The social aspects of Persona 5 can be overwhelming, to say the least. The moment the game opens its city streets and shops to you, it’s like being a kid in a candy store. Should you buy something? Or talk to someone in particular? Ultimately, the choice is yours.

Although the sense of freedom in Persona 5 is astounding, there are some activities that are of higher importance than others. In this guide we want to highlight these activities and explain what you should do first, and why.

High Priority Activities

Keep A Book In Your Pocket

Although most activities that raise your stats require you to use up your morning or afternoon, you can read any book in your possession once you head back to Cafe Leblanc in the evening. This will allow you to squeak in a few extra stat points before heading off to your cozy bed. Also, if you manage to secure a seat during a train ride, you’ll be able to read there too. Note that which type of stat will be boosted by reading a book is hinted in the book description. Books can be bought from the book store, but it’s usually better to rent one from the school library. Just be sure to return it.

Feed Your Plant

After clearing your room, you can purchase two different types of plant food to care for your withering plant. When you do so, you will gain Kindness without losing any time from your day. This is one of the highest value activities in the game, and should be maintained throughout your journey.

Answer Quiz Questions Correctly

This might come across as obvious, but it’s instrumental. You do not want to get quiz questions wrong, as they are effectively free boosts to your Knowledge stat. It’s better to think long and hard about a question (or check out our list of answers), than to get one wrong.

Hang Out With Confidants

Social relationships are of utmost importance. One of the perks of spending time with confidants are the stat boosts you earn during activities with them, such as:

Death – Guts

Devil and Sun – Charm

Hanged Man – Proficiency

Heirophant and Tower – Kindness

Star – Knowledge

In addition, you will gain access to powerful perks as your confidants level up, such as being able to try a second time when you fail a negotiation with a persona.

Eat A Burger

A few weeks into your journey you will gain access to the Big Bang Burger Challenge. Successfully completing this challenge requires that you have two points in each stat, so don’t bother until you reach this milestone. As a reward for your accomplishment, and for downing Persona‘s largest burger, you will gain one point in Guts, Knowledge, Charm, and Proficiency.

Persona Fuse

Only the personas that you use will gain experience. With this, you will constantly be adding them to your collecting, while many will fall behind in effectiveness. To ensure that your armada of personas remains up-to-date, you will want to head to the Velvet Room and fuse personas often. Try to ensure that when you fuse two personas, the output is a new persona that has a level as close to your level as possible.

Make Coffee

SP rejuvenating items are hard to come by. However, coffee will provide a free solution for this that is accessible. Simply progress through the story and speak kindly to Sojiro in Cafe Leblanc when provided the opportunity and you will eventually gain access to the coffee maker. You can then store coffee in your inventory to use next time you’re in a palace or Mementos.

Craft Some Lockpicks

Infiltration tools are handy, and necessary for some interactions. The Lockpick is arguably the most important tool as it allows you to open locked treasure chests in dungeons. Make sure that you have a few of these on-hand, as the treasure you will gain from using them is often times incredibly valuable. In addition, crafting provides a small boost to Proficiency, one of the more difficult stats to boost. See here for a list of all infiltration tool recipes

Day Exclusives

Monday

Visit the Bath House. This is located in an alley across the street from Cafe Leblanc, and is only accessible during the Evening. Although the Bath House can be used any day of the week, you receive an extra bonus to Charm for visiting on Monday or Thursday.

Thursday

Visit the Bath House. This is located in an alley across the street from Leblanc, and is only accessible during the Evening. Although the Bath House can be used any day of the week, you receive an extra bonus to Charm for visiting on Monday or Thursday.

Friday

Chat with Sadayo Kawakami. By using the phone in Cafe Leblanc on a Friday or Saturday you can speak with Sadayo Kawakami, an important confidant. Note that 3 Guts is required to speak to her.

Saturday

Chat with Sadayo Kawakami. By using the phone in Cafe Leblanc on a Friday or Saturday you can speak with Sadayo Kawakami, an important confidant. Note that 3 Guts is required to speak to her.

Sunday

Visit the Drink Stand. Near the Underground Mall you can visit a Drink Stand only on Sundays to purchase a special drink that boosts your Knowledge by a significant amount.

Buy items through the TV. Each Sunday you will be able to order an item using the TV in Cafe Leblanc. Some of these items are exclusive, while items available elsewhere are sold at a reduced price. The item will be delivered to Cafe Leblanc a few days after your order.

Rainy-Day

Drink some Fruit Tea. Fruit Tea is available at the Shibuya Diner, and will provide a total of three points in Knowledge when it’s raining out. Otherwise, it’ll only provide two points.

Ways To Kill Time

Watch A Film

You can visit the movie theater to see a film. These are similar to DVDs and books in that they boost a specific stat by a small amount, although at a cost.

Give A Gift To A Friend

The Underground Mall is full of shops that would love nothing more than to sell you some gifts. These gifts can be given to your confidants for a positive or negative result. See here for a list of the best gifts for every confidant.

Buy Items

Few things are worse than trying to progress through a palace and running out of options for restoring HP/SP. Make sure you regularly visit the Clinic and other shops to stock up on goods.

Get To Work

If you’re methodical enough with your farming and spending, you will never run out of money. But that requires some experience, and so during your first playthrough money may get tight. If this happens, make sure you enlist in a part-time job and get working. You’ll earn somewhere between 3,000 and 5,000 Yen per day that you go to work, which is a reasonable amount.

Conquer Mementos

Upon completing your first Palace you will gain access to Mementos, a seemingly infinite dungeon. This is a great place to grind and master the art of combat as it’s large, covers the entire range of difficulty and levels, while also providing opportunity to get valuable items and Yen.

Hit Up The Batting Cage

The Batting Cage is one of Persona 5’s few accessible mini games. If you manage to be successful at it, you can gain a boost to your Proficiency. Here is a guide to the batting cage minigame, its prizes, and one neat trick you can use to make it easier to hit home runs.

Listen to Morgana

Morgana serves as your guide for a long portion of the journey. Make sure you pay attention to what he says as to get an idea of what you need to do next for main story progression. Important mechanics are also explained by him.

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