Where to buy Adaptive Frame in Starfield

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Starfield Adaptive Frames are a key material you’ll need if you want to even start thinking about building your own outpost. There are a huge number of research projects relating to various aspects of your outposts that require Adaptive Frames, and you’re going to have to really stock up on them if you want to have a worthwhile outpost.

If you want to learn more about building Starfield outposts, take a look at our guide for some great tips. Make sure to prepare yourself for your adventures in space, too, with Starfield ship manufacturers, and Starfield best reactors so you can ensure you’ve got the best ship possible, as well as the Starfield best spacesuits to keep you safe. With that, let’s get into where to get adaptive frames in Starfield.

Where to get Adaptive Frames in Starfield

There are three main ways to get Adaptive Frames in Starfield. These are purchasing them from shops, crafting them using an Industrial Workbench, and finding them while exploring. Luckily, if you know where to look, stocking up on Adaptive Frames is a simple matter, and you’ll soon have more than you can carry.

Starfield Adaptive Frames: The outside of Jemison Mercantile in New Atlantis.
Jemison Mercantile in New Atlantis sells Adaptive Frames. Captured by VideoGamer

Purchasing Adaptive Frames

You can buy Adaptive Frames from vendors such as general stores, spaceport shops, Trade Authority locations, Civilian Outposts, and from certain specific electronics stores. Just in New Atlantis alone, you can buy Adaptive Frames from Jemison Mercantile near the spaceport landing bay and Outland in the Commercial District on the topside, and from the Trade Authority and Apex Electronics in The Well. If you’re exploring alien planets, look out for Civilian Outposts, as these will often stock Adaptive Frames, too.

Here is a list of vendors that sell Adaptive Frames:

ShopLocation
Shepherd’s General StoreShepherd’s General Store
UC ExchangeCydonia, Mars
Clints CollectiblesGagarin Landing, Gagarin
Sieghart’s OutfittersNeon, Volii Alpha
Apex ElectronicsNew Atlantis, Jemison
Jemison MercantileNew Atlantis, Jemison
OutlandNew Atlantis, Jemison

Out of all of these, the best vendors are those in New Atlantis, as there are a few vendors close together that you can buy in bulk from, that are also available from a lower level. Be aware that the availability of Adaptive Frames at some of these vendors will vary, so if they don’t have anything in stock, wait or sleep for 24 hours and check back again.

Without the use of the Commerce skill to reduce prices, one Adaptive Frame will run you a fairly cheap 24 credits. Be aware that vendor stock may vary, so you won’t always be able to get the maximum number of Frames from each shop.

Starfield Adaptive Frames: The player crafting Adaptive Frames at a workbench.
You can also craft Adaptive Frames. Captured by VideoGamer

Crafting Adaptive Frames

If you’ve got a big stockpile of resources, then crafting your Adaptive Frames might be the quickest way to obtain a lot of them. Head to an Industrial Workbench in your outpost, The Lodge, or on your ship. The components required to build one Adaptive Frame are x1 unit of iron and x1 unit of aluminum.

✓ Tip

Build an outpost on a planet rich in Iron and Aluminum. The resources you mine will help you craft Adaptive Frames quickly, letting you build out your outpost and potentially increase resource production to make even more Adaptive Frames.

Both of these ores are fairly common across Starfield’s many planets, and you should be able to come up with the ores you need fairly quickly, especially if your outpost is on a planet rich in these elements. This is especially true if you build some extractors to make your resource extraction much more efficient.

Our Starfield outposts guide has a list of the best places to put an outpost, but if you’re looking for a great planet to find these resources in abundance, we’d recommend both Leviathan IV in the Leviathan system, and Andraphon, a moon of Sumati in the Narion system. Both of these planets are rich in iron and aluminum, and great options to farm these resources.

Finding Adaptive Frames

This is definitely the least effective means of farming Adaptive Frames, but is worth keeping in mind while you’re doing some exploration. Adaptive Frames will sometimes crop up in random containers and crates you find in abandoned outposts, caves, and ships. Obviously, you can’t control which random planets you’ll find Adaptive Frames on, though, so just keep an eye out for them, but don’t go adventuring with the specific intent of finding them.

Starfield Adaptive Frames: A research project that requires three adaptive frames to complete.
Adaptive Frames are used for research. Captured by VideoGamer

What are Adaptive Frames used for?

Adaptive Frames are used as a material in various Research Lab projects, as well as a material used in building a variety of outpost structures, furniture, and more. Here is a list of all the research projects with Adaptive Frames as a research component

  • Domestication 1
  • Horticulture 1
  • Manufacturing 1
  • Manufacturing 2
  • Power Generation 1
  • Resource Extraction 1
  • Resource Extraction 2

During our playthrough, we found that with the Adaptive Frame being used in so many aspects of outpost construction, it’s important to stock up wherever possible, as it will be one of the most used materials during the outpost building process.

That’s everything you need to know about where to get Adaptive Frames in Starfield. If you’re looking for specific resources and want to know if a planet has them, be sure to check out how to scan in Starfield. And if you’re nearing the end of the game and wondering if there’s a Starfield new game plus, we’ve got you covered there, too.

For more Starfield help, read up on where to get the Mark 1 spacesuitwhere to get the Bounty Hunter spacesuithow to find the scorpion’s sting on Hyla IIwhere to get DigipicksStarfield companions and Starfield romance. If you’re questing, make sure to check out the Starfield Echoes of the Past, Starfield Into the Unknown, and Starfield Delivering Devils quests, too.

About the Author

Alex Raisbeck

Alex is a Guides Writer for VideoGamer. He is an indie gaming obsessive with a soft spot for Zelda, roguelikes, and Football Manager, as well as an unhealthy relationship with his backlog.

Starfield

  • Platform(s): PC, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series S/X, Xbox Series X
  • Genre(s): Adventure, RPG, Science Fiction, Space