Best Starfield ships: Epic designs to build, buy or steal

All of these tweaks can make a major difference in Bethesda's latest.

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While building a ship can be extremely rewarding, it does take time. Alternatively, there are a number of adequate free ships that are great when getting up and running in the early days of your adventure.

Either way, it's worth keeping your options open. After all, it's a great big universe.

So we've done just that, scouring all of the best Starfield ships that the game has to offer. On top of that, we've rounded up some remarkable designs created by players around the globe that will hopefully provide some inspiration.

Best Starfield ships to steal

Let's begin with the space pirates among you... It's all well and good spending time building a ship, but a lot of us enjoy the thrill of commandeering someone else's. It's certainly cheaper, too.

Some of the best ships belong to other space pirates in The Crimson Fleet (so if you feel guilty, remember they're in the thief game, too).

The pirates' ships tend to have great stats, not to mention the Shielded Cargo feature. This allows you to smuggle contraband into Settled Systems.

You can check out our detailed list of free ships here, where we go into detail on how to grab them. Or if you just want the ships' names without the guide, we'll list them below:

• Star Eagle
• Kepler R
• Razorleaf
• UC Prison Shuttle
• Wanderwell

Also, check out the video from YouTube channel Gaming with Griff Griffin who shares some handy tips on how to find some further free ships.

How to build ships in Starfield explained

To build one of the best ships in Starfield, you need to head to a spaceport and speak with the ship technician. From here, you can ask to customise a ship in your collection, register a new one, repair your ship or buy a new one outright.

An alternative is to build a large landing pad at an outpost. You can then use the ship building terminal to do it yourself. When in the ship viewer, go to the ship builder by pressing X (on Xbox) or the B key (on PC). You can move and replace the individual modules by selecting them and pressing Edit. If you make a mistake, you can undo and redo actions. To get to different modules, you can change the level by pressing up and down on the D-pad (on Xbox) or the H and F keys (on PC).

By pressing the A button (on Xbox) or the G key (on PC) you will go to the Add menu, where you can see all the available parts. At the bottom of the screen will be a row of your ship’s stats, and it’s wise to keep an eye on these if you want your ship to specialise in something in particular - such as transporting cargo, fighting or speed.

There are tons of ship parts to choose from, and certain vendors will have exclusive access to some of the more exotic modules - so be sure to shop around. You can also unlock more components and types of available ships by upgrading your Ship Command and Piloting skill levels. Once you are done customising your ship, you can confirm the changes and view your new steed on the landing pad. This useful beginner video by I.Eat.Games is worth a watch too.

Read more on Starfield:

• Starfield review - our final verdict
• Starfield missions list - how far are you?
• Starfield tips and tricks - how to get started
• Starfield romance - all potential relationships
• Starfield character creation - all your options explained
• Starfield digipick - how to lockpick
• How long is Starfield? - The hours you'll need
• Will Starfield ever come to PS5? - Developer comments
• Starfield cast - all voice actors
• Starfield soundtrack - how to listen
• Starfield storage guide - don't be overburdened
• Starfield FOV - change your point of view
• Starfield FPS - developers explain 30fps
• Starfield PC requirements - specs needed
• Starfield performance - potential fixes
• Starfield factions - all possible groups

Best ships to buy in Starfield

If you have a whole heap of credits burning a hole in your pocket or you simply can't bring yourself to "liberate" a ship from someone else, then you may find what you're looking for from one of the ship vendors dotted across the galaxy.

Below are some of the best ships that you can buy in Starfield with their specs listed and where to buy them.

Stronghold

Found in Akila City for 400,025 Credits, the Stronghold is a Class C passenger ship, perfect for ferrying crew and passengers through space safely.

It's armed to the teeth with defensive weapons and has a large cargo capacity to boot. Take a gander at all of its specifications.

• Price – 400,025
• Class – C
• Hull – 1,047
• Cargo – 2,360
• Reactor – 27(C)
• Crew – 6
• Jump – 30 LY
• Shield – 1,600
• Ballistic weapons – 48
• Laser weapons – 36
• Particle weapons – 0
• EM weapons – 0
• Missiles – 0
• Mass – 2,030
• Location – Akila City

Silent Runner

The Silent Runner is a marvel of cargo capacity that will ensure you don't run out of storage space anytime soon. It's amply powerful, too, with a 34-rated reactor and a 30-lightyear jump distance to get you where you need to go in as few steps as possible.

Found in Hopetown, this bad boy will set you back 390,150 credits. Check out the rest of the stats just below.

• Price – 390,150
• Class – C
• Hull – 1,164
• Cargo – 6,060
• Reactor – 34(C)
• Crew – 5
• Jump – 30 LY
• Shield – 975
• Ballistic weapons – 0
• Laser weapons – 0
• Particle weapons – 36
• EM weapons – 0
• Missiles – 96
• Mass – 2,463
• Location – HopeTown

Narwhal

The aptly named Narwhal is the most expensive ship in the game at 455,400 Credits, and its stats reflect this.

Nothing has been left on the table, and this whale of a ship is extremely well-rounded, doing a little bit of everything - and will serve you well in your quests.

Drool over what this ship is capable of just below.

• Price – 455,400
• Class – C
• Hull – 2118
• Cargo – 1,760
• Reactor – 36(C)
• Crew – 7
• Jump – 30 LY
• Shield – 995
• Ballistic weapons – 131
• Laser weapons – 26
• Particle weapons – 0
• EM weapons – 0
• Missiles – 90
• Mass – 1,593
• Location – Taiyo Astroengineering in the Ryujin building on Neon

Best Starfield ships: The best spaceship designs in Starfield so far

Of course, original ship designs in Starfield can be very cool, yet it was an inevitability that people would try their hand at recreating some of sci-fi’s most iconic ships - with the most famous of all arguably being the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars.

Given that we write about games, it may not come as a surprise that we’re big fans of spaceships from our favourite medium. Redditor neok182 made a very impressive rendition of the Normandy SR-2 from Mass Effect, and also a nigh-perfect Firefly Class ship from Serenity.

Rebs Gaming on X (formerly known as Twitter) shared a convincing Star Wars X-Wing build made by X user fudgiebrown. There's also a build guide on YouTube courtesy of fudgiebrown, should you wish to recreate this yourself.

We're massive fans of this freight haulier made by Brad Groux over on X, too, as it reminds us of the eponymous Red Dwarf.

Good news, everyone! The good ship the Planet Express ship from Futurama has been made in Starfield. With this handy tutorial on Reddit, too, you can craft your own to make some interstellar deliveries.

Even James Cameron himself would be impressed with this recreation of the Titanic by u/jethrowwilson on Reddit.

Someone also went to great lengths to create a Formula 1 ship, if you fancy racing around the galaxy like Lewis Hamilton.

Another great design was shared by u/richcooks on Reddit, which is known as the US BattleAxe.

After saving Gotham, this Batman-inspired ship is ready to save the galaxy. Shout-out to bmikey for the design.

Here's one we didn't expect: The Magic School Bus, courtesy of U/SP7R on Reddit.

What will you try and build in Starfield? We might try our hand at making the USG Kellion from Dead Space...

Starfield is available across Xbox Series X/S and Microsoft Windows. Head to Amazon to pick up a copy.

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