No Man's Sky Resources
What to mine first, how chromatic metal works, and which planet types pay.
Every crash site is the same argument: life support, hazard protection, launch fuel, then a warp cell. This page is the material side of that argument. For button layouts use Controls. For selling the surplus use units and nanites. For actually leaving the planet use Getting Started.
Scan first. The Analysis Visor (and the ship scanner in space) is how you see sodium flowers, oxygen plants, carbon-rich flora, ferrite rocks, and hotspot icons. If a resource is not lighting up, upgrade the visor and the ship’s scanner modules before you fly another hour in the wrong direction.
The early loop
Sodium and Sodium Nitrate refill hazard protection. Yellow flowers, cave clusters, and storm deposits. Always keep a stack in the exosuit.
Oxygen refills life support and refines with almost everything. Red plants, hazardous flora, and kelp later. Oxygen plus sodium or carbon is the cheap refine trick that keeps a new save moving.
Carbon and Condensed Carbon feed the mining beam and portable refiners. Punch plants. Condensed carbon is the backpack fuel you actually want.
Ferrite Dust, Pure Ferrite, and Magnetised Ferrite are the metal spine: repair the ship, make metal plates, feed terrain manipulators. Rocks everywhere. A refiner turns dust into pure, pure into magnetised.
Di-hydrogen is the blue crystal used in launch fuel and a dozen early crafts. Mine the crystals; do not waste them as vendor junk.
Copper (yellow-star stellar metal) and Cobalt (caves, often with ionised cobalt on extreme worlds) get you off the starter planet’s economy. Copper refines to chromatic metal. Cobalt sells, charges certain shields, and fills portal slots.
That is the first-hour grocery list. Everything else is a luxury until those seven behave.
Chromatic metal and stellar colours
Chromatic metal is the refined product of stellar metals. Copper in yellow systems, cadmium in red, emeril in green, indium in blue, quartzite in purple. Higher-tier metals refine into more chromatic metal per unit. You expand a stash by refining one unit of a stellar metal with chromatic metal already in the machine — the classic duplication-by-design recipe Hello Games left in on purpose.
Activated variants spawn on extreme worlds in the matching colour. They mine slower, pay more, and eat hazard protection. If the planet description screams firestorms or aggressive sentinels, expect activated copper (or worse) and storm crystals.
Storm crystals, Salvaged Data, Runaway Mould
Storm crystals grow during extreme weather. Walk into the storm, grab the crystal, walk out. They sell for units or refine toward nanites depending on current recipes; either way they are why extreme planets are not just a punishment. Pair with sodium and a decent hazard module.
Salvaged Data comes from buried technology modules — the little beacons your visor tags once you know to look. Take it to the Construction Research Station on the Space Anomaly. That is how base building unlocks rooms, storage, and the pieces you will later stick on an orbital base. Do not sell Salvaged Data unless you already own the parts you care about.
Runaway Mould pops from Curious Deposits (the bouncing balls). Refine mould to nanites. It is one of the honest nanite farms, slower than a perfect mill but available on ordinary worlds. Watch your inventory; mould stacks eat space.
Purple systems: lithium and quartzite
Worlds Part II (~January 2025) added purple stars. You reach them with the Atlantid Drive after the Autophage story In Stellar Multitudes. They do not show like a normal colour until that quest has run.
Facts we are sure of:
- Planets in purple systems carry quartzite (and activated quartzite on the nasty ones). It is the purple stellar metal and refines to chromatic metal like indium’s cousin.
- Water worlds in those systems carry lithium as a terrain resource and oceans that go absurdly deep.
- Gas giants carry crystallised helium, extreme planet-wide weather, and a handful of moons. They are not starter planets.
- Purple systems also tend to include a dissonant world, which matters if you still want an Interceptor.
You do not need lithium on day one. You need it when a recipe or a relic part says so. Until then, treat purple stars as a mid-game field trip, not a tutorial detour.
Planet hunting: what the scanner is saying
Paradise (or lush with low sentinels, no storms, water) is the postcard. Good for a first base and for showing friends through a portal. Check sentinel level; a paradise with aggressive sentinels is a postcard with a police force.
Extreme worlds pay with activated metals and storm crystals. Build a small hut, not a city, until you own the hazard tech.
Dissonant worlds drip purple corruption, inverted mirrors, and Sentinel interceptors. Bring combat or stealth. They are a multi-tool and ship hunt, not a cobalt farm.
Gas giants are hostile on a planetary scale. Land if you like helium and stories. Do not plant your only save beacon there.
Water worlds are ocean with a crust somewhere far below. Bring nautilon plans and oxygen. Lithium is the geological reason to stay.
After Cosmos, planet hunting is only half the scan. The star system map also marks belts, hulks, and outposts. A boring planet can sit under a brilliant ice field. Scan space the same way you scan grass.
A sane gather order
- Sodium, oxygen, carbon, ferrite, di-hydrogen until the ship launches without begging.
- Copper → chromatic metal → hyperdrive.
- Salvaged Data on every planet you already visit.
- Cobalt caves when you need a units spike.
- Storm crystals on the first extreme world you can survive.
- Runaway Mould when nanites gate a module.
- Purple-system quartzite only after Atlantid Drive.
A corvette from Voyagers does not replace this list. It just lets you haul more of it, plus hulk chunks the Tractor Beam eats. Keep the grocery stack in the exosuit so a wrecked fighter cannot strand you on a lithium beach with an empty life-support bar.
When a world looks perfect, screenshot a portal address with an OS capture (see Portal Glyphs) before you strip the copper node next to the pad. Future-you will want the coordinates more than another 200 ferrite. Bookmark the Tools Hub if you bounce between glyphs and materials. Then open the visor again — the next plant you ignore is probably sodium, and sodium is still what keeps the storm off your back.
Frequently Asked Questions
Quick answers Travellers search for after Cosmos.
What should I mine in the first hour?
Sodium, oxygen, carbon, ferrite dust, and di-hydrogen, then copper for chromatic metal. Keep those stacks in the exosuit, not only in the ship.
How do I make chromatic metal?
Refine copper (yellow systems) or a higher stellar metal: cadmium, emeril, indium, or quartzite. Activated versions on extreme worlds yield more.
Where do Salvaged Data and Runaway Mould come from?
Salvaged Data is buried technology modules tagged by the visor; spend it at the Anomaly. Runaway Mould drops from Curious Deposits and refines into nanites.
Do purple systems have unique resources?
Yes. Quartzite is the stellar metal on purple-system planets. Water worlds there carry lithium; gas giants carry crystallised helium. You need the Atlantid Drive to reach them.
Paradise or extreme for money?
Paradise is for living. Extreme is for storm crystals and activated metals. Pair either with the units and nanites guide instead of hoarding raw ferrite.