Bethesda has recently divulged the staggering disk space requirements for its forthcoming flagship game, Starfield. This much-anticipated title is set to grace PC and Xbox Series X | S consoles on September 6. For those who found Baldur’s Gate 3 to be a substantial consumer of storage space, the extent of Starfield’s demands might come as a surprise. Particularly for PC enthusiasts, the game’s penchant for devouring nearly 14 GB of additional hard drive space may seem perplexing.
According to Bethesda’s official information, Starfield will commandeer a hefty 139.84GB of disk space on PCs, with Xbox consoles accommodating a slightly less massive 126.1GB. This allocation of space is truly monumental. Although solid-state drives (SSDs) are more affordable today, they remain the prevalent storage solution. Given that a 1 TB SSD is commonplace, the footprint of Starfield equates to nearly 14% of that storage capacity. The scenario on Xbox consoles presents distinct challenges, with the Series X boasting 1 TB of storage while the Series S only offers half that capacity.
Starfield “eats up” disk space
Undoubtedly, Starfield stands as one of the most highly anticipated games this year, not without reason. Representing one of Bethesda’s most ambitious undertakings since Skyrim, the game has reached the milestone of being declared “Gold,” signifying its readiness for launch on September 6. In recent times, the developer has released official specifications detailing the disk space requirements for Starfield across both PC and console platforms.
Baldur’s Gate 3 had already demanded a considerable 150 GB of available disk space, with the caveat that this be on an SSD due to the immense loading times associated with a conventional mechanical drive. While the download size of Baldur’s Gate 3 is 97.4 GB, its installed size amounts to 121.47 GB on PC (the PS5 version’s space requirements are still undisclosed). This makes Starfield’s projected size even greater, positioning it among the largest games in history, if not potentially the largest.
Interestingly, the disparity in disk space allocation between the PC and Xbox versions of Starfield amounts to a significant 13.74 GB, or nearly 14 GB. This discrepancy prompts a question: Why such a substantial difference for a theoretically identical game? Assigning almost 14 GB solely for drivers and compatibility files to enhance PC performance appears disproportionate. Consequently, the disparity seems to hint at a more profound reason—potentially higher resolution textures or other technical enhancements.
Ray tracing, an advanced rendering technique, could hold the answer. Currently, it remains uncertain whether Starfield will officially support ray tracing, along with technologies like DLSS or FSR. Notably, this game is partnered with AMD, not NVIDIA. While these aspects await confirmation through actual gameplay, they offer a plausible explanation for the additional 14 GB in terms of enhanced graphical features.