How to tame a horse and use it to pull a wagon in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

Horses are back in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and they’re even more useful than they were in Breath of the Wild.

Our Tears of the Kingdom horse taming guide will help you find, catch, soothe, and bond with any horse you find, and then we’ll explain how you can equip the new towing harness to attach a wagon to your horse.

Finding wild horses

Graphic: Jeffrey Parkin | Source images: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

According to Link’s Hyrule Compendium, wild horses are most common in the Hyrule Field and Akkala Highlands regions on the Surface. They tend to hang out in wide, grassy areas.

For good starter horses, look just northeast of Sinatanika Shrine in the Akkala Highlands (Ulri Mountain Skyview Tower) around (3891, 2366, 0074) or in the Hyrule Field region (Hyrule Field Skyview Tower) to the south of Jiosin Shrine around (-0253, -0563, 0019).

And don’t forget: once you get the Sensor + upgrade to the Purah Pad from Robbie during the “Presenting: Sensor +!” side adventure, you can set your Purah Pad to detect nearby horses (or anything else you’ve taken a picture of for the Hyrule Compendium).

Increase your stealth to sneak up on horses

Once you’ve found a horse, your next step is to catch and mount it. The problem is that wild horses are skittish and will run away if they notice you.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

The simplest way to sneak up on a horse is just to crouch by clicking the left thumbstick and approaching a horse from the back. Beyond that, though, there are a few ways to increase your stealth:

• Remove your weapon, bow, and shield. It’s not a huge difference, but unequipping your weapons and shield will decrease the amount of noise Link makes while moving.
• Eat a sneaky meal or drink a sneaky elixir. When you cook a meal that includes food like silent shrooms or stealthfin trout, the resulting meal will give you a stealth up effect. Brewing an elixir with critters such as a sunset firefly plus any monster part(s) will result in a sneaky elixir that grants the same effect.
• Wear the Stealth Armor set. You can pick up the Stealth Mask, Stealth Chest Guard, and Stealth Tights during the “Gloom-borne Illness” side quest.

Soothing a wild horse

Now that you’ve found a horse and snuck up on it, you’ll have to soothe it. The soothing process is really as simple as mashing the L button while the horse bucks around and drains your stamina. For low-level horses, you probably won’t need any extra help, but better horses require more soothing — and more stamina.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

Just like with being stealthy, food and elixirs will help you out here. Cook a meal with stamella shrooms, endura shrooms, stambulbs, courser bee honey, or staminoka bass (or anything that mentions stamina in its description) to make an energizing meal. Energizing elixirs can be brewed with critters like tireless frogs or restless crickets and a monster part. Energizing meals can restore stamina, or raise it past its maximum limit.

And don’t forget to turn in your Lights of Blessing at Goddess Statues for stamina vessels.

Increase your bond with horses

Now that the horse is soothed and no longer actively trying to throw you off, you still have a little work to do. Link’s bond with a horse is vaguely a measure of how well the horse listens. Horses with a high bond are also better at automatically following roads.

While riding, hit the L button when the horse turns the way you ask, gallops, or stops. Most of the time, this will result in a pink cloud appearing around the horse’s head — meaning that the bond has increased. This, though, is a slow process.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

A much faster way to increase your bond is with food. (Same, honestly.) Dismount your horse and open your inventory. Hold (up to) five apples as if you were going to cook with them, and then approach your horse to stand right in front of it. The horse will eat the apples from your hand and your bond will increase with each one. You can repeat the process as many times as you want, but it rarely takes more than five to max out your bond.

Graphic: Jeffrey Parkin | Source images: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

If you’re low on apples, there’s an entire orchard just outside of Sonapan Shrine near Satori Mountain at (1938, -0344, 0226). You’ll have to watch out for Evermeans, but you’ll end up with several dozen apples (we found about 150) with just a few minutes of work.

Register your horse at a stable

Now that you’ve found, snuck up on, soothed, and bonded with your horse, all that’s left is to ride it to a stable and register it. Once it’s registered and named, you can summon your horse to any stable you visit — assuming you still have space after transferring your Breath of the Wild horses over.

Getting rewards for your horse

Every horse in Tears of the Kingdom has a set of stats — strength, speed, stamina, and pull. Pull is new for Tears of the Kingdom and it refers to how well they work with the new Towing Harness.

Pony Points are a new system in place at stables. Using a stable for anything — like sleeping or registering a horse — will earn you Pony Points. Those points can be redeemed for rewards at the Pony Points Ledger book on the right side of the check-in desk as you walk in.