The 12 best LEGO construction sets to build up this year (ranked)

Are you tired of your boring office job? Have recent emails not been finding you well at all? Maybe it’s time you forwent the video calls and corporate buzzwords and made your living with the strength of your arm! The sweat of your brow! That’s right, you need a career in construction!

But slow down there, you don’t just get forklift certified overnight. You need practice. You need these LEGO construction sets. Show up to the job site with one of these completed sets as your resume, and the foreman is sure to hire you on the spot.

1. LEGO City Construction Excavator Toy

LEGO City Construction Excavator Toy is the perfect warmup LEGO construction set before you get into the real big guns. This 633-piece set may be small potatoes compared to some of the complex LEGO Technic construction sets out there, but even small potatoes can still make a solid side dish! This Excavator is a mini version of the towering excavation behemoths that no construction site is complete without! With its 360-degree turning motion and movable arms, you can tear up and rebuild anything! As long as that anything is also made of LEGOS, that is.

2. LEGO Technic Heavy-Duty Bulldozer

Awwwwww yeeeeeeeuhhhh. The LEGO Technic Heavy-Duty Bulldozer is sure to impress the gang down at the site. Just imagine the look on their faces when you show up to the job puttering this thing down the street on hands and knees while making engine noises with your mouth. It will be a look of pride. This 195-piece set is a perfect beginner-friendly build, with rotating treads and a movable blade! With this thing in tow, even a seven-year-old could be a valued member of the build crew.

3. LEGO City Yellow Mobile Construction Crane

Is there a more glorious piece of construction equipment than a crane? That was a rhetorical question—there isn’t. The LEGO City Yellow Mobile Construction Crane is a 1,116-piece set that measures over two feet high! 26 inches! It’s also got a buttload of turning wheels (seriously, I didn’t know cranes needed so many) along with a 360-degree rotating cabin and even a hoist system that really hoists! If that wasn’t enough, this set also comes with multiple construction worker minifigures (they work for you) and even a porta-potty (which will not work for you).

4. City Construction Steamroller Toy

There’s something macabre about steamrollers. It’s Hollywood’s doing since there are too many movies where characters are steamrolled into a horrible crushing death. With the City Construction Steamroller Toy, you can purge the memory of those traumatic films (I’m looking at you, Who Framed Roger Rabbit) and create new, fun LEGO memories in their wake! Clocking in at only 78 pieces, this is one of the simplest LEGO construction sets on the market.

5. LEGO City Great Vehicles Mobile Crane Truck

If you thought the Yellow Mobile Construction Crane was mobile, just wait until you get a load of the LEGO City Great Vehicles Mobile Crane Truck. It’s got fewer wheels, sure. But no wheel-shaming here. It’s economical. This 340-piece set is a simpler build than the crane that came before it on this list, but still has all the moving parts and fixings for you to enjoy. The turning wheels, a movable boom, and a working winch combine to make this set an essential part of any LEGO job site.

6. LEGO Technic Dump Truck

Before its name became a TikTok euphemism, the dump truck was a respectable machine. With the LEGO Technic Dump Truck, you can rebuild the reputation of this glorious piece of equipment. A worthier construction project there ne’er was. At 177 pieces, this set is a relatively easy build. Builds plural, because this particular set can also be arranged into an awesome excavator set as well! Two for the price of one! With movable wheels, a working excavator arm, and a dumpable dump truck dirt holder thing (seriously, what is that called?) you’ll be a credit to any construction site you show up to.

7. LEGO City Great Vehicles Construction Loader

What is it? A bulldozer? A species of forklift? No, it’s the LEGO City Great Vehicles Construction Loader. At 88 pieces, this LEGO set is small but mighty! Perfect for anyone looking for a simple build, this set comes with a movable front arm, a tilting bucket, and a roll cage to protect its minifigure operator in case of accidental tumbles down the stairs. This set even comes with little LEGO bits of fence and concrete to load up and dump out!

8. LEGO Technic Volvo FMX Truck & EC230 Electric Excavator

Let’s face it, a little kid-friendly LEGO loader isn’t going to get you hired at the job site. You need an adult set. You need the LEGO Technic Volvo FMX Truck & EC230 Electric Excavator. This 2,274-piece two-in-one set lets you construct a heavy-duty Volvo flatbed truck AND an excavator to transport with it! This steerable truck has a 6-cylinder moving piston engine and a detachable trailer, letting you drive it to the site to unload the excavator. With the latter’s 360-degree spinning arm and pneumatic pump used to lift and lower the scoop, there’s no LEGO construction job it can’t handle.

9. LEGO City Forest Tractor

The city isn’t the only place where things get built. With the LEGO City Forest Tractor, you can work construction while breathing in the sweet smell of freshly cut timber! This 174-piece set features working wheels and a powerful metal grabby arm (that’s the technical term). Unlike those rigged claw machine grabbers at the arcade, this thing won’t let your cargo go. Hoist logs, lumber, and even the included lumberjack miniature if he decides to mouth off to you. After all, you’re the boss.

10. LEGO Technic Cat D11 Bulldozer

The LEGO Technic Cat D11 Bulldozer is not a set for the faint of heart. This 3854-piece set is perhaps the most complex build on this list. But when the build is done, oh, the result is sweet. This fully remote controllable set can be piloted with the CONTROL+ app, allowing you to drive this dozer across your wall-to-wall carpeted basement and use its controllable blade to push a wayward TV remote back into arm’s reach. Seriously, this thing is so advanced that it has actual practical uses. Get some rest! After building a set as complicated as this, you earned it.

11. LEGO® Technic Heavy-Duty Excavator

There are regular excavators, and then there are heavy-duty excavators. Which is this set? Hint: it’s in the name. The LEGO Technic Heavy-Duty Excavator is a 569-piece machine that will pose a reasonable challenge to LEGO aficionados everywhere. With a moving shovel arm, a rotatable body, and bad-ass treads, this excavator is basically the real thing! And look, it even comes with mini LEGO traffic cones for you to cordon off your construction site!

12. LEGO Technic Liebherr Crawler Crane

We’ve saved the biggest and baddest for last. The LEGO Technic Liebherr Crawler Crane is one of the most heavy-duty LEGO construction sets on the market. A scale model of one of the world’s most powerful cranes, this 2883-piece set stands 38 inches tall. Over three feet! And best of all? It’s remotely controllable! By downloading the CONTROL+ app, you can drive this bad boy around! Spin the arm! Raise and lower the crane! Pick up stuff! With this machine’s 2lb counterweight, there’s nothing (under 2 lbs) that you won’t be able to hoist. If I was a construction foreman and you showed up to the job with this thing, I’d have two words for you: “You’re hired.”