Challenge Mode/Strategies

This is a page for strategies on the Challenge modes. Feel free to add your own.

Tank 1[]

Moon Snail's 3-pet strategy[]

This is a strategy for those who only have 3 Pets, but need the money to get to the 4 pet upgrade. This is an easy and quick strategy for completing tank 1.

Pets: Shrapnel, Presto, Walter, optional (But if you have it, choose Seymour or Rhubarb.)

Difficulty: Easy

Start by changing Presto to Shrapnel. Punch one of the Shraps whenever you get the chance. If Presto reverts his form, turn him back into shrapnel. Once a guppy becomes a teen, buy two guppies. Keep punching Shrap whenever you get the chance. Once an alien appears, turn Presto into Gumbo. Once you kill the alien, change presto back to Shrap. Keep punching them. When a guppy becomes an adult, buy both quality upgrades, and if you can, a quanity. Buy some more guppies. Whenever an alien appears, turn presto into Gumbo. Do not buy a carnivore just yet. Once the timer hits 5:00, buy an egg piece. Buy as many carnivores as you can, and buy some guppies to feed them. After the next alien attack, turn Presto into Walter. Focus more on punching carnivores than punching Shrap. Buy another egg shell and buy some carnivores. With this strategy, you should be able to win before you meet your first difficulty increased alien.

Stxcatcher's 3-pet strategy (no bonus pets, overpopulates carnivores)[]

Pets: Niko, Seymour, Presto

Steps:

Change Presto to Niko
Buy at least 6-8 Guppies
If one of the Guppies becomes an adult upgrade food quality to max and quantity to 3
Buy 6-9 Carnivores
If Enemy Approaching sign appears change Presto from Niko to Gumbo
After beating the alien, change Presto from Gumbo back to Niko
If the currency reaches the amount of egg, buy the egg
After the price resets, buy 4-5 carnivores
If Multiple Alien Signatures sign appears change Presto from Niko to Gash
Repeat step 6-9
After that you should beat challenge tank 1 in around 5 minutes

Click this video if you want to see how the strategy works

Insaniquarium - Challenge Tank 1 (For Beginners)

DFGOB's 4-pet strategy[]

Keep in mind this only works if you have the four-pet upgrade. Doing it with just three pets will only make it even longer. It's a fairly easy strategy to follow.

Pets: Niko, Shrapnel, Presto, Walter. (Walter is optional for those with just three pets.)

Difficulty: Easy (4-pet variant), Medium (3-pet variant)

First, change Presto into Niko. This is necessary as, while Niko has a cooldown for collecting the pearl from his mouth, it's worth $250. Waiting just a bit more for Presto-Niko to open his mouth as well will give you an additional $250. As for Shrapnel's bomb worth $150, try using Walter as often as possible, as well as considering his cooldown regarding his punches (Five uses later, he'll fall asleep for a short while). Aliens will appear occasionally and it's also a good way to receive $200. Similar to several other strategies, wait at most five minutes for everything else to be unlocked (which means carnivores won't be involved in this at all). By then, your budget should be at least $10.000, which is enough to buy two of the egg pieces immediately, and since the cooldown is 15 seconds long, you will be able to purchase the third egg piece in less than 8 minutes from the beginning of the challenge, just before meeting your first "difficulty-upgraded" alien enemies. Using only three pets shouldn't take you much more than that.

The strategy also works in Tank 2 as the egg pieces are not very expensive either, and in other tanks, but it will probably take longer and longer, so doing it in Tank 1 and 2 would be ideal with the recommended 4-pet setup.

CHEAP 4-Pet Strategy (WORKS ON ALL TANKS EXCEPT FOR TANK 3)[]

     Pets: Amp, Walter, Angie, Presto

Using Presto, transform him into Walter. This method is all about luck and placement of Amp, but if you're lucky, you can easily clear tanks with ease. Due to Walter instantly charging Amp, you're gonna want them to line up, and when they are, use Walter's punch to charge amp. Keep purchasing guppies to double your amount of diamonds each time. Once you obtain the desired amount, change the Presto Walter into Blip to unlock the egg shell piece and you can complete the level.

Tank 2[]

This is a 3 pet strategy. This is a good but not fast strategy to beat Tank 2.

Pets: Stinky, Presto, Seymour (Meryl if you can have 4)

Difficulty: Medium for 3 pets, easy for 4 pets

Immediately, change Presto into Shrapnel. When one of your guppies grows, buy lots of guppies. Get as many as you can before the first alien attack. During the attack, if it is a Gus, turn Presto into Gumbo, if it is a Destructor, turn Presto into Gumbo, Gash, or Rufus. After the first alien, turn Presto into Prego or Meryl. Get a star guppy as soon as you can and buy a starcatcher when you have at least one star guppy. An easy strategy is to have 2 star guppies for the first starcatcher, then 1 for every next starcatcher. You should finish in 9-12 minutes, depending on your luck and skill.

Experiences with the strategy[]

3 pets: 4 attempts, 10 minutes on 3 attempts, 11 minutes on 1.

4 pets: 2 attempts, 7 minutes on 1, 6 on the other.

Stxrcatcher's 3 pet strategy (no bonus pets, overpopulates starcatchers.)[]

Pets: Seymour, Shrapnel, Presto

Steps:

Change Presto to Shrapnel
Buy at least 8 guppies
If Destructor Appears, change Presto-Shrapnel to Presto-Rufus. If Gus or Multiple Aliens appear, change Presto-Shrapnel to Presto-Gumbo
After the alien attack, change presto back to Shrapnel
If one of the Guppies became an adult, upgrade food quality to max and quantity to 3.
Buy the star potion, make sure that at least 4 guppies have become a star guppy
Buy 4 starcatchers, continue to turn all of your guppies into star guppies
After all of your guppies turn into star guppies, buy 7 more starcatchers
Buy the 1st egg if the currency is enough, after the price resets buy 4 more starcatchers
Change Presto-Shrapnel to Presto-Meryl
Repeat step 3-4, only change Presto into Meryl instead of Shrapnel

Tip: After every alien attack, buy 4 more starcatchers and change your presto-defense pets back to presto-meryl.

Video on Strategy:

Insaniquarium - Challenge Tank 2 (For Beginners)

Tank 3[]

This 3 pet strategy works, but is very hard. It will take a very long time.

Pets: Stinky, Presto, Seymour (Meryl if you have 4)

Difficulty: Hard for 3 pets, medium for 4 pets

This is another strategie (by Esteban Z-29)[]

Pets: Presto, Gumbo, Prego and, if you have the 4 pets limit, Stanley.

Use Presto as Shrapnel most of the time, except when the aliens attack and when you have a lot of money to collect and a lot of fish to feed.
When the aliens come: If Psychosquid (type P) attacks, turn Presto into Itchy or Gash in advanced difficulties. If Ulysses (type U) turn Presto into another Stanley (if you already have one, so the 2 Stanleys destroy the 2 energy balls. If not, use Angie or Itchy) or Angie when 2 or more Ulysses are coming.
Upgrade food quantity & quality at max.
Buy 1 or 2 Guppycrunchers, but not Beetlemunchers.
When the time hits 5 minutes and all things to buy open (and so start to increase it's prices), buy a Beetlemuncher or 2, collect pearls and start to upgrade the laser to maximum.
Too many fish to feed and money to collect? Then turn Presto-Shrapnel into Presto-Stinky or Presto-Amp.
Once you have maxed out your laser, buy some more guppycrunchers and beetlemunchers (4 of each one would be good). Collect money and buy the egg pieces, try to re-buy the guppycrunchers & beetlemunchers.
And now that you've bought 2 of the 3 egg pieces, try to have a lot of beetlemunchers (and also guppycrunchers to feed them), you should reach to victory in a few seconds (obviusly if the octopus invasion doesn't kill all you fish).

Difficulty: Medium.

Tip: Watch guppycrunchers, when they're going in the same direction as a baby guppy, they want to eat it (obviously). So don't worry: Buy a new guppy for each guppycruncher (the new one will be hungry) and put some fish food in the medium-bottom of the tank to attract them so they are horribly eaten so you can earn money. ;-;

Stxrcatcher's 3 Pet Strategy (No bonus pets)[]

- Pets: Seymour, Sharpnel, Presto

Change Presto to Shrapnel
If one of the guppies grow, buy at least 8-10 of them
If Ulysses appears, change Presto to Rufus or Angie, you can not change presto if you're skilled enough to handle Ulysses
If Psychosquid appears, change Presto to Gumbo or Gash (change Gash at a precise time in an order for Gash to not eat one of your guppies)
After the alien attack change Presto back to Shrapnel
If one of the guppies grow, go upgrade food quality, quantity, and then buy 1 guppy cruncher.
Upgrade your food quality to max, and quantity to at least 3 (number will show 4)
Buy 6 more guppy crunchers
Buy 10 beetle munchers
If there are too much money, change Presto to Stinky or Clyde (Optional)
If the first egg is bought, upgrade food quantity to max, buy 2-4 guppy crunchers and 2-4 beetle munchers
Consider to upgrade the laser to minimum of level 3 (yellow laser), the greater you upgrade, the better chance you will save your fish from aliens.
When the second egg is bought, repeat step 11-12. You may as well buy additional amount of 6-10 guppies, 4 guppy crunchers, and 4 beetle munchers to repair the damage caused from alien attack

After this, you should beat challenge tank 3 in about 10-11 minutes

Tip: when you have a lot of fish population in the tank, do not panic that they are dying, do not change presto to angie, just buy new fish and keep collecting money!

Insaniquarium - Challenge Tank 3 (3 Pets & No Bonus Pets)

Tank 4[]

Guppies Only, 3 pets by ep7g18. 14:17[]

- Pets: Presto, Seymour, Stinky

Turn Presto into Shrapnel to earn money at the start quickly, until you have 3 breeders.
Turn Presto into Zorf to feed your increasing population until you can upgrade food.
When the first aliens come, turn Presto into Gumbo and keep all your fish alive.
When they die, turn Presto into Meryl.
Upgrade your food to the max, buy 20 breeders, and continuously feed them.
As soon as Meryl-Presto finishes singing, turn Presto into another Stinky.
Seymour keeps all coins on the floor for 5 seconds, giving the 2 stinkys enough time to pick up a lot of them,
Repeat steps 3-6.
Buy the first part of the egg (about 38,000), then upgrade the weapon when you can, repeating steps 3-6
The aliens will upgrade once during this time, so switch strategy to the following:
10 seconds after the coins made by Presto-Meryl have all dissappeared, transform Presto-Stinky into Wadsworth. Do not switch to Gumbo anymore.
Try to feed your fish so that most of them stay to 1 side.
When aliens that eat your fish come, try to keep as many alive as possible. There will be 4, so you should be fine making sure that at least 1 large fish or bredder lives.
For Ulysses and the Destructor, switch Presto into Angie instead. Whatever you do do not shoot Ulysses's ball projectiles. If you leave them, they can only kill 1 fish each which Angie can revive. If you hit them, they'll kill every single fish in their path.
When they're dead, switch Presto to Meryl, and buy breeders to replace the ones that died
During this time, many of your fish may starve. This is fine; it's just because your breeders have cumulatively birthed too many. It's at the point where the number that starve = the number that get born = the number that you can't feed., and you need this to happen so wadsworth can save as many medium fish as possible, to earn money when aliens kill most of your other fish.
When Meryl-Presto stops singing, switch Presto to Stinky. The game might start lagging here.
About 30 seconds later, 10 seconds after meryl's coins dissappear, switch Presto to Wadsworth again.
Repeat steps 10-17 until you can buy the remaining 2 egg pieces, and win the level to gain 20k shells!

This strategy took me 14 minutes 17 to win the level, before the 2nd alien upgrade when there would start to be 6.

If you have Gumbo when 4 aliens that eat your fish appear, they might spawn on opposite sides, confusing Gumbo and causing him to stay in the centre, or even swim straight through them trying to get to a corner, and this can cause all your fish to die instantly.

Difficulty:Hard

Another Strategy (4 pets) by Esteban Z-29[]

Pets: Presto, Gumbo, Wadsworth, Stanley.

Turn Presto into Shrapnel and collect bombs. Once you get enough money, buy 2 more breeders and upgrade food quality & quantity to maximum.
For the first alien attack, turn Presto into Itchy, and for the advanced aliens, into Gash. If the aliens are Ulysses & Destructor, immediately turn Presto into Angie.
When you have a lot of fish and can't feed them and collect the money at the same time, turn Presto into Stinky and buy some Carnivores (then 1 or 2 Ultravores, upgrade to maximum the weapon and try to have 3, 4 or 5 Ultravores [if the aliens eat them all the time, use just 2/3 at time].
Once you've successfully bought 2 of the egg pieces, wait for the next alien attack to end, then buy as many Ultravores as you can, BUY A LOT! and wait a few seconds until you reach the price of the egg.
Buy the egg and, ENJOY YOUR 20.000 SHELLS AND YOUR (maybe) NEW STORY!

Difficulty: Medium-Hard.

Note: I have tried it 2 or 3 times and I only passed the level 1 time (the only one I did it) but... I DID IT!

Somewhat in depth guide (3 pets) by lil_youmu[]

>Pets either (shrapnel, angie, presto) OR (angie, Wadsworth, presto) [if you have a fourth slot go for the penguin i guess]

-This is a strategy i made if you haven't unlocked walter or you are annoyed with his randomness

-use the first team combinations if you want to get ahead of the curve early on, use the second one if you don't want to hurt your wrist or your hand just sucks

-using amph in this tank is doable but the screen is already full as it is, do you really want to spam click 100 diamonds in 5 seconds?

-this strategy is slow and steady and is more in line to trying to make failsafes incase half of your tank gets eaten. 20-30 minutes

For the first team you're going to want to go double shrapnel then buy 6-8 breeders (they'll all die later don't worry) the main goal is to start your curve as soon as possible. But at the cost of blowing up your ultravores later in the run (which why Angie is there)
For the second team you use presto as a solo shrapnel then do the same up above but be more mindful of saving up for your first carnivore.
in order to fully explain this strategy i have to explain "the curve" to put it simply it's the invisible line that keeps bending either on you winning or the aliens eventually overpowering your economy/tank. By buying lots and lots of carnivores/ultravores in quick succession you can stay ahead of the curve and buy the egg pieces.
It is important to remember that DO NOT under any circumstances use Blip in the first 5 minutes as it will immediately open up the egg and start increasing it by 250$ every 4 seconds. Same goes with carnivore, you really do not want to buy the first one unless the ultravore has been automatically unlocked after the five minute mark.
After buying the 6 Breeders and unlocking the food pellets, I usually just leave them on lvl2 Quality and lvl 3 Quantity. Anything more and less is wasteful. Explanation being that the lvl2 food makes small guppies only take 2 feedings to grow, shrapnel is your main source of income early on. And from experience 3 different pellets are usually enough early on
Basing off step 4 once you get the ultravore unlocked. It's time to start spamming carnivores, at this point i should probably note about the ratio this is hard to explain so I'll just give you the numbers. For every 1 breeder you must have 1 carnivore. For the FIRST ultravore you must have 10 carnivore before buying the ultravore, this is to make sure that you can consistently bump up your economy. Sadly this does mean you'll have to replace eaten/dead ones after an alien attack
ALIEN ATTACKS i did try playing around with it, but i only got Bilaterus once, he's the biggest threat to this strategy. I advise keeping your presto ready to switch to either angie or Gash. There are two types of alien attacks: "Psychosquid + Lion attacks" or "Ullyses + Robot attacks" if you're dealing with psychosquid get gash, if you're dealing with tons of dead guppies go with angie. My only advice here is to get used to mouse clicking because i REALLY don't recommend getting the gun upgrades due to how much they slow down your economy. It is also important to remember that psychosquid delays the tank even longer halting all your resources. But in the case of multiple attacks try to corner all 4 of them in one corner and kill all the lions in the first regen state of the psychosquids. Shoot them all even if it means that psychosquid regenerates. NOTE: IF YOU ARE GOING TO UPGRADE YOUR LASER GUN. MAKE SURE YOU ATLEAST HAVE 2 ULTRAVORES AND AT MOST UPGRADE IT TO LVL5 TO TO KILL PSYCHOSQUID AFTER 1 REGENERATION
Once you get your first ultravore is the biggest game changer, at this point you can usually max out your Food Quantity/Quality but I'd still advice to multiply the ultravores as fast as you can. On a normal run i would usually got for a 1:1 ration with the egg cost in accordance to the ultravore cost. But i think you should go for a 2:1 ratio here. For example if the egg costs i dunno... 25,000$ i would typically use Three Ultravores since they cost 10,000$ each but in this case i would use Five ultravores. Don't worry about the cost of the ultravores themselves, worry about the cost of the egg. With this strategy you will usually get to 30,000-50,000 egg cost before you buy your first one so it's THE ABSOLUTE IMPORTANCE to keep your ultravores Alive after attacks. I would also advice to spend less as the music goes to the (alien attack phase) you have to learn the timing on when the music usually indicates an alien attack.
Try to keep track of the carnivores and breeders you have in your tank. And remember the rule of 10 breeders, 10 carnivires and spam ultravores. If carnivores are turning green it's probably okay since angie will save them, but it DOES mean that your breeders died.....
For the late game, I'll usually buy 1 egg piece then 5-8 more ultravores then close up the game. Try to corner psychosquids to prevent them from eating EVERYTHING. Ullyses are going to spam you with annoying balls so be prepared to see 3-5 dead ultravores. Remember to prioritize clicking on the trasure chests and if you're using PetsA be sure to use Wadsworth to prevent wasting the chests.

Difficulty: Hard - VERY HARD ( if you're minmaxing lasers and not using Wadsworth )

Strxcatcher's 3 pet strategy (no bonus pets)[]

This strategy is inspired from other strategies above, shout out to those who made them!!!