If you’ve spent dozens of hours grinding for that sleek S-class hauler or stumbled on a crashed exotic shipwreck while exploring a frozen wasteland, you’ve probably run into confusion when you first try to swap vessels. I remember my first time trying to figure out how to switch ships no man's sky left me standing in the middle of a radioactive storm staring at an empty summon menu, half my inventory full of valuable storm crystals at risk of being destroyed before I could get to safety. It’s way simpler than it seems once you know the rules for different locations, and you don’t have to risk losing your hard-earned cargo or a new ship you spent weeks saving for.
How to Switch Ships in No Man’s Sky When You’re On a Planet Surface
Planetary swaps are the most common type of ship swap most players do, especially when you’re gathering resources or preparing for a long jump to a new galaxy. The process is straightforward as long as you meet a few basic requirements first. First, make sure the ship you want to switch to is already registered to your owned fleet. You’ll know it’s registered if it shows up in the Manage Fleet tab of your quick menu. If you just claimed a crashed ship, you’ll need to repair its launch thruster first before it will appear in your fleet list.
You don’t need a Summon Pad to call a ship to your location on most planets, but having one built at your base will speed up the summon time and reduce the risk of glitches. Without a pad, open your quick menu, navigate to the Summon Ship option, and select the vessel you want to use. It will spawn nearby within 10 seconds if you have a clear area around you.
- Ensure your target ship is already registered to your owned fleet before attempting to summon it
- Clear a 20-meter radius of obstacles around your position to avoid summon glitches
- Keep at least 10 units of launch fuel in your current ship if you plan to move it after swapping
- Avoid summoning ships during extreme planetary storms, as this can cause long delays or failed spawns
Once your new ship lands, just walk up to the cockpit and interact with the door to board it. Your old ship will stay where you left it, all its cargo intact, until you summon it again later. You don’t have to worry about it disappearing if you leave the planet and come back, it will still be in the same spot unless you summon it somewhere else first.
Swapping Ships Mid-Flight or In Open Space
Swapping ships while you’re in space is a huge time saver, especially if you’re switching from a fast explorer to a combat-focused fighter when you spot a pirate squad. But there are a few more restrictions here that you won’t run into on planet surfaces.
You can’t swap ships while you’re in active combat, and you need to wait for a 10-second cooldown after combat ends before the summon option becomes available. If you try to summon while you’re still taking fire, the menu will stay greyed out until you escape the fight or take out all enemy ships.
To swap in space, slow your current ship to a complete stop first. You don’t have to power down entirely, but you can’t be moving faster than 10u/s when you trigger the summon. Open your quick menu, select the ship you want to switch to, and it will spawn 50 meters directly in front of your current position. Don’t try to summon ships in stationary no-summon zones near space stations or fleet carriers, as you’ll get a warning from the local authorities and your summon will fail. If you’re near a station, fly at least 1km away from the structure before you try to swap. Your summoned ship will have full health and as much fuel as you left in it last time you used it, so make sure you top it off before you store it if you plan to use it in space.
Switching to a Newly Purchased or Claimed Ship
If you just dropped 10 million units on a new S-class hauler at a space station, or found a perfect crashed exotic ship in the middle of an uncharted planet, the swap process is a little different than summoning a ship you already own.
If you’re buying a ship from an NPC at a station or trade outpost, you don’t have to do anything extra besides sit in the cockpit of the new ship to register it to your fleet. Your old ship will automatically be added to your fleet list, and you can summon it any time you want. You don’t have to trade in your old ship unless you want to, unless you already hit the 9-ship limit for your fleet. If you’re at the limit, you’ll have to select one of your existing ships to scrap or trade in to make room for the new one.
If you’re claiming a crashed ship, you need to repair the launch thruster and life support systems first before you can fly it or add it to your fleet. You don’t have to repair every system right away if you just want to add it to your collection, but you won’t be able to summon it until the launch thruster is fixed. Once you sit in the cockpit of the crashed ship, it’s added to your fleet, and you can swap back to your old ship immediately if you don’t want to repair it right then. All cargo from your old ship stays in its own inventory, so you don’t have to transfer everything over before you swap. You can go back and grab it any time you summon the old ship again. That’s a common misconception new players have, that they’ll lose all their stuff if they swap to a new ship, but that’s not the case at all.
Common Issues When Swapping Ships and How to Fix Them
Even if you follow all the steps correctly, you might run into the occasional glitch when swapping ships, especially after a new game update drops. Most of these issues are easy to fix without losing any of your progress or ships.
The most common issue is a ship failing to spawn when you summon it. If this happens, first check if you have a clear area around you, or if you’re in a no-summon zone. If that’s not the problem, save your game and reload the last save point, and the ship should spawn right away. If it still doesn’t show up, fast travel to a nearby space station or another planet, and try summoning it there.
Another common issue is missing cargo after you swap ships. If you can’t find your cargo in either ship, head to the nearest space station and check the cargo retrieval terminal near the ship landing pads. Any lost cargo from ship swaps will be stored there for 24 in-game hours, so you can pick it up for free. If you’re trying to swap to a freighter, the process is slightly different. You have to fly to the freighter and board it, then head to the bridge to take control of it. You can’t summon a freighter to your location like a regular ship, you have to travel to it or call it to your current system using the freighter summon option in your quick menu.
Once you get the hang of how to switch ships no man's sky, you’ll be able to swap between your explorer, fighter, hauler and exotic vessels whenever you need to without any stress. I swap ships at least a dozen times every play session, switching to a fighter when pirates attack, a hauler when I’m gathering resources, and an explorer when I’m jumping to new uncharted systems. Take it slow the first few times, double check you have clear space to summon, and you won’t run into any of the common headaches that come with swapping ships.
