How to hack a terminal in Fallout 76

Appalachia has a vast array of terminals for you to hack in Fallout 76, and the process can be simple or much more difficult when you don’t know how to hack effectively.

If you’re like me and enjoy diving deep into the lore of the Fallout universe, accessing Terminals is an excellent way to gather a great range of hidden info—so expect to be hacking a lot. Likewise, certain quests require you to hack terminals, so you need to know how to do it.

Hacking terminals in Fallout 76, the easy way

To hack Terminals in Fallout 76, you need to have the same or higher skill level relative to the Terminal, or you won’t be able to hack it at all. There are only four hacking skill levels: 0, 1, 2, and 3. Interact with a locked terminal to hack it, and a screen will pop up with a plethora of characters and words. It’s your job to select words to guess the correct password within a set number of attempts.

You can make the process easier by selecting hidden characters you can find on the screen. These remove “duds” (incorrect passwords) or reset your tries. Whenever I’m hacking, I always recommend scanning line by line, like we’re demonstrating in the video below. If you stumble on a hidden string of connected characters, you’ll see it highlighted. Select it to take advantage of this helpful mechanic.

After you’ve reduced the number of fake passwords, you can easily make a few guesses, and you will unlock the Terminal in no time. For those familiar with previous Fallout games, the Terminal hacking process will feel familiar. It’s like going back to an old home.

All Fallout 76 Terminal levels and how to unlock each

If you constantly encounter Terminals with a higher skill level than you (trust me, I know the pain), it’s worthwhile knowing how to rank up your hacking skills. You can do so using perk cards you unlock and equip when ranking up. Having said that, even if a higher-skill level hacker card drops, you may not be able to equip it if you’re too low-level. You may have to wait until later in your playthrough to get the hacker skill level you need. Here are all the levels and when you can equip them.

Once you have all three hacker cards, you need to equip all of them to have level three hacking skill. Likewise, to have level two hacking skill, you need to have both the “Hacker” and “Expert Hacker” perks equipped. Now that you know how to hack Terminals in Fallout 76, no sealed security door will be able to stop you in your tracks before you get back to hunting for Mega Sloths in the wild. Happy hacking, Wasteland Dweller!