How Long Does It Take to Beat Starfield? Answered

There’s a vast galaxy to explore in Bethesda’s latest romp, filled with countless planets and moons. Naturally, you’ll encounter several companions and rival factions. Of course, you’ll also tackle numerous quests. Our guide takes a look at just how many hours it takes to beat Starfield. Likewise, please be reminded that this guide contains minor spoilers.

How Long Does it Take to Beat Starfield — Game Length Guide

The Starfield campaign length, according to HowLongToBeat.com, is approximately 15 hours. In comparison, doing the main story, as well as a few side content, will require roughly 77 and a half hours. However, a completionist run, which means tackling everything in every location on every planet, will probably lead to over 200 hours of playtime.

I certainly agree for the most part, especially since I was able to review the game. Likewise, I’ve cleared two New Game Plus runs already.

Main Quest Length

As far as how long to beat Starfield goes, I can offer a rough estimate: I spent less than 20 hours doing main missions only. That’s because of how the campaign is structured. Here’s a quick summary:

• The Constellation group tasks you with collecting artifacts. You’ll continue tackling missions, such as The Old Neighborhood, Back to Vectera, and others, until you’ve obtained all the artifacts.
• The missions themselves were fairly formulaic: go to a location, kill all enemies, and pick up an item/rescue a person. Still, there were some neat twists and surprising moments.
• Your tasks lead to the final mission and ending, as well as a decision to advance further into New Game Plus mode.

Related: Best Items to Sell in Starfield

What Types of Side Content Can You Expect

However, since this is a Bethesda game, you can expect loads of content and activities on the side. Here are some examples:

• There are four major factions that you can join, and each one has a lengthy quest arc. Moreover, you can do bounty-type tasks via mission boards.
• Four full-fledged companions have an affinity system, quest, and romance. This means they need to tag along so you can increase their approval.
• The game has dozens of star systems, each with multiple planets. There are hundreds of planets that you can visit.
• You can also expect radiant encounters, ship battles, and a bunch of neat things to discover. Similarly, it’s possible to complete planet surveys and reveal planet traits.
• You can build outposts to act as makeshift bases, and mine/farm resources.
• Of course, for those who like to capture perfect moments, I can tell you that making use of Photo Mode automatically adds 10-20 hours. We all know how important it is to get the right angle and filter.

To be fair, though, I did feel that many of the planets and moons were empty. Other than odd-looking alien plants and beasts, mercenary forces remained static in abandoned bases, with barely any patrols. As such, even if you want to do a lot of side content, you should still be mindful of the potential tedium when you see samey-looking landmarks and samey-looking creatures across the galaxy.

All in all, I was able to write my review with roughly 80 hours played in Starfield. Since then, I’ve spent close to 100 hours, mostly due to exploration, questing, and outpost building. I was also able finish the initial campaign, as well as the first New Game Plus run.

That’s everything you need to know about how long it takes to beat Starfield. For more tips and strategies, you can visit our guides hub.