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Starfield

How to Buy and Upgrade Ships in Starfield

By
Nathan Garvin

The ship you get during the first main quest, Frontier, is serviceable enough for getting you "New Atlantis" iconNew Atlantis and swatting away some tutorial enemies, but at some point you’ll find that upgrading your ship will prove to be a necessity. Distant systems require more robust grav drives and more fuel to reach, and more dangerous enemies than the pirates you initially encounter lurk among the stars, demanding more potent weapons and shields to deal with. This page will cover how to buy new ships and buy upgrades for existing ships in Starfield, including the locations of various starship vendors and some pitfalls to be wary of.

(1 of 2) Various technicians and merchants will allow you to buy ship components, or even entire prebuilt ships.

Various technicians and merchants will allow you to buy ship components, or even entire prebuilt ships. (left), The ship builder system in Starfield is fairly deep, and crafting your own ship component-by-component can be a real treat. (right)

Where to Buy and Upgrade Ships in Starfield

Buying a ship in Starfield is somewhat akin to buying a car in real life, albeit with most of the annoying bits stripped out. Spaceships are just the standard form of locomotion in Starfield, especially since humanity has apparently eschewed the use of proper land vehicles, for some strange reason. Anyways, space flight is complicated, and while jury rigging repairs to the hull is possible, fabricating new spaceship parts out of junk is not - such sophisticated machinery is the purview of dedicated manufacturers, so you’ll have to buy finished components from merchants. Fortunately spaceships in Starfield are fairly modular, and as long as you [understand the basics of shipbuilding] you should be able to mix and match different manufacturers as your needs, wallet and tastes demand. Starship vendors typically fall into two categories - Ship Service Technicians, who service (and hence can be found near) ports, and Staryard merchants, who sell a specific company’s line of starship components. The latter can be found in spacebound company staryards.

(1 of 7) The Ship Services building on Akila City.

All Starfield Ship Vendor Locations

Starship merchants typically come in two forms, when you land at major cities (New Atlantis, "Cydonia" iconCydonia, "Akila City" iconAkila City, etc) you’ll invariably find yourself at a proper port, replete with technicians who facilitate interstellar travel by ensuring that the ships that land are maintained, serviced, and pests are exterminated. In most cases these technicians include a “Ship Services Tech”, who you can talk to in order to buy new ships (“Let me see what ships you have for sale.”) or upgrade currently owned vessels (“I’d like to view and modify my ships.”). The locations of various Ship Services Technicians located throughout Starfield can be found below:

Location Planet System Guide
Akali City Akila Cheyenne From the port follow the road to "Akila City" iconAkila City and at a fork turn right (left leads to a gate to "Akila City" iconAkila City) to find the Ship Services building. The technician is inside.
"Cydonia" iconCydonia Mars Sol Fast travel to "Cydonia" iconCydonia on Mars (not the Landing Area or Mars Launchpad) and you’ll appear and you’ll appear outside, in the tunnel leading to the city. From here turn left to find the Ship Services building - the technician is standing out front.
"Hopetown" iconHopetown Polvo Valo Travel to the Valo system (it is overlaps with and is often obscured by the Narion system, so you may have to select the Narion system and select Valo via the dropdown menu) and land at "Hopetown" iconHopetown on Polvo. The Ship Services Technician should be straight ahead.
"Neon" iconNeon Volii Alpha Volii You’ll find the Ship Services building to the left of where your ship lands, right on the edge of the landing pad. This NPC is prone to… not spawning, but they’d presumably be found sitting behind the desk in the building.
"New Atlantis" iconNew Atlantis Jemison Alpha Centauri From where your ship lands, just head forward towards a ramp. This technician is just off to the right of the ramp.
"New Homestead" iconNew Homestead Saturn (Titan) Sol Land on Titan, a moon of Saturn in the Sol system to find "New Homestead" iconNew Homestead. The technician is just in front of your ship.
"Paradiso" iconParadiso Porrima II Porrima Land on "Paradiso" iconParadiso and from your ship head right to find the technician standing near some crates.
Red Mile Porrima III Porrima From the port, head to the “Red Mile” sign and pass through two airlock doors and go upstairs to find the Ship Services desk. The technician you seek - an NPC named Lon Anderssen - is in the office behind the desk.
"The Den" iconThe Den Chtonia Wolf Warp to the Wolf system (just to the right of the Sol system) and dock at "The Den" iconThe Den. The Ship Services Technician will be right ahead of you when you arrive.

All Staryard and Ship Brand Vendor Locations in Starfield

In addition to the aforementioned faithful Ship Services Technicians, you have brand-specific merchants who can be found both on various orbiting staryards and in planetside starship dealerships. These merchants are, understandably, preferential to their own company’s brand of components to the point where other brands are limited or even excluded from their wares, but on the plus side these merchants tend to sell the full range of their company’s products, which can be rare finds elsewhere. To find staryards, you’ll need to scour systems via the starmap and look for black and white diamond icons which represent various spacecraft. If it says “staryard” in the title, it’s worth a look (example: the "Stroud-Eklund Staryard" iconStroud-Eklund Staryard in Narion, orbiting Deepala).

Location Planet System
"Deimos Staryard" iconDeimos Staryard Mars Sol
"Neon" iconNeon (Taiyo Engineering) Volii Alpha Volii
"Stroud-Eklund Staryard" iconStroud-Eklund Staryard Deepala Narion
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Guide Information
  • Publisher
    Bethesda Softworks
  • Platforms,
    PC, XB X|S
  • Genre
    Action Adventure, Action RPG, Shooter
  • Guide Release
    30 August 2023
  • Last Updated
    18 October 2023
    Version History
  • Guide Author

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Starfield is an action role-playing game from Bethesda Game Studios set in a futuristic interpretation of space exploration and colonization. Earth has long been abandoned, but there are plenty of other planets in different star systems where humans have ventured and settled. You have the freedom to create your own character with a unique background, but the main story will take you through a series of adventures as you uncover more information about mysterious artifacts which create gravitational anomalies. Along the way, you can build and customize your own space ship, establish your own outpost, befriend and romance new companions, and more. As a Bethesda game, you can also expect to see a lot of creative mods which have the potential to change your experience of the base game, or take it in an entirely new direction.

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