Animal Crossing: New Horizons May Day maze 2024 walkthrough

Animal Crossing: New Horizons players can celebrate May Day from April 29 until May 7 in 2024.

To participate, head over to Resident Services and talk to Tom Nook. He’ll give you a May Day Ticket to go out on a limited-time May Day Island Tour. Take the ticket to the airport and you’ll fly to an island with a hedge maze.

How does the May Day maze tour work?

There will be tools, crafting material, and fruit hidden around the maze. To get through the maze, you’ll have to craft more tools and eat the fruit at the right times to get rid of obstacles like rocks and trees. To make the challenge a little trickier, you can’t bring anything with you. You can only use the stuff you find in the maze to complete it.

The maze is pretty straightforward if you’re careful, but still possible to mess up, so it’s worth keeping these important tips in mind:

• You can break rocks and lift trees with your shovel once you’ve eaten a piece of fruit.
• There’s a crafting station mid-way through the maze. You’ll need enough materials to make tools like Ladders (which you can find in the maze).
• The small pits only allow you to jump directly across them, but there’s always a way to get to the other side of them.
• If you mess up or get stuck, use your NookPhone and use the Rescue Service app to get escorted back to the beginning and reset the island. (If you leave the island, you will not be able to come back!)

With some persistence, you should be able to make it through in just a few minutes. If you want to earn some extra money, make sure you grab the Bell Vouchers scattered around the maze. They’re worth 3,000 Bells each. (But if 3,000 Bells isn’t that appealing to you, feel free to skip them and head straight for the end.)

ACNH May Day maze solution

There are two possible mazes you can get and they swap out depending on the year. Once maze appears when the year is an even number and one appears when the year is an odd number.

ACNH May Day 2024 maze walkthrough

This is the 2024, 2026, 2028, and so forth maze solution, since this maze will show up during even-numbered years:

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

1. Pick up the shovel in front of you. Use it to dig out the bush on the left and grab the fruit.
2. Eat the fruit and use your new fruit power to help you dig out the tree that blocks the straight path.
3. Explore the only open pathways, jumping over the holes in the ground to pick up four tree branches, three pieces of wood, and the worn axe.
4. Go to the top left of the maze and use the axe to chop down the tree blocking the path from another tree branch and two fruit. The axe will break, but don’t worry.
5. Head to the middle-left part of the maze to see a rock protecting an iron nugget. Eat a fruit and use your fruit power to break the rock and grab the nugget.
6. Go to the rock that blocks a fruit on the right edge of the hedge maze. Eat a fruit and use that fruit power to break the rock. Pick up the fruit and the two DIY recipes.
7. Eat the last fruit in your inventory to get the strength to dig up the tree blocking the DIY workbench.
8. Craft the flimsy axe and then use the flimsy axe to craft the regular axe.
9. Head back to the middle of the maze and chop the tree on the left side to get two more fruit.
10. Backtrack to where the iron nugget was to chop down the tree there. Pick up the fruit and head straight down the newly opened path.
11. Cut down the last three trees (and dig up the stumps) to get to Rover. He’ll mail you your reward later.
12. Dig up the bush to the left of Rover to get four Bell Vouchers.
13. Dig up the bushes above those Bell Vouchers so you can run around the outer rim of the island.
14. Loop around the left side to the front of the island to see three rocks protecting five more Bell Vouchers. Eat the three fruit you collected earlier to break these rocks and claim these vouchers.
15. Dig up the bushes to the right of where the rocks were to head back to Wilbur and go home.

What rewards do I get for finishing the May Day maze?

At the very end of the maze, Rover — a cat character who has made appearances in previous Animal Crossing games — will be waiting for you. He’ll give you Rover’s Briefcase, a furnishing item covered in travel stickers. If you’ve completed the event in previous years, you’ll get Rover’s Photo instead. The reward gets mailed to you once you head back to your island.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo via Polygon

The ticket and tour is only redeemable once your get your loot, and that’s all there is to do. Even if there’s only one thing to do for this event, it’s nice to see a familiar face. We don’t know what this means for Rover, or if he’ll return in a future event.