Fishing 101 for ESO

In this guide, we’ll cover all the basics you’ll need to start fishing in Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) right away. Anyone can fish – there are no level, class or skill restrictions. Just pick a zone, go to a body of water and find a fishing spot.

Jump to…
Finding and using fishing spots
Bait & water types
Fish types
Catching & filleting fish

Finding & Using Fishing Spots

Fishing spots are found all over Tamriel; you’re able to fish in each of the faction zones (including starter islands) and in Craglorn, Coldharbor and Cryodiil. Fishing spots spawn like flowers or ore, and they are depleted and disappear once all the fish are caught. The time it takes to respawn varies greatly — some take hours while others are up again just a few short minutes later. This means you may find 10 fishing spots dotting the entire shoreline of a tiny lake, or none at all depending on who fished the lake before you arrived.

Fishing spots appear as a small splashing on top of the water. As you approach it, you’ll see a label and a prompt to use “E” (on PC) to drop your line into the water. But before you do, you’ll want to select some bait (see next section below). Once your line is in the water, you’ll need to look for a slight bobbing motion of your pole, indicating that you have caught something. Press “E” again to reel in your catch. If you have auto-loot turned on, your catch will enter your inventory. Otherwise, you will see your catch before taking it (advised).

Bait & Water Types

There are four types of water in Tamriel: Ocean, Lake, River and Foul. You’ll need to use a different type of bait for each water type, or your chances of catching anything usable are very low. You’ll end up catching the dreaded “Used Bait”, which is absolutely worthless. There are eight types of bait you can use — two for each water type. Four of these bait types are collected in your travels (see below) and four are caught while fishing. You can also buy bait from guild merchants and it’s tradable with others. Here’s a cheat sheet of the water types and the bait to use in each.

Rivers	Insect Parts: Can be harvested from torchbugs, butterflies, small wasps and freshflies.	Shad: Can only be caught in Lakes.
Lake	Guts: Can be dropped from small animals/reptiles such as frogs, squirrels, rats, etc.	Minnows: Can only be caught in the Ocean.
Ocean	Worms: Can be harvested from picking plants or from undead mob drops.	Chub: Can only be caught in Foul Water.
Foul Water	Crawlers: Can be harvested from picking plants or from killing small spiders and centipedes.	Fish Roe: Can only be caught in Rivers.

Fish Types

There are three main categories of fish you can catch: White (common), Green (rare), and Blue (rarest). The green and blue fish all have unique names and show as trophies in your inventory. Once you’ve caught all of the named green and blue fish in a zone, you get an achievement for that zone. Catch all the rare fish in Tamriel and you get the coveted achievement and title of “Master Angler”! Rare trophy fish can be sold to a merchant if you don’t want to keep them.

White (common) fish are transformed into usable fish once you’ve filleted them. Filleting fish also gives you the chance of obtaining Perfect Roe, a special new ingredient for the provisioning recipe called “Psijic Ambrosia” which grants a player 50% more experience gained when using the drink.

Catching & Filleting Fish

While fishing, you only have a small amount of time to reel in your fish, or your line will break and you lose the catch. Some casts take longer than others, so you’ll have to be quick when your pole starts bobbing (get an Add-on to get a big alert when it’s time to reel in!). Once you’ve got a nice number of caught fish in your bag, it’s time to start filleting them.

Filleting is done from the inventory screen, and can be done anywhere. Just double-click the fish (or right-click and choose “Use”) and your character pulls out a rather large fillet knife and proceeds to scale the fish. The fillet is automatically added to your bag. If you fillet enough fish, you may even get a Perfect Roe! You’re character will be bathed in sparkles and light if you obtain a Perfect Roe, and it will automatically be added to your bag.

Now that you have the basics of fishing, go out and find a picturesque spot and start reeling them in! Need help finding fish? Check out the maps for every zone in ESO! Or read more in-depth information throughout the rest of this guide.