Animal Crossing New Horizons - How to get gold nuggets


Tools are some of the most important items you can own in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

As you are trying to make your island as desirable as possible, you will need to use a variety of tools to clear space for new structures or crops and cultivate other items. While the tools you start the game with are serviceable, they are certainly not the best kinds of tools you can have.

To make the best tools in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you'll need to know where to get gold nuggets. These nuggets are valuable metals that can be used for crafting and selling for large amounts of Bells.

Getting gold nuggets in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

To get gold nuggets in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you need to smash rocks with an axe or shovel.

Each time you do, there is a chance you will find a gold nugget. Gold nuggets are easy to come by if you spend time looking for them, but you will need some luck along the way. You'll need to eat some fruit and then hit rocks with your shovel to break them.

Animal Crossing New Horizons Gold Nugget from broken Rock
click to enlarge

To preserve rocks on your island, you'll want to use Nook Miles to smash rocks on a deserted island – just to be safe. They are rare, though, so expect to break plenty of rocks.

How to make golden tools with gold nuggets

To make golden tools using the nuggets, you will need to find the recipes for them, and they don't come easily. To get the recipe for all of the golden tools, you will need to gain certain achievements:

  • Golden axe: Break 100 regular or flimsy axes.
  • Golden fishing rod: Catch all the fish in New Horizons.
  • Golden bug net: Catch a total of 80 bugs.
  • Gold watering can: Have a five-star island rating.
  • Golden shovel: Help Gulliver 30 times.

With any one of those achievements completed, you'll need to head to the crafting bench and combine a golden nugget with the tool you have the recipe for. While golden tools aren't impossible to break, they'll last you for quite a while.

How many Bells do gold nuggets sell for?

Gold nuggets' extreme rarity and value mean you can sell them to Tom Nook for 10,000 Bells each, though it's arguably smarter to make tools out of them first. There's also no equivalent of Flick or C.J. NPCs who will buy gold at an increased price.

If you're enjoying Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you should look at our other guides, such as cultivating flower hybrids and finding mushrooms.

For more articles like this, take a look at our Animal Crossing New Horizons and Guides page.