Starfield skills list

Your Starfield skills are one of the most important parts of your character. Levelling up the right ones can take your playthroughs in wildly different directions. Whether that’s maintaining a strong, rounded build, or beelining certain skills to specialise in specific parts of the game, having a good knowledge of the game’s skills will help you plan things out.

As well as the skills themselves, you’ll want to check out some of the Starfield traits and Starfield backgrounds, as these can also have a big impact on your Starfield skills and your approach to the game. But for now, let’s take a look at all of the available skills to level up in Starfield.

How many skills are in Starfield?

So far, we know about 46 different skills that are available in Starfield. Each skill is categorised into one of five different categories. Here is a list of all of the categories:

• Combat
• Physical
• Science
• Social
• Tech

Combat

Combat skills are focused on your proficiency with weapons of all types. Levelling up these skills will make you more capable at using your weapons and dishing out damage to enemies. The confirmed combat skills are:

• Ballistics – Increases Ballistic weapon damage
• Demolitions – Explosives deal increased damage in a larger radius
• Dueling – Increases Melee weapon damage
• Heavy Weapons Certification – Increases Heavy weapon damage
• Lasers – Increases Laser weapon damage
• Marksmanship – Increases Marksman weapon damage
• Particle Beams – Increases Particle Beam weapon damage
• Pistol Certification – Increases Pistol weapon damage
• Rapid Reloading – Increases weapon reload speed
• Rifle Certification – Increases Rifle weapon damage
• Shotgun Certification – Increases Shotgun weapon damage
• Sniper Certification – Less sway when using scoped weapons
• Targeting – Increased hip fire accuracy and range

Physical

Physical skills improve your character’s physical attributes. This ranges from things like strength and HP to your ability to move quietly and even cook food. The confirmed physical skills are:

• Concealment – Harder to detect while sneaking
• Decontamination – Increases infection recovery chance
• Gastronomy – Can craft specialty food and drinks
• Martial Arts – Unarmed attacks use less Oxygen
• Neurostrikes – Increases unarmed attack crit damage
• Stealth – Increases sneak attack damage
• Weight Lifting – Increases carry capacity
• Wellness – Increases maximum HP

Science

Science skills span a wide range of things, including creating medicines, building outposts, astrophysics, and more. Science skills will likely play a large role in the game’s crafting mechanics and the gathering of resources. The confirmed science skills are:

• Astrodynamics – Decreases Grav Jump fuel cost
• Astrophysics – Increased chance of finding new traits while scanning moons
• Botany – Increases flora scan speed
• Chemistry – Craft improved chems at a research lab
• Geology – Increases ore scan speed
• Medicine – Increases Med Pack healing
• Outpost Engineering – Build advanced outpost modules
• Surveying – Currently unknown

Social

Social skills determine how well you communicate with others. This affects trading items, leading your crew, persuading and intimidating other NPCs, and more. The confirmed social skills are:

• Bargaining – Buy items for less and sell for more
• Commerce – Build better trading outposts
• Diplomacy – Force an NPC to not attack you temporarily
• Instigation – Force an NPC to join you temporarily
• Intimidation – Force an NPC to flee from you temporarily
• Leadership – Companions gain affinity faster
• Outpost Management – Can establish trade routes between outposts
• Persuasion – Increases success chance for speech challenges
• Scavenging – Find more credits while looting
• Theft – Increases pickpocketing success chance
• Xenosociology – Force an NPC to do your bidding temporarily

Tech

Tech skills involve your use of the game’s technology. While this will mostly be useful for piloting your spaceship, it also allows you to develop your ship, use robots, and hack security systems. The confirmed tech skills are:

• Ballistic Weapon Systems – Increases ship Ballistic damage
• Boost Pack Training – Increases Boost Jump height
• Missile Weapon Systems – Increases ship Missile damage
• Particle Beam Weapon Systems – Increases ship Particle Beam damage
• Payloads – Increases ship cargo capacity
• Piloting – Increases ship speed
• Robotics – Increases damage to Robots and Turrets
• Security – Can attempt to hack more advanced locks
• Starship Design -Unlocks more ship pre-built modules
• Starship Engineering – Unlocks more ship custom modules
• Targeting Control Systems – Target different subsystems on enemy ships

How do you level up skills in Starfield?

Every time your character levels up, you receive a skill point which can be used to unlock or level up a skill. Each skill has a set of ranks, which can be unlocked by completing progressively more difficult challenges. You can receive XP to level up your character through almost anything, from combat to using your individual skills themselves, like hacking locks to level up Security.

Levelling up these skills will subsequently provide you with more benefits. Sticking with Security, at rank 1, you’ll be able to disable advanced locks and store two auto attempts, while rank 2 will let you disable expert locks and store three auto attempts. The higher you rank up each skill, the more useful they will be.

Additionally, while there isn’t a skill tree per se, there is a hierarchy of skills with each skill being placed on a specific tier. In order to unlock certain higher tier skills, you will first need to level up the corresponding skills on the tiers below it. For example, you may need to rank up your Diplomacy skill before you can unlock Xenosociology. 

That’s it for all of the Starfield skills we know about so far. As we get closer to the Starfield release date, we’ll update this guide as and when we have more information. For now, take a look at some of the options in the Starfield character creator. And if you want to know more about the game’s world, our Starfield map guide is a good place to start.