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Animal Crossing Wisp: how to catch Wisp's spirit and reward in New Horizons explained

It's time to do some ghost hunting!

Wisp is an easily frightened ghost who will occasionally haunt your island in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. He is also one of the special visitors who will appear on your island.

Talking to this ghost will result in you hunting down and catching the five pieces of Wisp's spirit that escape when Wisp, the ghost, mistakes you, a living human, for a ghost.

It's worth the trouble, however, because Wisp won't forget to reward you.

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Wisp time and location in New Horizons explained

Like the other special villagers, such as Gulliver, Wisp will randomly appear on your island in New Horizons. You won't know he's visiting, until you run into him during one of your nighttime walks.

Wisp will make his first appearance after your first couple of days on the island. He only ever appears at night and floats around a random location on your island, until you either talk to him or the morning comes.

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How to catch Wisp's spirit in New Horizons explained

If you decide to talk to Wisp in New Horizons you'll scare him so badly that his spirit will divide into five pieces and scatter across the island. Since it's your fault that he's in this state, it's only right that you fix it.

To do this trek across your island and all five of Wisp's spirit.

Each one will look like a small blue flame and you can catch them in any net, just like you would with a bug.

These pieces of Wisp spirit can travel freely across your island, so just keep walking around, making you double back on yourself occasionally, and you'll eventually find all five.

Find and catch each piece of Wisp's spirit with a net.

Don't worry if you need to enter a building, Wisp and his pieces of spirit will still be there when you come out.

Once you've collected all five spirit pieces, it's time to head back to Wisp for your reward.


The Animal Crossing 2.0 update and Happy Home Paradise is here! We can help you with the new additions - including where to find Brewster, Gyroids, new villagers, ordinances, new fences, storage shed, new hairstyles, Froggy Chair, group stretching and Kapp'n boat tours. Cooking is now unlockable, so you need to know how to make both flour and sugar, as well as how to grow carrots, potatoes and tomatoes. Meanwhile, if you're new to Animal Crossing, our New Horizons tips can help with the basics. From the off, there's fish and bugs to catch, flowers and fruit to grow with. One long term goal is building your Happy Home Academy score. Finally, you need tools such as the new ladder and vaulting pole to fully explore.


Reward for helping Wisp in New Horizons explained

For helping Wisp become whole again in New Horizons, you'll be offered the choice of two rewards.

These rewards are:

  • Something new
  • Something expensive

While an expensive item might be tempting, we recommend the 'Something new'.

Wisp is upfront about the fact that he isn't very good at judging the value of items, so you might end up with something that's actually quite cheap. There's also a chance that you receive an item you already own.

The reward you receive from 'Something new,' however, might not be expensive, but it will be a completely new addition to your item collection.

You'll also earn Nook Miles if you help Wisp out.

Good luck with your ghost hunting!

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