Throughout your adventures in space, you will find a ton of loot, especially if you like to hoard anything you see. That’s all good until you are out of storage in the middle of your expeditions. Luckily, you have many ways to expand your Starfield ship storage!
Key Takeaways
- There are two ways to access your Starfield ship storage. First, go to the ship overview menu through the “character menu.”
- The second is by accessing the cargo hold directly from the ship’s cockpit, where you can find a panel on the left side.
- You can also increase your ship’s storage capacity through multiple ways. You can unlock and upgrade the “Payloads” skill to permanently increase capacity by 10-50% for all ships.
- You can buy more Cargo Hold modules and attach them in the ship-building mode.
- The shipbuilder and the new ships menu can be accessed by talking to any “Ship Services Technician” at settlements.
- You can buy Sheilded Cargo Holds at the Red Mile Base and Crimson Fleet Base. These allow you to smuggle contraband items through scanners safely.
How To Access Ship Storage
Once you carry over a certain limit, the game will not allow you to fast travel on the planets. The oxygen levels don’t help either, as you cannot run very long before taking a break and refilling your O2. Ship storage is essential here as you can access it anywhere, even far away from your ship.
Access From the Character Menu
There are two main ways you can access your Starfield ship storage, also called “Cargo Hold” in the game. The first way is to open your character screen and access it directly.
For this, you will need to press TAB on your keyboard. Next, select the lower left part, as shown in the image below. Click on it to go to the ship preview screen.
You can check your ship’s stats, storage capacity, and more here. You need to click the “Cargo Hold” option on the bottom right of your screen to access the ship’s storage. Once you do that, you will have a full overview of every item stored there as well as multiple other options such as:
- Moving items from your inventory to ship storage.
- Moving items back to your inventory (Left-click on selected item)
- Jettison (Drop selected item)
- Inspect each item
- Sort items
With this method, you can access your ship storage anywhere you can. This is quite convenient in tricky situations where you might be unable to return to your ship.
Access From Cockpit
The next method is by accessing your Starfield ship storage directly from the cockpit of your space ship, which provides a much simpler overview of the things in your cargo hold. To access the ship storage this way, you need to head to your spaceship and board it.
Once you are inside, head to the cockpit and look to the left side, Right after the jump seat there will be a strip with a small panel screen giving you access to the ship storage.
Here, you have a simplified overview of the items and can manage them by taking them or transferring them. Refer to the images to easily find your way to the specific part you need to head to.
How To Improve/Upgrade Ship Storage
Given the limited storage capacity, especially at the start of the game, you will need extra storage capacity soon. Once you carry items over a weight limit, the fast travel option on the ground will be disabled. You will be met with a message saying that you are carrying too much.
Thus, increasing ship storage is vital, and you can do that in several ways. We will also review other methods to save your items on the go so let’s dive in!
Invest in the cargo skill
Before buying any cargo parts and slapping them onto your ship, you should unlock the “Payloads” skill. You can find this skill in the tech section of the skills menu, which you can access anytime.
To access the skills menu, press “TAB” on your keyboard and click on the top right quarter in the character menu. Once in the skills menu, navigate to the “Tech” section and look for the Payloads skill. You will need to spend five skill points in this skill tree for this skill.
The first level will increase ship storage for each ship you own by 10%. The next is by 20%, then 30%, and finally by 50% at level four. This is a massive improvement once you add more storage modules onto your ships.
This also means that each extra cargo module you add will have this effect applied and increase its capacity by 50% at level four!
As for different skills, you can learn more about them in our extensive Starfield best skills guide.
Add a Cargo Module
You can also buy and add extra cargo modules to increase Starfield ship storage through the shipbuilder. At first, the shipbuilder is a bit complicated, but once you start to understand the basics, it’s quite an easy learning curve.
You will have multiple modular options from the shop with varying capacities.
To modify your ship, you must go to any “Ship Services Technician.” Talk to him/her and select “I’d like to view and modify my ships.” Next, left-click the “Ship Builder” button on the bottom right to enter the building mode.
You must select your default cargo module, as shown in the image below. Delete it and buy a new storage room from the “Habs” section by pressing G and navigating to that section.
Attach it where the previous module was; now you have extra spots to attach more storage modules. Now head to the “Cargo” section and purchase new Cargo Hold modules to attach them.
Lastly, check for errors and click the “Test” button on the bottom right. If there aren’t any errors, confirm everything and exit the ship-building mode to enjoy extra cargo space.
Shielded Cargo Holds
You can buy special cargo holds at the Red Mile Base or the Crimson Fleet Base. These are essentially called “Sheilded Cargo Holds,” and essentially, they protect you from being caught for having contraband items.
Once you place contraband items in these cargo hold sections on your ship, you will pass through any scanners when close to a protected settlement.
To buy these Sheilded Cargo Holds, go to their “Ship Services Technician” and buy them like any other cargo hold. This is great if you choose the more criminal life and smuggling for the Trade Authority.
Buy A New Ship
This is another easy way for starters to change the ship rather than mess with the shipbuilder. You must go to the same ship tech person and select the “Let me see what ships you have for sale.” prompt.
Next, select any ship you like and buy it after checking its cargo capacity, assuming you have the credits.
The good thing about buying a new ship is that it is a super easy and fast upgrade. But the downside is that new ships usually cost a lot of precious credits. You should also always check the ship’s stats to see if it is worth the credits. These include:
- Energy slots for Engine, shield systems, and Gravity Drive.
- Weapons and their energy slots.
- Fuel and Storage Capacity.
- Maximum Hull health.
This method does give you a quote on quote “Free Unlimited Storage,” But it is a bit messy. All you have to do for this is drop your items on the ship anywhere you like. The game is designed to know what items were dropped where, and they will stay there until you pick them back up.
You can move the items on the ground by either bumping into them or shooting them with weapons. Now, you can travel anywhere you want, complete missions, land on other planets, and your items will be exactly where you left them.
This is great when you are low on credits and can’t buy new modules or ships to increase your Starfield ship storage problems!
Companion Storage
Throughout the game, you will meet new characters you can assign as crew to your ship and have them follow you into missions. They can also be assigned to your outposts as well. These companions have storage space you can access just by talking to them.
To access a character’s storage, you must head up to them and select the “Talk” prompt. Then select “Let’s trade gear” to open their storage. Here, you can give them items from your inventory or take items they carry. Sometimes, they will also have some good gear for you by default to use!
That concludes this article, and if you are interested in learning more about Starfield, you can read some of our other great articles by clicking on the links here:
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