How To Fish In No Man's Sky

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Every No Man’s Sky update brings something new to this ongoing space epic. The Aquarius update has brought something long requested by No Man’s Sky fans: fishing. Finally, Travelers can land their spaceship near a quiet ravine or lake, kick off their space boots, and throw a line into the water to see if the fish are biting.

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The casual serenity of fishing is the perfect thing for weary Travelers tired of exploring an endless universe. The low-stakes exploration of a local watering hole provides all the thrill of discovery without the risk of pirates, Sentinels, or giant bug monsters. So grab your rod and learn how to fish in No Man’s Sky.

Your first step to going on your fishing adventure is grabbing the Fishing Rig from the Anomaly. Head to the Anomaly and speak to Iteration Eos in the research area behind Polo and Nada. You'll be able to purchase the Fishing Rig blueprint from Eos for a single Nanite.

Once you have the blueprint, you'll need to install the Fishing Rig on your Multi-Tool. To do that, you'll need the following ingredients:

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Now that you've got your Fishing Rig installed, it's time to go fishing!

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Once you've got your Fishing Rig installed, head to the nearest body of water. While fish can live in many different types of planetary environments, they only live in water.

Not every planet will have water. Barren, Scorched, and Volcanic planets might have little to no water, while Dead worlds will have zero water. Look for Marshy, Frozen, and Lush worlds for water. For more, check out our planetary guide here.

Find a nice spot near the water's edge and select your Fishing Rig from your Multi-Tool (the same way you would select the Terrain Manipulator, Mining Tool, or your various weapon systems). Press RT or the left mouse button to cast your lead at the spot indicated on the water.

If your target area is too far or not on water, you'll receive an error message.

Now comes the hard part: waiting. Fish won't immediately bite, but after a few seconds, you'll see your lure start to bob in the water alongside a yellow flash. This indicates that a fish is interested in your lure. Once the lure sinks below the water as your Fishing Rig and lure glow green, you've hooked a fish, and it's time to reel it in by holding RT/left mouse.

Wait until the indicator turns green to reel your catch. If the Rig flashes yellow, it's too early.

If successful, your catch will appear in the middle of your screen. Fish can vary widely by size and quality, which will be indicated by the rarity of your catch. To catch better fish, you'll need to enhance your lure with bait.

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If you want better fish, you're going to need bait. Luckily, you learn six bait recipes as soon as you install your first Fishing Rig. Those bait recipes are below:

Bait Type

Recipe

Effect

Mealworms

120 Condensed Carbon → 20 Mealworms

Improves size and rarity of catch

Spicy Chum

80 Mordite, 25 Phosphorous, 90 Di-hydrogen → 20 Spicy Chum

Further improves size and rarity of catch

Bionic Lure

2 Amino Chamber, 3 Ionic Battery, 3 Lubricant → 20 Bionic Lure

Greatly Improves the size and rarity of catch, especially for seeking Legendary-grade fish

Dangling Orb

1 Solar Mirror, 1 Metal Plating, 65 Sodium Nitrate → 20 Dangling Orb

Attracts diurnal fish

Shadow Lure

2 Antimatter, 1 Metal Plating, 40 Cyto-Phosphate → 20 Shadow Lure

Attracts nocturnal fish

Magpulse Lure

1 Magnetic Resonator, 1 Metal Plating, 90 Tritium → 20 Magpulse Lure

Attracts fish only active during storms

These six recipes aren't the only items that can be used as bait. Other items can also be applied to your Fishing Rig to act as bait, such as Juicy Grubs or Meaty Chunks.

To apply bait to your Fishing Rig, you'll first need to create the bait in your Exosuit inventory. Once done, go to your Multi-Tool and select the Fishing Rig option 'Apply Bait.' You'll then be taken to a new screen where you can select the type of bait you wish to apply from your inventory.

This screen also shows how your bait improves the size and rarity of your catch as a percentage.

Bait can make a big difference in the quality of your catch. You should generally apply some sort of bait to your Fishing Rig before fishing.

You lose one bait every time you reel your lure in, regardless of whether you’ve caught something or not.

There are quite a number of different fish able to be caught—possibly equal to the number of procedurally generated species on every planet. However, just like starships and technology upgrades, fish will fall into four different rarity categories: C, B, A, and S.

The higher the rarity, the more valuable the catch, and the better quality meals it can produce.

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Like other ingredients, caught fish can be cooked using the Nutrient Processor.

Construct the Nutrient Processor and place it on the ground (no power or base is required for its operation). Interact with the Nutrient Processor to bring up its menu. You can place up to three raw ingredients for processing.

Every fish can be processed into a cooked meal. Fish can also be combined to create more potent and valuable dishes. You can cook two fish for a moderately expensive and nutritious meal, or three fish for an even more expensive and nutritious meal.

The quality of the ingredients determines the quality of the cooked dish. The rarer the fish you put into the Nutrient Processor, the more valuable and healthful the final product.

Half the point of fishing is to achieve a meditative state waiting for a fish to bite, but if you're not interested in the whole fishing thing, you can automate the process using the Automated Fishing Trap.

You can buy blueprints for the Automated Fishing Trap on the Anomaly at the Construction Research Station for one Salavaged Data. Creating an Automated Fishing Trap requires the following ingredients:

Automated Fishing Traps can be placed on the water and then returned to later to see what you catch. Each Automated Fishing Trap can catch up to four fish.

Unfortunately, the Automated Fishing Trap cannot have bait applied in the same way as the Fishing Rig. Because of this, the overall quality of fish caught using these traps is generally lower than what you can get by actively fishing on your own. But if it's quantity over quality you’re after, the Automated Fishing Trap is the perfect way to fish.

Create an underwater base with many Fishing Traps to set up your own deep-sea fish farm.

Now get out there and enjoy the calm joy of fishing in an infinite universe!

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