If you’ve spent hours exploring No Man’s Sky’s infinite galaxies only to realize you hate your Traveler’s default haircut or your starter ship’s chipped neon paint job, you’re not alone. I’ve restarted three separate save files just to get a character face I didn’t cringe at before I figured out how to change appearance in No Man’s Sky without wiping all my progress. The good news is that almost every customizable asset in the game can be tweaked later on, no restart required, as long as you know where to look. You don’t need mods or fancy cheats to make your playthrough feel uniquely yours, either—most customization options are built directly into the base game for free.
How to Change Appearance in No Man’s Sky for Your Traveler, Multitool, and Ships
If you’re wondering how to change appearance in No Man’s Sky for every asset you own, the process is slightly different for each item but all follow the same basic logic of interacting with the right terminal. For your Traveler, look for an Appearance Modifier terminal. Appearance Modifiers are free to use as many times as you want, no units or nanites required, even if you completely redo your entire look from head to toe. They’re located right next to the spawn point in every space station, in the main plaza of the Space Anomaly, and you can even build one for your personal base if you purchase the blueprint from the Anomaly construction vendor. You can tweak everything from your character’s face shape, hair style, and tattoos to your exosuit’s color scheme and backpack attachments at these terminals.
For your multitool, head to the multi-tool upgrade station in the back of any space station. You can swap out its casing color, add custom decals, and even adjust the glow color of its mining beam if you’ve unlocked the right upgrades. You don’t have to pay to change your multitool’s appearance, though you will need to spend nanites if you want to install new functional upgrades at the same terminal. I usually swap my multitool’s color to match my ship’s paint job every time I get a new S-class model, it’s a small touch that makes my loadout feel cohesive.
For starships, you’ll need to use the ship customization terminal located near the landing pads in any space station or on your freighter’s hangar deck. Ship customizations do cost nanites, so save up if you want a full custom paint set for your favorite S-class hauler. You can change the primary, secondary, and accent colors of every part of your ship, add decals to the hull, and unlock custom engine trails from expedition rewards. Some rare color palettes are locked behind milestone challenges, but you’ll have access to dozens of basic shades from the start of the game.
Hidden Customization Options Most Players Miss
Most casual players only know about Traveler and ship customization, but there are tons of lesser-known assets you can tweak to make your playthrough even more personal. The first one is your freighter: you can change its entire exterior color scheme, add decals to the hull, adjust the hangar lighting, and even swap out decor in the bridge by interacting with the captain’s terminal on your freighter’s command deck. Freighter customizations are mostly free, outside of rare decals you unlock from pirate battles.
You can also customize your companion pets if you’ve unlocked the creature taming system. Head to the creature terminal in the Space Anomaly to change your pet’s fur pattern, add custom collars, and even adjust the glow of their bioluminescent markings if they have any. Some players don’t realize you can also rename your pets and upload their custom designs to the community library for other players to download.
If you’re looking for rare, free customization unlocks, these are the ones I always prioritize:
- Rainbow ship engine trails, unlocked by completing the first iteration of the Expeditions: Leviathan event
- Glowing tattoo options for your Traveler, earned by reaching level 10 in the Sentinel standing system
- Rare holographic decals for freighters, unlocked by clearing 50+ pirate dreadnought battles
You don’t have to participate in limited-time events to get most rare customization items—Hello Games re-runs popular expeditions every few months for new players, so you won’t miss out permanently if you start playing after an event ends. You can also unlock most event exclusive customization items from the Quicksilver merchant in the Space Anomaly for a small amount of Quicksilver.
Modding Options for More Advanced Appearance Changes
If you’re playing on PC and want even more customization options than the base game offers, there are hundreds of safe, community-made mods you can use to tweak almost every part of the game’s appearance. Popular mod packs include custom hair and face options for your Traveler, custom ship skin packs, custom exosuit designs, and even mods that let you change the color and texture of planet terrain to fit your preferred vibe.
It’s important to note that mods are only allowed in single-player or private, invite-only multiplayer lobbies. Using mods in public multiplayer lobbies can lead to a temporary ban from Hello Games’ servers, as many mods can give you an unfair advantage over other players even if they’re only cosmetic. Always back up your save file before installing any No Man’s Sky mods to avoid losing hours of progress if a mod conflicts with a new game update.
I’ve used a custom pastel hair mod for my last two playthroughs, and it’s never caused any issues as long as I disable it before installing new game patches. Console players don’t have access to mods, but the base game has expanded its customization options so much in recent updates that you’ll still have hundreds of combinations to choose from without downloading any extra content.
Common Customization Mistakes to Avoid
It’s easy to get carried away when you first unlock all the customization options in the game, but there are a few common mistakes that can waste your resources or cause you to lose progress. The first one is wasting all your nanites on random, low-quality ship decals that you’ll replace a week later. I always recommend unlocking the full paint color palette first, since you’ll use that way more often than single decals.
Another common mistake is forgetting to save your custom appearance preset after you tweak it. If you don’t hit the save preset button before exiting the Appearance Modifier terminal, you’ll lose all your changes if you interact with the terminal again by accident, or if you load an older save file. Saving your custom appearance preset takes two clicks, so it’s always worth the extra step before you exit the customization menu.
The last mistake to avoid is downloading random mods from untrusted websites. Stick to verified modding communities to make sure the mods you’re downloading don’t have malware or won’t corrupt your save files. If you’re new to modding, start with small, popular cosmetic mods first before you try anything that changes core game mechanics.
Part of the fun of No Man’s Sky is building a playthrough that feels uniquely yours, and customizing every part of your loadout is one of the easiest ways to make that happen. Once you know how to change appearance in No Man’s Sky, you can swap up your look whenever you get bored, after you hit a big milestone, or even to match the vibe of the new galaxy you just landed in. You don’t need to spend real money or use complicated mods to get a look you love, either—most of the best customization options are already available in the base game for free. If you’ve found a weird or underrated customization unlock we didn’t mention here, feel free to share it in the comments to help other fellow travelers.
