The Belt Provides
Mining is one of the core money-making activities in Stars Beyond. You take a mining-equipped ship into asteroid fields, scan for valuable deposits, fracture rocks with mining lasers, and extract raw materials. Everything the economy runs on comes from the belt — ship parts, weapons, fuel, station supplies. Miners keep the world turning.
There are three tiers of mining. Surface Scraping is easy and low-risk — you skim the outer layers of common asteroids for basic ores. Deep Core Drilling takes more skill and better equipment, cracking into dense asteroid cores for higher-value materials. Volatile Extraction is where the real money lives — and where ships get destroyed. Unstable materials can detonate during extraction, and the asteroids themselves can fragment without warning.
You can mine solo or in groups. Solo runs are quiet and profitable for common ores. Bigger operations targeting rare deposits benefit from coordination — dedicated miners, hauler ships to move cargo, and escorts to keep pirates off your back.
How Mining Works
Activate your scanner pulse to highlight nearby asteroids. Results are color-coded: grey means worthless rock, yellow marks common ores, blue indicates rare deposits, and red flags volatile or dangerous materials. Scanner range and precision are upgradeable — better scanners find better rocks.
Lock your mining laser on the target asteroid and manage the power output carefully. Too low and nothing happens — the rock shrugs it off. Too high and the asteroid explodes violently, damaging or destroying your ship. Hit the sweet spot and the rock fractures cleanly into extractable fragments.
Switch to extraction mode once the rock is fractured. Your tractor beam pulls fragments into your cargo hold one by one. Different materials have different weights and volumes — plan your cargo space before you fly out. Nothing worse than leaving rare ore behind because your hold is full of iron.
Raw ore must be refined at stations before it can be sold at full value or used in crafting. Refining takes time and costs credits. Higher-tier refining stations yield more usable material from the same amount of ore. Alternatively, sell raw ore for quick cash at a lower price — sometimes speed beats margins.
What You Can Find
Iron, Nickel, Copper. Found everywhere in every belt zone. Low value per unit but a steady, reliable income stream. Used in basic crafting recipes for hull plating, structural components and ammunition.
Titanium, Tungsten, Chromium. Found in dense asteroid clusters deeper in the belt. Medium value with consistent demand. Essential for ship parts, weapon manufacturing and station construction projects.
Power Crystals, Plasma Shards. Found locked inside deep-core asteroids that require skilled fracturing. High value on the market. Critical components in energy weapons, shield generators and power systems.
Neodymium, Palladium, Iridium. Rare spawns that don't appear on every scan. Very high value and always in demand. Used in advanced technology, elite upgrades and experimental equipment.
Water Ice, Ammonia Ice, Methane. Found in the outer belt zones where temperatures drop. Medium value with specialized uses. Essential for fuel production, life support systems and chemical processing.
Drift Fuel, Anomaly Crystals. Extremely valuable but dangerously unstable — a timer starts the moment you extract them. Deliver to a station before the timer runs out or they detonate in your cargo hold. Highest risk, highest reward.
What Can Kill You
The belt is not safe. Pirates patrol known mining routes, waiting for ships with full cargo holds. They scan for loaded miners and strike when you're focused on extraction — weapons cold, shields down, too deep in the belt to call for help.
Unstable asteroids can fragment without warning, sending shrapnel into your hull. Volatile materials in your cargo hold run on a countdown — if you can't reach a station in time, your ship becomes the explosion. Nexus Corp patrols enforce "extraction taxes" on independent miners, and refusal means confiscation at gunpoint.
And sometimes, in the deep belt where the rocks are oldest and the scanner range fades to static, your instruments pick up a signature that isn't a rock. Something moving. Something that doesn't match any known ship profile. Experienced miners know the rule: if you can't identify it, you leave. Immediately.
Your Tools of the Trade
Your first ship's mining attachment. Slow extraction speed, small cargo capacity, limited scanner range. Good enough for learning the ropes in safe inner-belt zones where competition is low and pirates rarely bother.
A purpose-built mining vessel with upgraded lasers, a proper ore scanner and a significantly bigger cargo hold. This is the workhorse — the ship you'll spend most of your mining career flying. Reliable, efficient, and pays for itself quickly.
Multi-laser mining rig with massive cargo capacity. Needs crew members or AI helpers to operate at full efficiency. Can crack deep-core asteroids that smaller ships simply can't touch. Slow and vulnerable, but nothing else moves this much ore.
Miner's Wisdom
"Start in the Eridan Belt inner zone — fewer pirates, decent common ores. Learn the fracturing rhythm before you go deeper."
"Always check volatile material timers. Losing a full cargo hold to an explosion is the most expensive lesson in the game."
"Group mining is more efficient: one mines, one hauls, one watches for pirates. Split the profits three ways and everyone makes more than they would solo."
"Invest in scanner upgrades early — finding rare deposits is the difference between grinding common ore for hours and actually getting rich."