The Internet's First Multiplayer Team Game — Reborn for the Modern Web
Command starships, conquer planets, and battle across the galaxy in real-time with players worldwide.
Command your starship in a persistent galaxy where every decision matters. Coordinate with teammates to conquer enemy planets, defend your homeworlds, and achieve galactic domination.
Four empires vie for control: the Federation, Romulan Empire, Klingon Empire, and Orion Syndicate. Choose your side and fight as part of a 16-player team in 4-way galactic warfare.
From the swift Scout to the mighty Starbase, each ship class brings unique capabilities. Master torpedoes, phasers, tractors, cloaking, and plasma weapons to dominate the battlefield.
NeoNetrek runs entirely in your browser via WebSocket. No downloads, no plugins, no installs. Connect and play instantly from any modern device.
Netrek features two primary weapons: torpedoes and phasers. Torpedoes are unguided projectiles that travel in a straight line — you fire volleys of up to 8 at a time. They deal splash damage within 350 units. Phasers are instant-hit beams with 6,000 unit range that always hit their target but deal less damage at distance.
Advanced ships also carry plasma torpedoes: slow, powerful homing projectiles that can devastate an enemy. Destroyers, Cruisers, Battleships, Galaxys, and Starbases all carry plasma.
Tractor and pressor beams let you pull enemies into your torpedo spreads or push them away. These are key tactical tools in dogfighting.
Winning in Netrek is about taking planets, not just getting kills. The core gameplay loop is:
You need at least 2 kills to pick up armies. Each kill lets you carry more. Armies are the currency of conquest — protect your carriers!
When enough players are online (typically 5 per team, 2 teams), the server enters Tournament Mode. Only stats earned in T-Mode count toward your rank and ratings. T-Mode is where the real Netrek happens — coordinated team play, strategic bombing runs, organized defense, and tense planet takes.
Each ship class has unique strengths. Choose the right tool for the job.
The fastest ship in the fleet. Scouts excel at reconnaissance, planet bombing runs, and quick escapes. Fragile but nimble.
A fast, versatile warship. Good balance of speed and firepower. Carries plasma torpedoes and is excellent for dogfighting and ogging.
The iconic Netrek workhorse. Well-rounded in every category. The default ship for a reason — learn the game in a CA before specializing.
Heavy capital ship with devastating plasma and thick armor. Slow to turn but lethal in a brawl. The king of sustained combat.
The troop transport. Carries a massive 20 armies with the thickest hull in the fleet. Slow and lightly armed, but essential for conquering planets.
The team's fortress. Massive shields, fuel reserves, and firepower. Allies dock here to repair and refuel. Requires Commander rank. 30-minute rebuild if destroyed.
An enhanced cruiser variant. Slightly better shields and fuel than the standard CA, with comparable speed and armament. A solid all-rounder.
Choose your allegiance. Each empire controls 10 planets in their home quadrant of the galaxy.
F
The stalwart defenders of order and diplomacy. Federation pilots are known for their disciplined tactics and strong team coordination. Home quadrant: upper-left.
R
Masters of stealth and deception. Romulan captains favor cloaked attacks and ambush tactics. Their cunning makes them formidable opponents. Home quadrant: upper-right.
K
Warriors who live for the glory of battle. Klingon players tend to be aggressive and relentless. Expect all-out assaults and fearless ogging. Home quadrant: lower-left.
O
Pirates and merchants united under a single banner. Orion pilots are unpredictable and resourceful, using unconventional strategies to gain the upper hand. Home quadrant: lower-right.
40 planets across 4 quadrants — 100,000 x 100,000 galactic units
Advance through 9 military ranks by accumulating T-Mode hours and ratings. Higher ranks unlock advanced ship classes.
| Rank | Title | Code | Hours Required | Rating Required | Offense Required | Unlocks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Ensign | Esgn | 0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | SC, CA |
| 1 | Lieutenant | Lt | 2 | 1.0 | 0.0 | DD |
| 2 | Lt. Commander | LtCm | 4 | 2.0 | 0.0 | BB, AS |
| 3 | Commander | Cder | 8 | 3.0 | 0.0 | SB |
| 4 | Captain | Capt | 15 | 4.0 | 0.0 | — |
| 5 | Fleet Captain | FltC | 20 | 5.0 | 0.0 | — |
| 6 | Commodore | Cdor | 25 | 6.0 | 1.0 | — |
| 7 | Rear Admiral | RAdm | 30 | 7.0 | 1.2 | — |
| 8 | Admiral | Admr | 40 | 8.0 | 1.4 | — |
From university labs to the modern web — the story of the internet's first multiplayer team game.
Kevin Smith at UC Berkeley creates Xtrek, a two-player space combat game for X Window System terminals on Unix workstations. The game lets two players dogfight over a campus network.
Terence Chang and Scott Silvey extend Xtrek into Netrek, adding team play, planet conquest, multiple ship types, and support for 16 simultaneous players. It becomes arguably the first internet team sport.
Netrek becomes a phenomenon on university networks worldwide. At its peak, around 5,000 players compete daily on dozens of servers. Competitive leagues form — the International Netrek League (1992), the European Netrek League, and others. In December 1993, Kevin Kelly writes in Wired magazine that Netrek is "team chess on speed, or playing mind hockey," calling it the first online sports game. The saying among students: "GPA + Netrek rating is a constant."
The Netrek protocol is documented in RFC 1101 discussions and becomes one of the first networked game protocols studied by the internet standards community. The game pioneers concepts still used in multiplayer gaming today.
In the Informatics building at the University of Ulster's Jordanstown campus, students on the Software Engineering BEng programme discover Netrek in the Sun Lab — rows of Sun SPARCstation 5 workstations running Solaris, with their distinctive "pizza box" form factor, networked via NFS and NIS.
These were Sun Microsystems machines at the height of the company's influence. The SPARCstation 5, released in March 1994 with a MicroSPARC-II processor, was the workhorse of university computing — massively outperforming the 486 PCs of the era. Students logged in to Solaris 2.4 or 2.5, navigated OpenWindows (later CDE), and compiled C code with make on a system that was the professional standard for software development.
It was also the perfect Netrek platform. The X Window System ran natively, the network was fast and always-on, and there was nothing stopping a group of BEng students from compiling the COW client and spending long hours between lectures fighting over galactic territory. From 1994 to 1998, the class of '94 waged campaigns across the galaxy from those Sun workstations — memories that would, decades later, inspire NeoNetrek.
Sun Microsystems releases the UltraSPARC processor and unveils Java — transforming both hardware and software. The transition from 32-bit SPARC to 64-bit UltraSPARC marks a generational leap. Meanwhile, Solaris 2.5 becomes the first truly stable Solaris 2.x release, deployed across university labs worldwide. Sun's motto: "The Network Is The Computer" — a philosophy that Netrek, with its client-server architecture and networked play, embodied perfectly.
The server codebase matures with features like short packets (bandwidth optimization), LTD stats (detailed tracking), and INL tournament support. Client ports appear for Windows, Mac, and Java.
Born from the memories of playing Netrek in the Sun Lab at Jordanstown, NeoNetrek brings the classic game to modern browsers via WebSocket and HTML5 Canvas. No downloads needed — just open a URL and play. The original server protocol is preserved, connected through a WebSocket proxy layer, keeping compatibility with the battle-tested C server.
The first NeoNetrek server launches in London — a tribute to the BEng Software Engineering class of '94–'98, who spent many an hour between lectures commanding starships from those SPARCstation 5s. The spirit of the Sun Lab lives on.
Choose a server to join. Each server has its own community, leaderboard, and settings.