If you’ve spent dozens of hours warping between star systems in No Man’s Sky, you’ve probably stumbled across all kinds of weird cosmic sights, from rainbow nebulas to rogue planets adrift without a sun. It’s normal to wonder if the game includes one of the universe’s most famous mysterious objects, so are there black holes in No Man’s Sky? The short answer is yes, but they work very differently from their real-life counterparts, and they’re not nearly as dangerous as you might expect. I’ve logged over 300 hours in the game across multiple saves, and I’ve used black holes to cut travel time to the galaxy core dozens of times, so I’ll walk you through everything you need to know to find and use them safely.
Are There Black Holes in No Man’s Sky That Are Dangerous to Use?
If you’ve only ever seen videos of black holes in No Man’s Sky online, you might be scared to try one for yourself, but there’s no reason to be. Unlike real black holes that will crush anything that crosses their event horizon, the ones in No Man’s Sky are designed as a fast travel mechanic, not a lethal obstacle. When you initiate a warp to a black hole, you’ll see a short cinematic of your ship being pulled through the swirling dark mass, and you’ll end up spawning in a random star system thousands of light years closer to the center of your current galaxy.
The only real downside of using a black hole is that one random piece of installed starship technology will take damage during the jump. I once had my hyperdrive damaged right after a jump, and I was stuck in a desolate system with no plutonium for 20 minutes while I scavenged for repair materials. You won’t take any health damage, your cargo won’t be lost, and your ship won’t be destroyed, so the risk is very low for most players. The damage is also always limited to a single module, so you never have to worry about fixing half your ship after a jump.
How to Find Black Holes Easily in Any Galaxy
You don’t have to stumble across black holes by chance when you’re exploring the galaxy. There are two reliable ways to find their exact coordinates no matter where you are in your playthrough, and neither requires you to progress very far in the main story. First, you can get coordinates from the Cartographer NPC found at every major space station. You can buy black hole location maps from them for 3 navigational data each, and they will add a permanent waypoint to your galaxy map for a nearby black hole system.
The second method is even easier if you’ve unlocked the Space Anomaly early in the Artemis quest line. The NPCs Polo and Nada will give you free black hole coordinates whenever you ask, no navigational data required, as long as you’ve completed the first few Artemis missions. I use this method all the time when I’m grinding towards a new galaxy, because it saves me the trouble of farming navigational data for maps.
If you’re not sure where to start looking for a black hole right now, follow these simple steps:
Key Rewards and Risks of Using Black Holes for Travel
Black holes are the fastest non-cheat way to reach the galaxy core in No Man’s Sky, and that’s their biggest draw for most players. Regular warp jumps only move you between 100 and 500 light years per jump, depending on your hyperdrive upgrades. A single black hole jump will move you between 5,000 and 10,000 light years closer to the core, cutting your total travel time by 70% on average compared to regular warp travel. If you’re trying to unlock all 25 galaxies in the game, black holes are basically non-negotiable if you don’t want to spend hundreds of hours warping between systems.
There are a few small risks to keep in mind before you start spamming black hole jumps, though. First, the random tech damage can hit critical modules like your hyperdrive or pulse engine, and if you don’t have repair materials on hand, you can get stuck in a system for a long time. Second, you have no control over what system you land in after the jump. You might end up in a harsh dead system with no space station, no habitable planets, and aggressive sentinel interceptors that will attack you on sight. I once jumped into a system where every planet had constant extreme heat storms, and I had to use my emergency oxygen reserves twice before I found the materials to fix my broken pulse engine.
These risks are very manageable as long as you prepare ahead of time, but if you’re carrying extremely rare cargo or you have expensive, irreplaceable tech modules installed on your ship, you might want to skip black hole jumps for regular travel. It’s not worth losing a rare S-class hyperdrive upgrade just to save a few minutes of travel time.
Pro Tips for Navigating Black Holes Without Losing Gear
After dozens of black hole jumps across 8 different galaxies, I’ve picked up a few tricks that make the process almost risk-free. The most useful tip I can give you is to move all your high-value, rare tech modules from your starship’s tech inventory to your exosuit inventory right before you make the jump. The damage from the black hole only affects modules that are actively installed on your starship, so if you remove the rare ones first, only a common, easy-to-repair module like your launch thruster or basic scanner will take damage. You can move the modules back to your starship as soon as you land in the new system.
Another easy trick is to keep a small stockpile of common repair materials in your starship cargo at all times. I always carry 50 units of tritium, 20 chromatic metal, 10 ferrite dust, and 5 di-hydrogen on my ship, and those materials cover 99% of all possible repair needs for damaged starship tech. You’ll never get stuck in a system if you have those materials on hand, even if your hyperdrive breaks right after a jump.
If you’re playing in survival or permadeath mode, make sure you save your game at a space station before you make a black hole jump. You never know if you’ll land in a system with aggressive pirate fleets or sentinel interceptors that will attack you before you have time to react, and having a recent save will save you from losing hours of progress. I used to forget to save all the time, and once I lost 2 hours of exploration progress because I landed in a system with S-class sentinel interceptors that blew up my ship before I could land on a planet to hide.
At the end of the day, if you’ve been asking are there black holes in No Man’s Sky, you can rest easy knowing they’re not only real, but they’re one of the most useful tools for fast travel across the galaxy. You don’t have to worry about getting sucked in and destroyed like you would in real life, and the minor inconvenience of a broken tech module is well worth the thousands of light years you’ll skip in travel time. Next time you’re grinding towards the galaxy core, stop by your local cartographer, pick up a black hole map, and give it a try - you’ll be shocked how much faster you reach your destination.