The best night vision goggles in Stalker 2 are not for sale anywhere. They sit behind a door with the code 5578 in Yantar, and you can grab them long before Prypiat, where a pair that is just as good costs about 100,000 coupons. Below: all four models, where to get each one free, how to switch NVGs on, and why your gun suddenly slides off to the side once they are on your face.
If you read that the game has no night vision and you need a mod for it, that was true for the first ten months only.
NVGs arrived in patch 1.6, and they are their own item
At launch on 20 November 2024 there was no night vision at all, and guides from that winter rightly pointed you to Nexus. GSC added NVGs in Update 1.6 "Night of the Hunter" on 23 September 2025, top of the highlights list. The same patch gave NPCs better night vision too, so at night they now spot you sooner than they used to.
It does not work like the old trilogy. Back then night vision was built into a suit or helmet; here it is a separate piece of kit with its own slot, next to the detector and the binoculars. Technicians do not fit or upgrade it. You buy NVGs, find them or get them as a quest reward, and every pair weighs exactly 1 kg.
Four models: what you see in each and what they cost
NVG Gen 1. The in-game text calls it a 1960s design and "better than nothing", which is fair. One lens, a narrow view, a green image and constant snow that only clears in total darkness. Near radiation, black bars close in on the edges. Base price 25,000 coupons; Sidorovich in the Cordon bunker, Beard on the Skadovsk and Huron at the Slag Heap always stock it. Shacknews paid Sidorovich 24,250.
NVG Gen 2. Nineties tech: two lenses, a wider view, no snow, the radiation bars stay. Base price 50,000; Shacknews saw 56,250 at Malachite. Sellers are Viktoria Dorozhnyuk at Malachite (a 50% chance per day, per the wiki) and, also per the wiki, Birch at Rostok. A Ukrainian Steam guide updated for 2.0 leaves Birch out, so don't count on Rostok.
NVG Gen 3A and 3B. Four tubes, the widest view and the strongest intensifier; the radiation bars only show up at a high dose. On stats 3A and 3B are identical. What differs is the tint, green for 3A and blue-white for 3B, according to the wiki and the Ukrainian guide (TheGameSlayer says it is 3A that looks blue, so the sources do argue here). Bison in Prypiat sells 3A for somewhere between 97,000 and 112,500 depending on who you ask, since the price shifts with difficulty and patch. Nobody sells 3B. You can only find it.
| Model | View | Buy | Free |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gen 1 | one lens, green, snow | about 25,000: Sidorovich, Beard, Huron | Honta, quest "A School of Life"; Wild Island, code 2711 |
| Gen 2 | two lenses, green, clean | about 50,000: Dorozhnyuk at Malachite | Swamps, Abandoned Hamlet; Scoutmaster in "White Noise" |
| Gen 3A | four tubes, green | about 100,000: Bison in Prypiat | Jupiter, Market basement |
| Gen 3B | four tubes, blue-white | not sold | Yantar, door code 5578 |
Free along the story: from Honta to code 5578
- Honta, Zaton. The hunter from Call of Pripyat came back in 1.6 and lives in the Hunter's Hut southwest of the weather station. In "A School of Life" he hands you Gen 1 for a night snork hunt and shows you how to use it. The easiest NVGs in the game.
- Wild Island, Waste Processing Station. Another Gen 1, behind a door with code 2711. The wiki says the goggles sit so close to the window you can take them without the code.
- Swamps, Abandoned Hamlet. Gen 2 in an underfloor stash: break the boards under the medical box. TheGameSlayer describes a different spot, the ruined house to the left of the hamlet, last room, next to an empty bottle and a suitcase. If the floor is empty, check there.
- Yantar, door code 5578. Gen 3B. The wiki places it in the Basin location; Shacknews says the western side of the lake, due south of the scientists' bunker; TheGameSlayer describes a house with a metal gate and a keypad marked with an eye. The same room, per the Ukrainian guide, holds the Kharod rifle and an extended RP-74 magazine. Yantar opens up far earlier than Prypiat, which is the whole reason not to buy 3A.
- Jupiter, Market. Gen 3A, no code: break the plank behind the door and drop through the hole into the basement.
The free updates add a couple more. Scoutmaster gives you Gen 2 before the defence in "White Noise" from the Stories Untold update, and Gen 1 drops from mercenaries after you defend the Kazkovyi camp in the Burnt Forest. Cost of Hope adds no new models, only new spots for the old ones: Gen 1 in a bag on the roof of the Iron Forest power substation, Gen 2 at SRICAA in the poltergeist tank room and in the tunnel under Yantar lake (only if you took the stealth route through X-16), and Gen 3A in the safe at the end of "The Forgotten" at the CNPP.
The video loads from YouTube (Google) when you press play. Privacy policyHow to turn NVGs on, and why your gun slides sideways
First the goggles have to go into their slot in the inventory; sitting in your backpack does nothing. Then on PC hold L, the same key as the flashlight, or the middle mouse button. Hold, not tap: a tap just flips the torch. Players on the Steam forums complained that rebinding the key was buggy, and GSC fixed two such cases in 1.7, in dialogue and on ladders. No source spells out the gamepad button, so check Settings, Controls.
Now the gun. With goggles on, everything except pistols switches from normal aiming to offset aiming, beside the tubes. That is by design. The "NVG adaptation" weapon upgrade at a technician gives you normal sights back with NVGs on. Sources don't agree on its cost, and patch 2.0.5 retuned some technicians' prices anyway, so I won't quote a number. Since Update 2.0 you can offset-aim without goggles too, Alt by default.
What I'd do: take Gen 1 from Honta almost straight away, it is enough until Yantar. In Yantar go straight to door 5578, and you are done for the rest of the game. 3A and 3B see the same, so the only choice is green or blue-white, which is pure taste. Spend Bison's hundred grand on armour or repairs instead.
Sources
GSC, Update 1.6 Night of the Hunter, 23.09.2025. GSC, Update 1.7, 17.11.2025. GSC, Update 2.0, 20.08.2026. GSC, patch 2.0.5, 10.09.2026. Series wiki: Night vision, NVG Gen 1, NVG Gen 2, NVG Gen 3. Game8. Shacknews, 24.09.2025. TheGameSlayer. Ukrainian Steam guide, updated 13.09.2026. Video by Lootward. Screenshots from Steam, chart by FramesGames from the series wiki.
