Shovel

Artwork of a female player using a shovel from Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp

Shovels in the Animal Crossing series are used to dig holes and bury items in the ground. It is an essential tool for planting flora, unearthing fossils to donate to the museum, and removing stumps from trees that have fallen to an axe.

In New Leaf, villagers can be seen carrying around shovels, but they are never used.

Usage

A player digging a hole

A shovel can be used to dig holes in any location where there is no obstruction, such as stone paths, ground designs, buildings, structures, and trees. Flora such as flowers, fruit, saplings and bamboo shoots can be buried within holes in order to grow them. Items can also be buried in the ground, and are marked with a small star-shaped crack. Items can be unearthed with a shovel, while digging plants will destroy them. Tree stumps and bushes can only be removed by digging them out with a shovel.

A player dug up an egg

Shovels can also be used on certain rocks. Daily in every game, a random rock in town will dispense Bells or ore when struck with a shovel. In Doubutsu no Mori e+, a random rock in town can be broken once a week to access the Resetti Surveillance Center. In Animal Crossing: New Leaf, a fake rock will appear somewhere in town and can be broken with a shovel to reveal a single piece of ore. Additionally, in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, all rocks except for one will yield resources, such as clay, stone, or iron nuggets, while the remaining one will yield Bells like in previous games

In every game, there are more advanced versions of the shovel that have unique effects, though they differ between the games. The silver shovel has a slim chance of altering the money rock, causing it dispense double the usual amount of money, or ores instead of Bells. The golden shovel has the ability to bury Bells to plant money trees, or unearth random Bells from the ground.

Obtaining

In Animal Crossing

Shovels in Animal Crossing

#	Item	Image	Buy price	Sell price	Available from
59	Golden shovel		Not for sale	Cannot be sold	golden tree
63	Shovel		500 Bells	125 Bells	Tom Nook's store

Includes data sourced from the Data Spreadsheet for Animal Crossing (N64, GCN), compiled by TimeSword3D, AlexBot2004, Cuyler, Ruthless Cutie, SuperHamster, vmario, and Chubby Bub.

In Wild World

In Wild World and all future games up through New Leaf, money trees can only be planted with a golden shovel, however, unlike in Animal Crossing, they can now be planted anywhere a standard tree will grow.

Shovels in Animal Crossing: Wild World

Item	Image	Buy Price	Sell Price	Available From	Info
Shovel		500 Bells	125 Bells	Tom Nook's store	Standard shovel
Golden shovel		Not for sale	125 Bells	Bury a shovel and after three days it will turn into a golden shovel	Can bury Bells to grow money trees

In City Folk

City Folk introduces a silver shovel with a unique effect, in addition to the standard and golden variations.

Shovels in Animal Crossing: City Folk

Item	Buy Price	Sell Price	Available From	Info
Shovel	500 Bells	125 Bells	Tom Nook's store	Standard shovel
Silver shovel	Not for sale	125 Bells	Mr. Resetti (in the Reset Surveillance Center)	10% chance to double money dispensed by money rock
Golden shovel	Not for sale	125 Bells	Bury a shovel and overnight it will turn into a golden shovel	Can bury Bells to grow money trees

In New Leaf

New Leaf changes the requirement to obtain the golden shovel. Filling in holes without using the shovel can now be done while still carrying said tool and the button method has been changed to the Y button.

Shovels in Animal Crossing: New Leaf

Item	Buy price	Sell price	Available from	Note
Shovel	500 Bells	125 Bells	Timmy and Tommy's store	Standard shovel
Silver shovel	500 Bells	125 Bells	Museum Shop (after donating at least 15 fossils to the museum)	Chance for money rock to dispense ore instead
Golden shovel	Not for sale	125 Bells	Leif (after purchasing 50 bags of fertilizer)	Can bury Bells to plant money trees

In New Horizons

Shovels in New Horizons will break after a specific amount of uses. Digging up items buried in the ground, uprooting plants and trees, and hitting rocks all reduce a shovel's durability. A shovel's durability is not reduced when hitting other players or characters, hitting objects that are not rocks, digging holes without finding anything or when filling holes.

Unlike most other tools, shovels will not break for the certain actions even when they are no longer durable. This is to prevent the breakage from interfering with the action. Such actions include breaking rocks, uprooting full-grown trees, or when hitting a rock that dispenses an item. The shovel will remain usable until a short moment after such actions have stopped.

Shovels cannot be used on any players' islands unless they are marked as a Best Friend.

Shovels in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

#	Item	Buy price	Sell price	Available from	Durability	Customizable
33	Colorful shovel	2,500 Bells	625 Bells	Nook's Cranny (upgraded)	100	Yes
47	Flimsy shovel	800 Bells 100 Nook Miles	200 Bells	Nook's Cranny Wilbur Crafting	40	No
57	Golden shovel	Not for sale	10,675 Bells	Crafting	200	No
89	Outdoorsy shovel	2,500 Bells	625 Bells	Nook's Cranny (upgraded)	100	Yes
101	Printed-design shovel	2,500 Bells	625 Bells	Nook's Cranny (upgraded)	100	Yes
113	Shovel	2,400 Bells	600 Bells	Crafting	100	Yes

Includes data sourced from the Data Spreadsheet for Animal Crossing New Horizons, compiled and edited by 6480, noizhub, Ricky, chaiinchomp, saberslime, robotic_scarab, mollumisc, sunmarsh, kyrokey, obstinateRixatrix, jackiwi, Zalex, SuperHamster, kait, hyuum, Azarro, Czarcasm, cinnamon_swirlix, astronomyfortwo, Welcius, glowtopia, BriKun, Alyrei, dodocodes.com, StevieCoops, sneeze, Shiny190, TwistedPeach, LavaToaster, capstone, vmario, rocklamp, Alexis, Aeon, and PanchamBro.