How to build Age of Empires 2 barracks to expand your army

(Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)

Using Age of Empires 2 barracks, you can build up your armies with new soldiers ready for war, but barracks take up a lot of space and resources. Assuming you've already got some workers gathering basic resources, such as wood, your next priority should be getting your army start - those workers aren't going to protect themselves, and your enemies aren't going to conquer themselves either! However, Age of Empires 2 is pretty complicated, with lots of menus, sub-menus and UI elements, so knowing exactly how to build your barracks and what to do with them can be confusing. With that in mind, here's what you need to know to begin building barracks in Age of Empires 2.

How to build barracks in Age of Empires 2

To build barracks in Age of Empires 2 you need to select a villager and choose the barracks from the Military page of the villager’s Command menu. You’ll also need 175 wood, and a 3x3 area to place your barracks and start building your army.

Age of Empires 2 barracks construction command menu — (Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)

Select a villager: Do this by manually finding and selecting a villager or by cycling through your villagers with up on the D-Pad.
Open the Military page of the Villager’s Command menu and select Barracks: Hold RT to open the radial villager Command menu, then press Y to switch from the Economy page to the Military page. Use the left stick to highlight Barracks and then press A to start placing.
Place and build your Barracks: Now you can move around your territory to find a spot for your Barracks. Press A to place the barracks and construction will automatically being. If you want to speed up the construction of your barracks, you can assign more villagers to the job.

Age of Empires 2 barracks training command menu — (Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)

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Age of Empires 2: Definitive Edition — (Image credit: Xbox Game Studios)

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With your Age of Empires 2 barracks built, you can now use them to train up infantry units and bolster your army. You’ll need to spend food and gold to both train and improve you soldiers, with upgrades costing far more than training. Train units by selecting your Barracks, holding RT to open the Command menu, then selecting the unit type you want to train.

Starting in the Dark Age, you’ll have access to only the humble Militia fighter, but you’ll be able to upgrade to the Man-at-Arms and other specialized units as soon as you reach the Feudal Age and beyond. With infantry units being your primary forces in Age of Empires 2, it’s essential that you have a good number of barracks, and the resources to support them, so that you can have a large army. Barracks are also essential for Archery Ranges and Stables, so you’ll need them to get other armed units too.

If you've been checking out Age of Empires 2 on Game Pass, why not take a look at these games like Age of Empires to see what else can scratch that strategy itch.

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Will Sawyer is a Guides Editor at GamesRadar+ with over five years of experience in writing online guides, news, and features, and has a BA (Hons) in Journalism. Starting as a freelancer, Will contributed to startmenu and Game Rant before joining the GamesRadar+ team in August 2021. Since then, he has written hundreds of guides about a huge range of games, with shooters and action games being his areas of expertise. Outside of writing about games, Will hops between multiplayer shooters with friends, such as Darktide and Helldivers 2, and delves into whatever has been on his backlog for far too long. He also tries to get through his never-ending Warhammer pile of shame of grey Tyranids, Aeldari, and Chaos Space Marines.