After 10 Years of Redemption, No Man's Sky Comes to iPhone and iPad

If you have an iPhone 11 or newer, you can carry a universe in your pocket.

If you have an iPhone 11 or later, you can have a world in your pocket.

Screenshot of No Man's Sky on iPhone.

Just over 10 years after its initial release, space exploration and survival game No Man's Sky is making its way to iPhone and iPad, Apple and developer Hello Games announced today.

It runs on devices like iPhone 11 and iPad Air 3rd generation. No Man's Sky may not have the most cutting-edge AAA graphics (though they're still strong and have come a long way since launch via updates), but the game's unusual way of generating incomprehensible-scale galaxies on the device is consistently impressive for all players from a single-core device on a phone, to those working on desktop phones or PCs.

This version of the game includes all the content and system updates that have been added to the game over the years - developments that famously transformed the game from a stone-throwing ritual into a wildly popular redemption story.

There are a few compromises, though, and it's similar to what we saw in No Man's Sky on the Nintendo Switch. Hello Games says that the ability to build and explore player-made planetary locations is limited to the iPhone 15 Pro and later, and multiplayer is not supported on any iOS device. "We're excited to see player feedback on iOS and will support it appropriately based on how many people are playing," the company says, potentially leaving the door open to not supporting all future content updates if the player base isn't there to justify it.

In addition to touch controls (which should really be fine for a menu-heavy game like this), the iPhone version supports gamepads and cast-to-TV, while the iPad version supports both, plus mouse and keyboard input.

Hello Games has been working on the iOS version for three years. It also recently released a well-received macOS port of the game.

The iOS port of No Man's Sky is part of what Apple is billing as "Indie Games Week," which includes several other titles, such as the cat exploration game Little Kitty, Big City, and the strategy game 9 Kings.

While other indie titles in Apple's push are already out, No Man's Sky is going to stick around a bit: it's coming out on October 28th. It also offers a free trial and the final purchase price will be $19.99. File size is less than 5 GB. Remember, those millions of planets are not assets stored in a folder. Instead, they are generated on-the-fly on the device.

Samuel Axon is the editor for tech and gaming coverage at Ars Technica. He covers physical and generative artificial intelligence, large language models, software development, gaming, entertainment, and mixed reality. He has written about gaming and technology for nearly two decades at Engadget, PC World, Mashable, Vice, Polygon, Wired, and others. He previously ran a gaming industry PR and marketing agency, led editorial for CBS Television, and worked on social media marketing strategy for Samsung Mobile at creative agency SPCSHP. He is also an independent software and game developer for iOS, Windows, and other platforms, and is a graduate of DePaul University, where he studied interactive media and software development.