How to build bridges and inclines in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Your Animal Crossing: New Horizons island will start out with many unreachable areas, thanks to the Switch game’s rivers and cliffs. While you’ll get tools to help you get across rivers and climb mountains, you’ll want a long-term solution to overcome these natural obstacles. That’s where bridges and inclines come in.

You’ll be able to craft your first bridge early on, though after that, you’ll need to pay for every other bridge with Bells.

Building bridges and inclines

After you upgrade Resident Services to a building, Tom Nook will begin offering the ability to build bridges and inclines. To start building a bridge or incline, you can talk to Tom Nook and select “Let’s talk infrastructure.” From there, you can select bridges and inclines and he’ll ask if you want to demolish any existing ones or if you want to build a new one. After you select the type of bridge or incline you want, you’ll have to find a suitable place to build it. Just like housing plots, you’ll be able to see how they look before you finalize its location.

After you place a bridge or incline, Lloid will appear, asking for donations to the new structure. Your villagers won’t contribute, so be prepared to pay for it on your own (or maybe with the help of other players on your island). Pay off the structure, and it’ll be built the next day.

If you change your mind about the location you chose, you can demolish the structure for 10,000 Bells.

You cannot build multiple structures at once. You also cannot build and destroy a structure in the same day. It’ll take one day to destroy the structure and one day to build a structure after you fund it.

There’s a variety of styles, and they range from a depending on what version you want.

Note: You can’t build more than eight inclines on a single island. That’s likely the cap for bridges, as well, but we haven’t reached that number quite yet. If you’re planning a mountainous island layout, be sure to keep this limit in mind.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons bridge styles

Image: Julia Lee/Polygon | Source images: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo

1. Stone bridge – 168,000 Bells
2. Suspension bridge – 129,800 Bells
3. Wooden bridge – 168,000 Bells
4. Brick bridge – 198,000 Bells
5. Zen bridge – 228,000 Bells
6. Log bridge – 98,000 Bells
7. Red zen bridge – 228,000 Bells
8. Iron bridge – 228,000 Bells

Animal Crossing: New Horizons incline styles

Image: Julia Lee/Polygon | Source images: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo

1. Stone staircase – 168,000 Bells
2. Red steel staircase – 228,000 Bells
3. White-plank ramp – 128,000 Bells
4. Natural ramp – 98,000 Bells
5. Log staircase – 168,000 Bells
6. Blue-plank ramp – 128,000 Bells
7. Blue steel staircase – 228,000 Bells
8. Brick staircase – 198,000 Bells