The usual way of getting between the stars is through the use of a Jump Drive. These are capable of moving a ship across multiple parsecs in the period of a week. A jump always lasts about a week, regardless of the distance. More powerful/advanced drives can travel further distances in that week, but they can't take less time to move a shorter distance.

The most advanced jump drives, at TL 16+, have a range of 6 parsecs. The basic jump drive, introduced at TL 10, could manage 1 parsec. The TL 10 drive was highly experimental, and took up most of a ship's mass.

Generally, a jump drive can't initiate a jump, or end a jump, within 100 diameters of a planet or star.