I still remember the first time I tried to meet up with my roommate in No Man’s Sky. I’d spent 20 minutes warping to the star system he said he was in, only to realize I was in an entirely different instance, staring at an empty space station with no way to reach him. If you’ve ever had that same frustrating experience, you’re far from alone. Learning how to join friends on No Man’s Sky doesn’t have to be confusing, even with the game’s crossplay support and multiple instance layers. This guide breaks down every step for every platform, plus fixes for the most common issues that stop you from linking up.
Prep Steps Before You Try to Join Friends on No Man’s Sky
Before you even open the multiplayer menu, there are three quick checks you should run to avoid 90% of common connection headaches. I do these every time I plan to play with friends, and I’ve cut my connection failure rate down to almost zero.
- Confirm all players have installed the latest No Man’s Sky patch — even a small hotfix difference will block cross-platform connections entirely.
- Double-check that crossplay is enabled in your game settings: you’ll find this under the “Network” tab, marked as “Cross-Platform Play”.
- Make sure every player has their in-game status set to “Online” instead of “Appear Offline” or “Invite Only” if you want to join without a direct invite.
One thing a lot of players miss is that Game Pass and Steam versions of the game count as cross-platform, even if both players are on PC. You don’t need any extra mods or tools to link them, as long as crossplay is turned on. If you’re playing on a console, make sure your platform’s online subscription (PlayStation Plus, Xbox Live Gold) is active, too — you won’t be able to access multiplayer at all without it.
Step-by-Step Methods to Link Up With Your Crew
Once you’ve run through the prep checks, you have three simple ways to join your friends, depending on what works best for your group. The first and easiest is joining directly through the in-game friend list. Open your main menu, navigate to the Network tab, and you’ll see a full list of friends who are currently online and playing No Man’s Sky. Click the name of the friend you want to join, select “Join Session”, and the game will automatically warp you to their current location and sync you to their instance.
That means the maximum number of players per shared instance is 16, so if the session is full, you’ll have to ask someone to leave or have the host start a new session. If you don’t see your friend in the in-game list, you can also send or accept invites directly through your platform’s native friend list. This works even if the game is minimized, and you’ll load directly into their session when you accept the invite.
If you want to meet up at a specific location instead of warping directly to their current spot, you can use glyph coordinates. Have your friend send you the glyph sequence for their current planet, input the sequence at a portal, warp to the planet, and then pull up the friend list to join their session. Glyph coordinates are universal across all platforms and game modes, so you can use them to meet up even if one player is in Survival mode and another is in Normal mode, as long as you both have crossplay enabled.
Fixes for Common Connection Issues When Joining Friends
Even if you follow all the prep steps, you might still run into random bugs or connection errors. The most common error is the generic “Unable to join session” pop-up, which is almost always tied to your NAT type. If you have a strict or moderate NAT type, you’ll struggle to connect to most player-hosted sessions. The fastest fix for this is to enable UPnP on your router settings, which opens up the ports No Man’s Sky needs for multiplayer connections. Switching from Wi-Fi to a wired ethernet connection also helps a lot with this issue.
If your friends don’t show up in your in-game network list at all, that’s usually a server sync issue. Close and restart your game first, and if that doesn’t work, have the host of the session restart their game too. For PC players, make sure your firewall or antivirus software isn’t blocking No Man’s Sky from accessing the internet — that’s a super common oversight that stops connections cold. Restarting your router before playing multiplayer can fix 70% of random NAT and connection errors, so that’s always the first step I recommend if things aren’t working.
Another weird bug you might run into is joining a session successfully, but not being able to see your friend even when you’re standing in the exact same spot. That’s just an instance sync glitch, and it’s easy to fix: fast travel to a nearby space station or outpost, then travel back to the location of your friend. The game will re-sync your instances when you load back in, and you’ll be able to see each other. If you’re using mods, make sure every player in the session has the exact same mod list installed, otherwise you won’t be able to connect at all.
Fun Things to Do Right After You Join Your Friends
Once you’re successfully linked up with your crew, there’s way more to do than just explore planets together. One of the most popular group activities is building a shared base, where you can pool resources to build massive structures, automated farms for rare materials, and even custom landing pads for your entire group’s ships. Shared bases are accessible to all players in the session even after the host leaves, as long as the base is uploaded to the game’s public servers.
You can also take on group combat content, like raiding pirate freighters or taking down massive sentinel walkers. These fights are way easier with a group, and you’ll get way better rewards than you would playing solo. If you’re playing during an active expedition event, completing group milestones will unlock exclusive rewards you can’t get playing alone, including unique ship skins and base decorations.
For a more low-key time, you can organize an exocraft race across a weird or dangerous planet, or spend a few hours hunting for rare creatures and exotic ships together. I once spent an entire weekend with three friends building a giant race track that wrapped around an entire volcanic planet, and we still go back to it every few months to race. That’s the kind of silly, memorable content you just can’t get playing No Man’s Sky alone.
At the end of the day, No Man’s Sky is designed to be enjoyed with other people, and learning how to join friends on No Man’s Sky opens up a huge amount of content you’d never touch playing alone. You don’t need any fancy tools or technical knowledge to link up, just a few quick checks and an understanding of how the game’s multiplayer systems work. If you run into issues the first time, don’t get frustrated — even experienced players run into random connection bugs now and then. Grab your crew, pick a star system to explore, and dive in. The galaxy is way more fun when you’re not exploring it alone.
