The Most Efficient Way to Farm Dragon Shards in BotW (2024)

At first glance, farming dragon shards in BotW looks like a real grind. Farosh, Naydra, and Dinraal are relatively easy to spot, but they take massive laps around Hyrule and can be difficult to track down. Dragon Horns are, by far, the most effective cooking ingredient in the game and come with the added perk of selling for 300 rupees a pop. Dragon Horns can also fetch 150 Mon from Kilton’s shop if you’re still collecting his gorgeously knitted monster hats.

But we can farm more than horns. Dragon claws, dragon scales, and dragon fangs are needed for quests and armor upgrades. Sling an arrow where you expect each part to be, and let it fall to the ground. Easy win. It’s worth noting that landing an arrow anywhere on a dragon’s foot is good enough to obtain its claw.

Farosh is the easiest dragon to exploit, but I’ll also include Naydra and Dinraal farming methods. Farosh yields 3-5 dragon parts per minute, making him an easy target for belligerent campers to whip around like a ragdoll at the crack of dawn.

1. A trusty long-range bow and a bunch of arrows
2. Firewood
3. A flame sword (or fire arrows) for igniting firewood

1. Drum roll, please! The bows with the longest range in BotW are:

   • Ancient Bow
   • Great Eagle Bow
   • Golden Bow
   • Falcon Bow
   • Phrenic Bow
   • Swallow Bow
   • Duplex Bow.

Here’s a more comprehensive list of the best bows in BotW, if you happen to be interested.

Since strength is irrelevant here, we’ll want a bow with a quick draw speed and plenty of accessible spawn points. The general consensus is that the Golden Bow works best. We can find one leaning up against a wall in the Gerudo training quarters – located within the city walls of Gerudo Town.

• The Thunderhelm helps us resist Farosh’s lightning orbs.
• Unlocking Tarrey Town lets us purchase cheap arrows in bulk. (Fyson sells arrows at 35 rupees for bundles of ten instead of 20 rupees for bundles of five.)
• Having a complete set of Zora armor gives us the ability to swim up waterfalls – making the trek from the shrine quick and easy.

Since Link is a total sweat who insists on waking up at 5 A.M. every morning, Farosh is the only dragon we can farm immediately after rising to our feet. We want to plant our campfire in a place protected from rain, preferably somewhere we won’t have to run back and forth. We don’t want to risk our campfire despawning.

Luckily, when resting at a campfire, harvested dragon parts won’t disappear. You can pile them up for days without taking a single step from your campsite, making this process much more streamlined.

So, where is the magical camp location? At the base of a cave north of Riola Springs.

There’s a conspicuously round rock etched into the dirt. Drop your firewood directly on that rock. It’s close to the edge of the cave, and you won’t risk bopping your head against the roof of the cave when catching an updraft. Once you’ve ignited your campfire, make sure you have your long-range bow equipped and generic arrows ready for shooting. Everything will happen pretty fast!

Select the option to stay by the fire until morning. When morning comes, you’ll immediately want to use your flame sword to spark that campfire again.

Use your paraglider to catch the updraft. Farosh will already be poking her head out of Riola Spring. Don’t overthink your shot. The Golden Bow has an excellent range, and Farosh has a horn the size of Texas. You’ll get a feel for it after 2-3 tries.

You’ll want to wait for the horn (or whichever dragon part you shot) to start flying through the air before resting in front of the campfire again. It doesn’t need to hit the ground, though. It’ll continue its flight path when Link rises again at 5 A.M.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Don’t fret about where the shards will land! The harvested dragon parts won’t go flying off the cliffside. They tend to form piles on the left and right sides of the lake, making them easy to gather.

Note: You can also farm Farosh near Lake Hylia after praying at the Spring of Courage, but we can collect dragon shards much faster in Necluda. I owe special thanks to a content creator at Random Respawnfor discovering this farming method. Mad props!

• Level 2 or higher Snowquill armor pieces grant resistance to Naydra’s giant hailstones.
• A complete set of Zora armor comes in clutch again. We have another waterfall to climb outside of the shrine.
• Revali’s Gale is also handy since Naydra bobs up and down more than the other dragons.

Naydra will only spawn from the mountaintop if you keep a distance from her when setting a campfire. If you don’t need dragon shards specifically from Naydra, I strongly recommend farming Farosh instead!

Fast travel to Dow Na’eh shrine and camp until morning. Don’t worry. You’ll have plenty of time to get where you need to go. In-game, it takes about an hour and a half for Naydra to approach the area. That’s a solid two minutes, at least. Still, if you’re worried your cross-country running skills aren’t up to scratch and don’t mind twirling your thumbs for a while after setting camp, placing the fire at the top of the mountain won’t hurt anything. It’s just painfully slow.

Equip your Zora armor if you have it. Then, swim up the waterfall with the elegant grace of a rosy salmon. Paraglide straight back and aim to land on a set of ruins buried in the nearby cliffside.

Note: You can get where you need to go without Zora armor, but you’ll be giving up that elegant grace of a salmon thing.

Run along the top of the ruins until you reach the northeast pathway on the mountain. The area appears on your map as Lanayru Bluff. It’s a great vantage point for getting a clean shot on Naydra.

If you’ve shown up early, you’ll see her popping up over the horizon from a distant peak directly in front of you. She’s rising from the Spring of Wisdom.

Be patient when taking your shot. You can get closer to Naydra than the other dragons. Naydra’s flight path directly follows the canyon on your left. She flies pretty low, too. You won’t need the best bow to hit her.

You know the drill from here: catch some wind, take your slo-mo shot, collect your dragon shard, fast travel, and repeat.

Naydra is an easy target. There’s one thing to be wary of: getting frozen in mid-air and crash landing onto Naydras back. You’ll know what I mean when it happens. Link will bounce along Naydras back like a pinball until you’re stuck questioning every life decision you’ve ever made.

It’s hilarious.

• Flamebreaker helm.
• A metal bow that won’t catch fire.
• Snowquill armor pieces to resist the harsh climate.

Dinraal has three popular farming locations. I bring up all three because none are perfect. The Hebra Tower spawn comes with scouring for parts. The spawn above the Gorae Torr shrine is fast and repeatable, but it’s difficult to find (and next to a ferocious Lynel.) The Dinraal spawn near Tabantha Bridge Stable is easiest but painfully slow.

Hebra Tower comes with two perks: we can teleport directly back to the tower and save time getting back to the high ground. It’s also the easiest to find.

So, let’s go with Hebra.

Travel to the tower and fly northeast. You’ll see an enormous chasm nearby. Land anywhere you’d like along the precipice of the cliff. Camp until morning.

Check the skies to the northeast for a big red ribbon. At first, it’ll be tough to distinguish Dinraal from Death Mountain or a champion’s laser beam. You’ve got all the time in the world to figure it out, and Dinraal will get more distinguishable as he approaches you.

Optional tip: Twirl your left analog stick vigorously as you impatiently await Dinraal’s arrival.

When Dinraal is close enough to bring an updraft, take flight and gun down your dragon scale, horn, fang, or claw.

The tricky part with this spawn is keeping track of where the dragon shard lands. You’ll want to conserve some stamina to make use of your slo-mo cam while tracking where the shard drops. Sometimes it’ll bounce off of rocks 5-6 times.

I’ll include some videos from the other two Dinraal farming methods, in case you’d prefer one of those:

Credit where it’s due: I’ll drop a special shout to the Best Zelda YouTubers before we part.

Anyway, now you’ll quickly and easily farm all dragon shards in BotW. Farosh is a better target than Naydra or Dinraal, but Hyrule is yours to explore. Farm at your own pace. Thanks for reading!