• Maximum Ship Size has 4 named categories spread across 6 unnamed ones:

  • MSS	mass limit, t	fits ≤	connects
    Small	5,000	Destroyer, Porpoise, ZPME HIC, ZPME Odysseus	JS → JS/NS
    Medium	62,000	BC, Hauler, Nestor if unplated or w/offlined plates	any ↔ any
    Large	375,000	Orca, all BS except BLOPs & Marauder w/Higgs + prop on	any ↔ any
    Large	410,000	Bowhead, all BS except Golem & Paladin w/Higgs + prop on	KS/Pochven → Pochven
    Extra large	1,000,000	Freighter & Jump Freighter	HS/Thera ↔ HS/LS/NS/C5/C6
    Extra large	2,000,000	Carrier, Dreadnaught, Force Auxiliary, Rorqual	LS/NS/C5/C6 ↔ LS/NS/C5/C6

  • Size is often abbreviated to its first letter or "XL" or "VL" for Extra large (it used to be called "Very large")
  • C729 is the only 410 k Type in the game. more on it below in Supplemental Facts
• Lifetime has 4 options, colored as they appear in-game:
  1. More than 1 day remaining AKA fresh or stable
  2. Less than 1 day remaining AKA fresh or stable
  3. Less than 4 hours remaining AKA EOL for end-of-life or 4H
  4. Less than 1 hour remaining AKA 1H (this info was also added by this August 2025 patch)
• Mass Stability has 3 options describing the total throughput remaining, colored as they appear in-game:
  1. More than 50% remaining AKA fresh, stable or healthy
  2. Less than 50% remaining AKA destab, shrunk or first shrink
  3. Less than 10% remaining AKA crit or second shrink

Supplemental Facts

• you can determine JS class by clicking the system name at the top left; the first letter of the Region name indicates the Class:
  • A=C1, B=C2, C=C3, D=C4, E=C5, F=C6, G=Thera, H=C13/tripnull, K=Drifter/Uni
• C1, C2 and C3 are often referred to as lowclass whereas C5 and C6 are highclass. C4 is one of those or neither, depending on who you ask
• wormhole spawning mechanics are fairly well (although not completely) understood
• wormholes cannot connect a system to itself, but they can connect systems which are adjacent by stargate
• wormhole spawn distance mechanics differ considerably from those of stargates, being based on hull mass & remaining throughput mass (Ctrl + F "potential distances" here)
  • given a "lower bound of 2.5km," wormhole spawn radii vary between 5,500 and 16,800 m (diameters 11,000-33,600)
    • the nearest edges of spawned ships are placed in those ranges
    • these values are measured from a hole's center. if you can't intuit why that's consequential, read about zero spheres and look at this image
    • lighter ships spawn in the closer side of that range, heavier ones toward the farther
      • wormhole spawn distances increase (still as a function of hull mass) as remaining hole mass decreases
• shattered systems have ruinous planets and no moons, contain unique PvE sites, and can spawn sites from a class above or below their own
  • a unique group of 25 of these called C13s or Tripnulls only connect to JS/NS via Small wormholes. they get expanded site spawns & C6 Wolf-Rayet effects
• structures as well as POS and POCOs can be anchored in non-shattered JS but one cannot jump clone into or out of JS structures or set them as home stations
  • you can jump clone within a single JS structure, i.e. swap clones
• capitals can't jump into C1-C4 (nor non-Nestor BS into C1) but they can be built there if players anchor a structure & harvest/import the raw materials as necessary
  • this is why there are capital kills in C1-C4 despite capitals being unable to jump into them
• Small holes technically have 3 million tonnes of throughput, but that value regenerates. they really have infinite throughput, collapsing only when their life timers end
• most holes respawn 60 seconds after collapsing. the static VLs in Tabbetzur and Turnur take 20 minutes, and Drifters/Unis take ~30 (may be 20, too, but hard to prove)
• this is semantic fluff of little consequence (click to show/hide)

  • instead of JS or J-Space, some people say WS or w-space, for wormhole space. some also say they "live in a wormhole" or suchlike
    • to me, this unnecessarily muddles two distinct concepts: planetary systems and wormholes
      • every "place" in EVE (apart from Abyssal Deadspace) is a system, and no system is also a wormhole (a wormhole being a transient gatelike object)
        • as I said, this distinction is of essentially no practical consequence, but I'm a tedious pedant who values precision & distinctness in language
• wormholes can be either static, wandering, or reverse static
  • statics respawn in the same system with a random connection
  • wanderers respawn in a random system with a random connection
  • reverse statics respawn in a random system with the same connection
    • 35 planetary systems have associated reverse-static Types:
      • Thera has 5: ~3 T458 from HS, ~2 M164 from LS, ~3 L031 from NS, ~4 F135 from C2-C6, and ~1 F353 from C1
      • Turnur has 1: ~5 J377, from C1-C4
      • Tabbetzur has 1: ~5 J492, from C1-C4
      • each of Pochven's 27 systems has a single associated C729 with its own unique spawn zone, each quite small compared to other spawn zones
        • some of these zones partially overlap. the zones are shown in these maps
      • the 5 Drifter/Uni systems constitute the region K-R00033. each system has ~59 reverse-statics which spawn in systems with Jove Observatories
    • Pochven as a region also hosts several instances of 2 Types which wander around its systems: F216 from C2-C6 and U372 from the Dronelands
  • to clarify the difference between normal and reverse statics, since this seems to confuse some folks:
    • a normal static respawns inside its host system and its K162 appears somewhere in its spawn zone if the conditions are met
    • a reverse static respawns outside its host system—somewhere in its spawn zone—and its K162 shows up in the host system if the conditions are met
  • note: certain wormhole Types can include both static and wandering wormholes, but specific individual wormholes out in space are never both
    • e.g. a C5 system might host a static H296 and a wandering H296 simultaneously; those two wormholes are distinct, unique entities
      • the static H296 will respawn in the same system after collapsing whereas the wandering H296 will respawn in a randomly-selected C5
• HICs and the Odysseus can use Zero-Point Mass Entanglers to drastically reduce their mass with a severe mobility penality. they can enter Small holes this way
• each KS region has a unique skybox and thus a unique wormhole graphic, but they have similarities based on their relative locations
• each JS class from C1-C6 has a unique skybox & wormhole graphic. Thera, the 5 Drifter/Uni systems and all 25 Tripnulls share one
• there are 8 sizes of total wormhole throughput mass, listed here (in tonnes, not kg) along with average throughput for various hull classes. data last updated June 6th, 2025
  • there is much variation within these averaged groups. for exact throughput numbers, use my calculator or use a dscan tool w/tonnage totals then divide it in
    • there's only one 5 mil hole (D845) and it only fits BS and smaller. 500k and 100k holes only fit BCs/Haulers/Nestors and smaller

  • mass, t↓ hull→	Cap	Freighter	Rorqual	Bowhead	Marauder	Orca	BLOPs	BS	Nestor	Barge	BC	Hauler	Cruiser	Porpoise	Shuttle	Destroyer	Frigate	Corvette	Capsule	Zephyr
    5,000,000	✖	✖	✖	✖	33	34	34	51	250	286	376	378	433	1,112	3,125	3,386	4,326	4,337	156,250	1,000,000
    3,300,000	3	4	5	9	22	22	23	34	165	189	249	250	286	734	2,063	2,235	2,855	2,863	103,125	660,000
    3,000,000	3	4	4	8	20	20	21	31	150	172	226	227	260	667	1,875	2,032	2,596	2,602	93,750	600,000
    2,000,000	✖	3	✖	5	14	14	14	21	100	115	151	152	173	445	1,250	1,355	1,731	1,735	62,500	400,000
    1,000,000	✖	2	✖	3 *only fits through C729	7	7	7	11	50	58	76	76	87	223	625	678	866	868	31,250	200,000
    750,000	✖	✖	✖	✖	5	5	6	8	38	43	57	57	65	167	469	508	649	651	23,438	150,000
    500,000	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	25	29	38	38	44	112	313	339	433	434	15,625	100,000
    100,000	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	✖	5	6	8	8	9	23	63	68	87	87	3,125	20,000

Exploring/Scanning Best Practices (make these habitual)

• ABC: Always Be Cloaked. if you don't need to be uncloaked, be cloaked
• bookmark both holes, and again, the holes themselves rather than their sigs
• use the directional scanner to reduce the likelihood of being caught unaware
• recall your probes ASAP when done scanning. they betray your presence

Mapping Tools

• actively-maintained wormhole mapping tools as of January 2026 (please poke me if this should be updated):
  • EVE WHMapper (open source; repository)
  • GalaxyFinder (proprietary)
  • Pathfinder (open source; repository)
  • Tripwire (open source; repository)
    • Short Circuit is a standalone program which uses Tripwire to find the shortest route between arbitrary systems (it can integrate EVE-Scout's data with your own)
  • Wanderer (open core, repository)
  • WormholeSystems (proprietary)
• I won't tutorialize these, although I do offer some AHK scripts which make Tripwire a bit faster to use (I learned on TW, so it's what I use)