How do you unlock powers in Starfield? While you won’t be screaming Fus Ro Dah in Bethesda’s space RPG, the Starfield powers are just as helpful outside of combat as they are when you’re battling intergalactic beasties. So, whether you want to alter gravity, resurrect the dead, or become a godlike farmer, we’ve prepared everything you need to know about powers, including how to unlock powers in Starfield, and all the best Starfield powers that can be obtained.
Starfield powers are one of the most intriguing aspects of the game, infusing the fun of Skyrim’s Shouts and Fallout’s VATS system with a new sci-fi twist. Plus, there’s no better way to show off to your Starfield companions than flexing your new-found abilities unique to you. This only gets better when you consider the possibilities that come with Starfield New Game Plus. Thanks to our time with the game for our Starfield review, we know now all the powers available, which you can check out below. Just be aware that there will be major story spoilers ahead, so tread carefully.
All Starfield powers
The Starfield powers are:
- Alien Reanimation – Resurrect a dead alien to fight for you
- Anti-Gravity Field – Create an area of intense low gravity to suspend enemies
- Creator’s Peace – Disarms nearby enemies
- Create Vacuum – Cut the O2 supply of nearby enemies
- Earthbound – Alter the gravity around you to Earth’s gravity levels
- Elemental Pull – Breaks inorganic resources nearby and pulls them towards you
- Eternal Harvest – Regrows flora that has been harvested
- Grav Dash – Propel yourself forward and briefly increase damage dealt
- Gravity Wave – Launch a gravity wave that staggers and knocks down enemies
- Gravity Well – Create an area of dense gravity that pulls in and crushes everything effected
- Inner Demon – Force an enemy to confront their inner demons, creating a mirror image of themselves that attacks them
- Life Forced – Drain the life of enemies and transfer it to yourself
- Moon Form – Root yourself in place and increase your resistance to all damages
- Parallel Self – Create a duplicate of yourself to fight enemies alongside you
- Particle Beam – Shoot a beam of energy that deals high damage
- Personal Atmosphere – Restore oxygen
- Phased Time – Slow down time
- Precognition – See the future actions of NPC in combat and dialogue
- Reactive Shield – Create a shield that reflects projectiles and increases your resistance to attacks
- Sense Star Stuff – Detect nearby life
- Solar Flare – Emit a burst of energy that damages and burns nearby enemies
- Sunless Space – Fire a ball of ice, freezing any enemies damaged by the blast
- Supernova – Emit an explosive burst of energy, dealing massive damage to nearby enemies
- Void Form – Become nearly invisible
There are 24 powers to unlock in Starfield, each letting you manipulate the environment or enemies in various ways. While you can unlock many early on, acquiring all the powers is a long-term endeavor.
These special abilities are granted by the mysterious Starfield artifacts the main character and Constellation, one of the Starfield factions, are looking for. We won’t go into a more story spoilers right now, but these mysterious relics are key to the narrative, while also giving access to awesome powers.
Once you’ve unlocked powers through the main questline, powers can be used by pressing the ‘Z’ on keyboard and mouse, and LB+RB on controller. However, using a power will require ‘power’ (mana, in other words), represented by a bar below your health bar. This will regenerate over time, so you don’t need to worry about replenishing it manually. Each ability costs a different amount of power according to how strong the effect is, so think carefully about what power you cast and when.
You can find a showcase of all the Starfield powers in the video by ‘Rifle Gaming’ below:
How to unlock powers in Starfield
To unlock powers in Starfield, you must complete the Into the Unknown quest, the third main story mission with Constellation.
After completing One Small Step and The Old Neighborhood, you will be given the quest Into the Unknown. This will eventually direct you towards an anomaly that reveals a temple.
Once you’ve located the temple, head inside and complete the activity by collecting the orbs of light that appear. This activity goes on for a surprisingly long time, especially as there seems to be a timer on these orbs that often bugs, causing them to not count when you glide through them. Nevertheless, complete this and you will be taken outside of the temple with your first power – Anti-Gravity Field.
From here, you’ll need to complete more Starfield missions and locate the various temples around the universe to unlock the remaining powers.
Starfield all powers locations
To locate all the powers in Starfield, find and complete other temples that are marked with the quest Power From Beyond, which is obtained after completing the main story mission Into the Unknown. These powers can be unlocked in any order, depending on which temples you visit.
To access the temples in the first place, you’re going to need to hunt down the 24 artifacts that correspond to each power. For example, Vladimir uses Artifact Eta to locate Temple Eta in Into the Unknown.
The locations for each Artifact can be found below:
- Artifact Alpha – Constellation-owned
- Artifact Beta – Maoro’s Ship, ‘The Old Neighborhood’ mission
- Artifact Chi – ‘The Empty Nest’ mission
- Artifact Delta – The Hunter, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Epsilon – The Hunter, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Eta – Argos Extractors Mining Outpost, ‘One Small Step’ mission
- Artifact Gamma – The Hunter, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Iota – Abandoned Mine, ‘Into the Unknown’ mission
- Artifact Kappa – The Hunter, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Lambda – Nishina Research Station, ‘Entangled’ mission
- Artifact Mu – Buried Temple, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Nu – Astral Lounge, ‘All that Money Can Buy’ mission
- Artifact Omega – The Emissary, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Omicron – Scavenger Burrows, ‘Final Glimpses’ mission
- Artifact Phi – The Scow, ‘No Sudden Moves’ mission
- Artifact Pi – The Emissary, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Psi – NASA Launch Facility, ‘Unearthed’ mission
- Artifact Rho – The Emissary, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Sigma – ‘Worlds Apart’ Barrett companion mission
- Artifact Tau – Random planet, ‘Further into the Unknown’ mission
- Artifact Theta – Random planet, ‘Further into the Unknown’ mission
- Artifact Upsilon – The Hunter, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Xi – The Emissary, ‘Revelation’ mission
- Artifact Zeta Unexplained Geophysical Feature, ‘Into the Unknown’ mission
There are a few important things to note regarding Artifact Sigma. Firstly, you’re going to need to have both finished the In Their Footsteps main mission, and achieved the appropriate friendship level with Barrett before you’ll be able to start Worlds Apart. Ideally, then, this mission will be completed before deciding to defend The Lodge or go to The Eye in ‘High Price to Pay’ – we’ll let our guide explain why as not to spoil too much here.
Finally, you won’t have to worry about hunting down Artifact Sigma itself, as Barrett already has it during Worlds Apart, meaning you just need to travel with him to Temple Sigma to unlock the power within.
Given how central the artifacts are to the story of Constellation, it makes sense that more powers are waiting for you by progressing the main story. However, aside from acquiring your first power in Into the Unknown, it’s actually optional whether you acquire the remaining powers, as the Power From Beyond mission is considered a side activity.
Can you get all the Starfield powers in one playthrough?
Yes, it’s possible to get all 24 Starfield powers in a single playthrough, though you will have to make specific choices and actively hunt out the artifacts and temples. This is important as NG+ will give you the opportunity to upgrade the powers you’ve already collected, so you don’t want to miss out.
Firstly, after you finish Revelations, the penultimate main mission, Vladimir will give players the locations of the remaining artifacts to find the temples. However, it’s surprisingly easy to miss this considering how close you are to the end of the game and the large gap between the first batch of locations and the remaining ones. In fact, it seems as though many players have indeed missed these additional locations, though there are reports of bugs with the Powers From Beyond quest, unfortunately.
Secondly, you will need to complete the Worlds Apart quest to access Temple Sigma and earn the Parallel Self power. The only problem with this is that you will need to earn affinity with Barrett to unlock the quest, which requires both time investment and good timing. As we alluded to earlier, this is because Barrett can actually die during in the main story, meaning players won’t be able to access this quest if they didn’t complete it in time.
Without prior knowledge, this is all too easy to do, gating access to the final of the 24 powers. Luckily, NG+ is the perfect opportunity to catch up on this if you missed it.
Best Starfield powers
The best Starfield powers are:
- Anti-Gravity Field
- Grav Dash
- Parallel Self
- Phased Time
- Precognition
- Reactive Shield
- Supernova
Generally, the best powers will give you a leg up in combat, either by offering some rare crowd control capabilities to our tool box or by boosting our own strength.
Unlike Skyrim and Fallout 4, you’re not limited to just one equipped power in Starfield, so you can in fact use several of the best powers at once. All you’ll have to do is head into the powers menu and assign whichever ones you’d like to use to your favorites menu. This will let you access them on demand in combat, without sending you back into a menu.
Yes, that does mean your favorites bar could be quite cramped given you will likely also have several weapons and aid items assigned prior to even unlocking powers.
Anti-Gravity Field
Anti-Gravity Field is a superb starting power, letting you disrupt nearby enemies. While it might not be as lethal as later skills, it’s hard to deny how useful this power can be, especially when you’re still progressing towards the later abilities.
Grav Dash
Grav Dash is about more than just mobility. While the ability to dash forwards is great in its own right, the added bonus of increasing damage makes it incredibly powerful and fun to use. It only gets stronger when it’s paired with one of the best Starfield builds, such as a melee build.
Parallel Self
Parallel Self can be extremely powerful if you know how to use. Creating a duplicate of yourself to fight alongside might not sound too strong – almost like having another companion – until you realize that this clone uses the same gear. So, equip one of the best Starfield weapons and spawn your Parallel Self to see them charge around with infinite ammo.
Phased Time
Like VATS from Fallout 4, Phased Time is easily one of the best Starfield powers thanks to how convenient it is. Slowing down time not only makes enemies easier to hit, especially with precision weapons, but it also gives you the breathing room to quickly reposition.
Precognition
Precognition doesn’t sound powerful on paper, especially in combat, but it’s utility to too handy to pass up. Sure, highlighting enemy movements can be great for stealth playstyles, but it’s the ability to see the consequences of dialogue choice that makes all the difference.
Reactive Shield
If you’re caught in a pinch, Reactive Shield is the perfect power for you. Striking a fine balance between offense and defense, Reactive Shield will boost your damage reduction while also reflecting projectiles.
Supernova
With a name like Supernova, it’s not all that surprising that it’s one of the best Starfield powers. Boasting massive damage in a large area, Supernova is great for clearing areas of enemies.
How to upgrade Starfield powers
You can upgrade your Starfield powers by entering New Game Plus mode after finishing the story and collecting the artifacts again. If you complete a temple you have already completed before, instead of unlocking a new power you will upgrade it to the next level. This increases is power and reduces its cost.
This rewards those who hunted down the artifacts and temples during their first run, as any duplicates will reward you with an upgraded power. While NG+ removes much of the players progress, powers are retained at the same level they were before entering the mode or moving into the next NG+ run.
Even if you didn’t collect them all on your first playthrough, however, fret not. Since you can do New Game Plus several times over, you can actually upgrade your powers through multiple different tiers, so long as you complete the temples each run.
Well, that covers everything you need to know about Starfield powers, including the best powers and how to get them. So, while you’re building Starfield outposts and exploring the Starfield planets in search of secrets, why not put your new abilities to the test?
Still looking for more? While a good Starfield wiki can be a handy source of information, our new Starfield Database goes further, offering you daily news, searchable databanks, and even interactive tools.