How Many Crew Members Can You Have in Starfield?

Crew are people you can recruit to work for you at your outposts, on your ships, or as followers. Potential crew members can be found throughout the Settled Systems, especially in bars. However, at the start of the game, you are limited to three crew members by default for both ships and outposts. Unfortunately, knowing how to raise this default limit is not explained and may be confusing. Here’s how many crew members you can have in Starfield and how to increase your max ship crew size.

What is the Ship Crew Size in Starfield?

Here’s how many Crew Members can you have in Starfield:

• The combined Crew Capacity on your Reactor, Weapon, Engine, and Shield modules
• The total number of Crew Stations in your cockpit and other modules.
• The number of active Crew members allowed by your Ship Command skill.

As you can see, three factors determine how many Crew Members you can have in Starfield. I recommend that you determine how many crew members you want, save your credits until you findd the perfect ship to handle them, and invest time and skill points in the Social skill tree to rank your Ship Command and Outpost Management skills. This plan took me a bit to accomplish during my playthrough, but I saved myself many wasted Skill Points, Credits, and time.

How to Increase Max ship Crew Size in Starfield

To expand the maximum crew size of your ship from the default number of three, you need to invest a minimum of 12 skill points in the Social skill tree to unlock the Ship Command skill (this is in the last tier in the Social skill tree). After unlocking it, you can invest skill points to increase your ship’s maximum crew size.

Related: How to Recruit New Crew Members in Starfield

You can use the Crew Roster to view your recruited crew members and their skills so you can assign them to your ships and outposts. You can also unassign them either through dialogue or through the Crew Roster. To access the Crew Roster, open your Character screen. Then, select the Ship tab on the bottom left of the screen.

How to Increase Max Outpost Crew Size in Starfield

If you want to increase your outpost crew capacity in Starfield, you need to invest a minimum of eight skill points in the Social tree. This will unlock the Outpost Management option. From here, you need to spend three more ability points to raise your Outpost Management skill to Rank three which allows you to assign additional crew members to your outposts.

Author’s Note: I wrote this guide while playing Starfield on Xbox Series S and PC.