Trying to determine which location I should make my main base as in my first playthrough I did Sanctuary; now I want to build a better settlement on my second playthrough and am finding the size budget very limiting.

Has anyone looked into which settlement offers the most size budget, after clearing all the debris?

I heard/read somewhere that locations that doesn't need to render a lot of things (faraway buildings or items that can't be scrapped, both of which seem to exist in the Castle) have bigger size budgets.

If there's a list, I'd appreciate it.

Spectacle Island has the largest build size, but that's a settlement that you aren't likely to unlock until much later in the game.

There really isn't a limit on build size if you use the weapon storing trick.

Pick up a bunch of weapons from enemy encounters or wherever else, and store them in the workbench. When you have a good amount of them, remove them from the workbench, drop them on the ground, and then store them in the workbench again. This causes the size meter to go down. You can also simply scrap the weapons instead of storing them again, but then you lose the chance to do it over and over with the same guns.

You can do this as many times as you need to. That said, I think The Castle and Starlight Drive-In have some of the bigger build allowances. Graygarden has a pretty big build allowance when you add in the section of raised highway that you can build in.

I like Starlight Drive In. Once you scrap everything, you will have a nice build area.

Use the scrap trick to get size as needed, but watch your performance. You don't want to drag it down too much or crash (should only happen if you run out of memory). I use console commands to boost my settlement size, but that takes a bit more work and won't work on consoles. I haven't had any slowdowns or issues so far, even with huge builds, but I've got memory to spare and a decent machine.

Definitely the biggest by far and you can unlock it as soon as you're able to reach it and clear the mirelurk infestation (ie, kill a queen, a few kings, and lots of normalish mirelurks). It would be a rough match very early on, but easy once you have a combat shotgun. Doing it before combat shotguns appear would be doable... I'd think frag mines and grenades could get the job done pretty quick. Spectacle Island has the advantage of being very isolated as well, which is great if you're hurting on performance (ie, playing on console or old PC).

Sanctuary is always my #1 since you get it right away, it's huge, tons of scrap, and you can easily incorporate houses and hedges as part of a wall to isolate smaller sections early on before expanding later.

I've been growing fond of The Slog lately. It's got a lot of flat land if you tear out the fences and playground and it's easy to just build atop the central structure. Abernathy Farm has a fair bit of space as well, but their main structure is tricky to build on top of and there is no water source. Nordhagen Beach is a little cramped, but fun location and there is enough space there for a good sized build. Warwick factory place is fun. It has a huge structure to work with. The land is a bit cramped otherwise, but it has excellent innate defensibility. Graygarden is big, but it's almost all on a steep hill with no water source (funny considering the quest to get it)... but you can utilize the highway with some clever construction, although NPC pathing will be an issue at times to get up and down. The lighthouse has a bit of space to work with and a cool theme. Starlight is an excellent choice. Huge area, water (remove the barrels), and good structures to use that don't take up too much of the area.

Agreed on Spec. Island being the biggest, at least in terms of land size. Apparently Ab. Farm is one where you can build the farthest upwards, however.

As others mentioned, workbench or manual scrapping (dropping items to scrap) seems to be a glitch that increases build size the more you do it. A glitch I hope they don't remove. So really, if you're willing to use that, you can just pick the settlement you enjoy the most.

I like Sanct. but there's so many buildings already there, that aren't removable, that I find it restricting for creativity.

As far as default/non-glitch "size limit" goes, Drive-In feels pretty large and it's a nice flat open space once you scrap/remove the radiation barrels. The water hole works for a purifier, too, unlike some settlements with no fresh water.

Spectacle Island is the Best.

Yeah, I'm trying to see if I can do it without resorting to that trick. I'm getting partial to the Egret Tourist Marina location so I'm trying to make it work there.

Graygarden I'll investigate again and see before I really get into building.

I get that Starlight is a huge real estate size (as well as Spectacle) but I'm more talking about the build size limit. Panorama also plays a part in my choice Too bad Spectacle is more appropriate for late levels. I looked at the Castle but even when I scrapped everything just patching up the walls with the concrete floor object took a chunk out of the budget.