There’s no question here, instances are where you want to be when in a full group for maximum experience gain. Elites opponents give you a ton more experience than regular opponents and in a group are just as easy.
Levels 1-20
I highly advise against grouping with anyone until you’re well into your teens. At this point of the game, very few people know how to use their class and skills properly and honestly, you’re going to die a lot because of it. That being said, there are a few times you will want to group to get chain quests out of the way, Defense of the Lands in Loch Modan is one example.
If you’re Alliance, I suggest heading to Loch Modan or Westfall in the teens, then head to Redridge until you’re level 20. Yes, if you’re a night elf, you need to travel far but there are no non-night elves in Teldrassil or Darkshore and you’re missing out on grouping with mages, warlocks and paladins.
If you’re Horde, the Barrens are where it’s at. You don’t need to group much at all here but you can head into the Wailing Caverns instance for some decent experience.
More than likely, you’ll be level 20 in less than a week. If you start on a Friday night and play through the entire weekend you can hit 20 by Sunday if you know what you’re doing. Grouped with a healer you’ll tear through everything with ease and no downtime.
Levels 21-40
At this point you will have a good grasp of what you can and can’t do as a rogue. You will acquire the last of your rogue skills and get to try out different combinations. You will also get to actually see some use from your talents as you’ll be deep enough into the trees to access some of the stronger talents.

As an Alliance you’re looking at Duskwood and the Wetlands for 20-30, Stranglethorn Vale(STV) for nearly all of your 30s. The quests in STV require groups and give some excellent rogue items.
As Horde, you’re more than likely still in the Barrens for a few levels. Head out to Stonetalon Mountains and 1000 Needles for the rest of your 20s, in that order. For the 30s, I also suggest STV through Gromgol as there are some very nice quests to complete for some good gear.
Near the end of your 30s, I highly suggest heading to the Scarlet Monastery(SM) as there is a quest that will give you either a good dagger(Black Menace) or sword(Blade of Harmony). The Tigerbane also drops here. There’s nothing wrong with simply doing SM until you hit 40.
Before you hit SM, hit Gnomeregan and get to the end to kill Thermaplugg to complete the quest to get Triprunner Dungarees. You’ll keep these pants well into your 40s. You can also pick up the Toxic Revenger.
I won’t go into super big details for these levels as they are very fast to get through, 20-30 will be a week’s worth and 30-40 about the same. Playing 4 hours a night you should easily get at least 1 level per session if not more. Just do as many quests as you can.
Levels 41-60
This is when the rogue truly stands out. There is very little difference between Horde and Alliance either as they usually each have their own outpost in most zones. I won’t go into too much detail here because this is the Groups section and you really will only be grouped for the end of the 50s.
You should head to Badlands for the early 40s and knock off Uldaman by level 45. Head off to Feralas to complete some easy quests then up to Mauradon. Make sure you collect as many quests as you can for this instance and go through it multiple times. There is some very good rogue loot here so kill all the named opponents a few times.

After you’ve done your run of Mauradon, head to Tanaris and knock of Zul’Farrak. There are about 9 quests for this zone alone and you can probably do 7 of them in 1 run that lasts 2 hours. It’s best done at level 48+ and you will have a great chance to practice your Distract Pulls here.
Later on, you can head to the Sunken Temple to run off a few quests, which is by now an easy instance. From 50-55 there’s not much going on group wise but you can head to Ungoro Crater and both the East and West Plaguelands. From 55 on up, its Blackrock Depths, Black Rock Spire, Stratholme and then Scholomance, in that order of difficulty.
These instances used to be the cream of the crop. Remember, since the expansion pack these instances now have a lot of difficult finding groups as they require a fair amount of skill and gear to complete. Feel free to visit them but be aware that nearly every single item you acquire here can be replaced by the Auction House at 60.
Levels 60-70
In the expansion pack there are a lot of additional 5 man instances to do, 13 to be exact. You can join a LFG (Looking for Group) and keep questing alone rather than sit around waiting for a group. Press the “I” button to enter this screen. I’ll describe the instaces in more detail later on in the guide but a quick look follows:
60-64
Hellfire Ramparts, Blood Furnace, Slave Pens
65-69
The Underbog, Mana Tombs, Auchenai Crypts, Sethekk Halls
70
Hellfire Ramparts, Steamvault, Shadow Labyrinth, Mechanar, Botanica, Arcatraz