No Man's Sky is going to iPhone and iPad. Hello Games announced today that its space exploration game will launch on the App Store on October 28, and pre-orders are already live. It will be free to try: the opening of the game costs nothing, and a single one-time purchase unlocks the rest. This is not a cut-down mobile spin-off. It is the same universe that PC and console players have been exploring since 2016, with ten years of free updates included.
The full game, not a Lite version
Studio head Sean Murray made the point directly in the announcement: this is not a 'Lite' edition. The iOS release carries the complete game with more than forty major updates. That includes COSMOS, the 10th-anniversary update that arrived only a few weeks ago, and Voyagers, last year's update that let players build their own large starships.
The App Store listing names every one of them, starting with Foundation and Pathfinder and running through NEXT, Beyond, Origins, Worlds Parts I and II, The Swarm and COSMOS. On paper, an iPhone owner who buys in on day one starts with the same feature set as someone who has been playing on a PS5 for years.
What's missing at launch
There are two caveats, and Hello Games compares them to the original Switch launch. Multiplayer is not supported on iOS, so for now every Traveller explores alone. Planetary Settlements, the system that puts players in charge of running a town, only works on iPhone 15 Pro and newer.
The studio says it will treat the iOS version the way it treated Switch: listen to players, then build on it. That approach eventually led to a much fuller Switch 2 edition. Hello Games adds that how much it invests in the mobile version will depend on how many people actually play it, so day-one numbers will shape what comes next.
Which devices can run it
Rather than limiting the game to the latest flagship phones, Hello Games has set the minimum at iPhone 11 and the 3rd-generation iPad Air. The App Store listing also asks for iOS or iPadOS 26. That covers a large share of iPhones still in use, which matters for a game whose universe is generated on the device itself.
That on-device generation also keeps the install small. Hello Games puts the download under 4GB, and the App Store listing shows about 3.8GB, which is light for a game of this scope on any platform. The studio also says it spent a lot of effort on battery life and heat, aiming for long play sessions that don't leave the phone too hot to hold.
Touch controls rebuilt from scratch
The bigger challenge was controls. No Man's Sky asks players to walk, fly, drive, pilot mechs and switch between first and third person, then spend long stretches in crafting and inventory menus. Hello Games says it rebuilt the touch interface from the ground up rather than laying virtual buttons over the console layout, and singles out inventory and crafting as the areas it worked on most.
Players who would rather not play on glass have options too. The iOS version supports game controllers and casting to a TV, and on iPad it also supports a mouse and keyboard. Put together, an iPad with a controller or keyboard is close to a portable PC setup.
How the launch works
Pre-orders opened as part of the App Store's Indie Games Week, and the game goes live on October 28. Because it is free to try, anyone with a compatible device can download it and play the opening hours before deciding whether to pay. That is a low-risk way to sample the game for anyone who skipped it on other platforms.
The iOS launch caps a busy anniversary year for Hello Games, which has also kept Light No Fire, its next game, in development. Ten years after a famously rocky launch, No Man's Sky now runs on almost everything from VR headsets to Switch, and from October 28, on the phone in your pocket.
