OSRS: Getting Started with Sailing as a Newer Player
Posted on November 20, 2025 by Aywren
Yesterday, Old School RuneScape launched its first ever new skill – sailing! This was something I’ve been waiting for since I first heard about it last year, and was one of the deciding factors on what drew me to play in the first place.
Now that sailing is finally here, I’ve spent a few hours exploring the early levels of the skill and enjoying time on my little raft. As a newer player who doesn’t have a lot of transportation options available yet, being able to sail around to ports and locations I’ve never seen in the world is a huge draw to me. In fact, most of the RuneScape map is new to me as I’ve only just explored a very tiny bit of what’s out there.
How To Start Sailing in OSRS
The OSRS team has been very good about providing instructions on how to get started, and I saw more folks than I think I ever have in one place yesterday trying it out. However, before you begin, yes, sailing is a member only skill. So, you do have to have a subscription to OSRS to be able to unlock it and level it.
Even a new player can access sailing as the starting quest is just an easy walk to Port Sarim, which is located directly west of the starting town, Lumbridge.
There, you can find two NPCs – Will and Anne – who will start the questline called Pandemonium.
This questline was all I needed to learn the ropes of how to sail, what ships can do, and eventually how to get my first raft. I also found the questline to be quite entertaining with a number of colorful NPCs helping to create a foundation for the situation I found myself in.
Though I quickly finished the Pandemonium questline, there’s a lot more to do, and the game makes this obvious. Some of this is locked behind other quests I haven’t done yet – which is par for the course when it comes to OSRS. But that hasn’t stopped me from enjoying sailing as a relatively new account.
Overall Thoughts
I’m here just for a chill sailing vibe. So far, OSRS has delivered this, and I am very content.
Learning to control the raft/boat was easy enough. I love that once you set a direction to sail, your raft just goes with it automatically, no need to keep clicking - unless you want to change direction. Controls are quite intuitive, allowing you to interact with the sail itself or to use a sailing panel in the UI (which I prefer).
I also like that there’s no collision with other people’s boats. If you overlap with theirs, you can still see that there’s a vessel there, but they’re derendered so that no one can block anyone else’s view. This was very much needed considering the huge number of players who were sailing in the same areas.
Each vessel gets a randomly generated name by the game (for better or worse), which is a nice touch. Some names I’ve seen are a little iffy, but I’m quite happy with mine!
Beginning leveling is all about taking tasks from the job board to bring trade goods from port to port. It looks like as you level, you can get other types of tasks – I see battle tasks on the board, as well, for example.
You can also unlock ocean charting in your captain’s log, which is somewhat like the sightseeing log in FFXIV. You find points of interest that you either interact with or use a spyglass to observe, and you get credit for charting those spots. Sadly, it doesn’t look like the charting indicators disappear when you chart them, which may lead to me forgetting if I’ve charted a spot or not. I’ll have to look more deeply into it.
But it’s nice to have an exploration option along with sailing, too.
As you level, you’ll be able to get better vessels. Though I don’t have a boat of my own, I see plenty of other players who have already graduated to something beyond a raft. I’m still having plenty of fun with my own little raft, and currently at level 13, I’m in no rush at all to upgrade.
The biggest perk for this is that as I level sailing, I unlock the ability to dock at more ports in the world. As I noted before, I’m not widely traveled in the world of OSRS yet, having no access to Fairy Rings (it’s on my to-do list). So, none of these port names are familiar to me, and I’ve really loved opening the map as I unlock new ports to learn where they are in the world.
Sailing has already been the method that’s introduced me to many locations that I would have never been able to reach on foot easily. I love the feeling of seeing this map open up to me gradually. The fact that OSRS doesn’t hold your hand in telling you where any of it is – you still have to remember the port names and look up the locations and docking icons on the map – lends to that old school feeling of discovery and reward.
I’m sure there’s some value for long-time players as well. But yes, as a new player, I’m feeling like the world is my oyster – pun intended – and I’m looking forward to the new locations each level unlock brings more than anything else.