If you’ve ever flown through No Man’s Sky’s endless star systems and spotted a sleek, rare S-class ship zip past only to lose it in the asteroid field 10 seconds later, you know how frustrating bad targeting can be. Learning how to lock onto ships in No Man's Sky isn’t just for dogfighting pirates either—it’s the key to negotiating trades, hailing friendly pilots, and even tracking down those elusive exotic vessels you’ve been hunting for months. I’ve spent over 300 hours in the game, and I used to fumble with controls so bad I let three separate S-class haulers slip through my fingers before I got the hang of consistent targeting, so I’m breaking down everything you need to know to avoid that same mistake.
How to Lock Onto Ships in No Man's Sky: Basic Controls for All Platforms
The core targeting mechanic is the same across every platform, but the exact button inputs vary slightly depending on what you’re playing on. First, Make sure your ship’s scanner is fully charged before you go hunting for ships—dead scanners can’t lock onto anything, even if they’re right in front of you. Point your ship’s reticle directly at the vessel you want to target, and make sure it’s within the 15,000 unit default lock range. On PlayStation consoles, tap the R1 button once to trigger the lock, on Xbox tap the RB button, and on PC tap the middle mouse button by default.
You don’t need to hold the button down—a single tap is enough to trigger the lock once the ship is in your reticle. You’ll see a thin red or green outline appear around the target, and a small lock icon will pop up on the right side of your UI to confirm the lock is active. If you have multiple ships in your field of view, you can cycle between targets using the left and right d-pad buttons on console, or scroll your mouse wheel on PC to pick the exact ship you want. If you’re still struggling to figure out how to lock onto ships in No Man's Sky after checking for these common issues, try resetting your control scheme to default to rule out any custom keybind conflicts.
Common Reasons Your Ship Lock Fails (And How to Fix Them)
Most new players assume locking onto ships is buggy, but 90% of the time, it’s a simple user error or overlooked game mechanic that’s causing the problem. If your ship’s shields are down or you’re taking damage, your targeting system will be temporarily disabled until you recharge shields to at least 20%. I’ve made this mistake more times than I can count during pirate ambushes, fumbling to lock onto attackers while my hull is taking fire, only to remember I need to pop a shield charge first.
Atmospheric and warp interference will also break locks or prevent them from triggering in the first place. If a target is entering or exiting a planet’s atmosphere, your lock range drops to just 3,000 units, so you’ll need to get much closer to lock on successfully. If a ship is starting to warp, its signature will scramble your scanner entirely, so you won’t be able to lock on at all unless you interrupt its warp sequence with a weapon hit first. If you have an active bounty or quest that targets a specific ship, your system will prioritize that quest target over all random ships, so deselect the quest from your log if you want to lock onto something else.
Advanced Lock-On Tips for Combat, Trading, and Rare Ship Hunting
Once you’ve mastered the basic lock-on mechanic, you can tweak your setup and habits to make targeting work even better for your playstyle. Once you lock onto a hostile ship, holding the fire button will let your missiles track the target even if it pulls evasive maneuvers, but you have to keep the lock active for 3 full seconds before missiles will fire. For traders, locking onto a friendly ship lets you hail them immediately from up to 10,000 units away, so you don’t have to chase them across the system to initiate a trade or ask for directions.
For rare ship hunters, a successful lock will stay active even if the target flies to a space station, trading post, or planetary settlement, so you can follow it straight to the dock without losing sight of it. I’ve used this trick to track four separate S-class exotic ships to their landing spots, and it cut my hunt time by 70% compared to just trying to follow them visually. These are a few more pro tips to make targeting even smoother:
- Upgrade your ship’s scanner to S-class to boost lock-on range by 70% and cut target acquisition time in half, which is a game-changer for chasing fast exotic ships
- Turn on "target lock feedback" in your audio settings to get a loud audio ping when a lock is successful, so you don’t have to take your eyes off your flight path to check the UI
- If you’re hunting for specific ship types, filter your scanner to only show the class you want (fighter, hauler, explorer) in your ship’s utility menu to avoid locking onto irrelevant targets
All of these tweaks take less than 10 minutes to set up, and they make a massive difference if you spend a lot of time flying around open star systems. You don’t need to spend millions of units on upgrades to get better locks, either—even a B-class scanner upgrade will give you a noticeable range boost.
What to Do After You Lock Onto a Ship
A lock doesn’t do you much good if you don’t know what to do with it, so let’s break down the options you’ll get once a lock is active. For friendly ships, you can choose to hail them to trade resources, ask for directions to nearby points of interest, or even purchase their ship if it’s for sale. If you’re playing multiplayer, you can also lock onto your friend’s ships to follow them across systems without having to input their coordinates manually, which makes group exploration way less stressful.
For hostile pirate ships, you can either engage them for nanite and resource rewards, or send a distress signal to nearby system defense ships to help you fight if you’re outgunned. Never fire on a locked friendly ship unless you want to get a wanted level that will have system defense and space station guards shooting at you on sight for 15 minutes. If you lock onto a derelict freighter or abandoned ship, the lock will guide you straight to its docking port so you don’t get lost in the debris field around it, which is a huge help if you’re exploring uncharted systems with lots of floating junk.
At the end of the day, getting the hang of how to lock onto ships in No Man's Sky is one of those small quality of life skills that makes every part of the game feel smoother, whether you’re a casual explorer just passing through systems or a hardcore pirate hunter chasing the biggest bounties. You don’t need fancy upgrades to get it right, just a little bit of practice and awareness of the small mechanics that can break your lock when you least expect it. Next time you spot that perfect ship zipping past your cockpit, you won’t have to watch it disappear—you’ll lock on, follow it, and finally add that dream vessel to your fleet.
