Keyboard and mouse controls

Main console

• F1: Change camera view.
• F2: Use the map system.
• F3: Look at your own information.
• F4: Select targets, operate autopilot and communicate.
• SHIFT-F1 to F5: Time compression
• PgUp / PgDwn: Increase / decrease time compression
• CTRL click on Time compression icons: Force time compression

• CTRL-Print Screen: Save screenshot

• CTRL-F9: Quick save
• CTRL-Q: Quit instantly
• ALT-F1: Change view to fly by camera

Menus

• Numbers or click to select

Map System

• F5: Galactic sector view
• F6: System orbit view
• F7: Star system information
• F8: Galactic view

 

Galactic sector view

• Arrows: Rotate
• Page Up/Down: Scroll Z
• W, A, S ,D: Move on the plane
• R, F: Move up and down
• C: Center to where I am
• H: Center to selected system
• Enter: Enable/Disable automatic system selection
• Space: Set Hyperspace Target to Lock or Follow Selection

 

Orbital view

• click / unclick (planet or ship) sets / unsets as navigation target, and to focus on it
• Hold right mouse to rotate the view

In flight

• F5: Turns off the autopilot, and changes between manual flight and set speed flight
• F6: Undercarriage
• F7: Hyperdrive
• F8: Set lower thrust speed
• F9: Toggle missile / scanner panel on / off

• CTRL click on Autopilot icon: Cycle Heading control to forward, afterward and off (note: Ctrl+F5 doesn not work, must use mouse)
• R: Toggle rotation damping

• Tab: Cycle through full HUD/HUD without labels/No HUD and cockpit
• `: Lua console

• Clicking on an object (planet, star, station, ship), will select it as a target.
• CTRL click on a object, will select it as a target and as reference body.

Views

• KP 8: Front Camera / Rotate External/Sidereal Up
• KP 2: Rear Camera / Rotate External/Sidereal Down
• KP 4: Left Camera / Rotate External/Sidereal Left
• KP 6: Right Camera / Rotate External/Sidereal Right
• KP 9: Top Camera
• KP 3: Bottom Camera / Roll External/Sidereal Right
• +: Zoom in (external/sidereal view only)
• -: Zoom out (external/sidereal view only)
• Home: Reset zoom (sidereal view only)
• , and .: In fixed view, roll camera

In external views, third mouse button rotates the view.

(NOTE: If you do not have a numeric keypad, please rebind the view direction controls from the View tab in the Settings screen)

Scanner

• \: Toggle scanner mode
• ]: Increase scanner range
• [: Decrease scanner range

 

Weapons

• T: Target object in crosshair
• Space: Fire laser
• M: Launch missile

 

Manual control 

• W, S: Forward/backward thrust
• A, D: Left/right lateral thrust
• R, F: Up/down lateral thrust
• Q,E; I,O: Roll CCW/CW
• J,L: Yaw left/right
• I,K: Pitch down/up
• X, P: Kill rotation
• V: Toggle rotation damping

Holding the right mouse also rotates the ship.

Hold SHIFT + <key> to low power thrust and smooth turns.

"Set speed" control mode

Thrust and rotation are same as above

• Enter, T: Set speed faster
• Right Shift, G: Set speed slower

Engaging any of the translation thrusters will tempralily disengage Set Speed Mode, until the directional thrust is cut.

A useful tip when you need to approach ships, either in combat, or a SAR mission for example. Pressing ctrl+LMB on the tartget will set it as the reference frame. Then the Set Speed mode will work relative to the ship, which in practice acts like a match speed mode, if speed is set to 0.

Cheats and debug

• CTRL-I: Debug informations (FPS and other statistics).
• CTRL-F10: Object viewer. Shows the currently targeted object. It allows for editing the properties of target planet
• CTRL-F12: Spawn a hostile ship
• Console: ~ or ´ depending on keyboard. Some useful commands for debugging/testing code/contributions are given here, but remember, cheating is for weaklings. However, it is allowed to restore borked saves.