How to control the population in Fallout Shelter

The main balancing act of this game is in the population control.


As you get more dwellers, you’ll need more clean water and food, and space. As you build more rooms to accommodate, you’ll need more power. Beyond the intro of the game, gaining new followers is generally molasses slow. With a single cell, level 2 radio room, staffed by two people with near max Charisma (19 out of a possible 20) I almost never got new dwellers from the outside. So how do you increase your population? The old fashioned way. Make new people. I mean, it is the apocalypse. It is your civic duty to repopulate the earth and ensure the survival of the human race, right?

Reduce your population when you HAVE TO

If you want to be really heartless, it is possible to reduce your population. You can either send someone out to the wastes empty handed and wait for them to die, or you can have someone rush a room over and over, until the fire and Radroaches kill them. More on rushing later.

So I’ll tell you right now. Don’t be over-eager to expand. It’s manageable at first, but once you have several dozen people, many of whom are low level with low stats, things get icky quick. It’s much harder to keep track of everyone and you have no time to really get to know who is who among your population. It’s agonizing to pace yourself in this game, but only birthing a few children at a time, keeping people’s stats up in the training rooms, and keeping some Caps in reserve and upgrading rooms before building new ones seems to be the best way. Any major changes can really offset your game. Speaking of Caps!