How to upgrade Nook's Cranny in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

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Help Tommy and Timmy open Nook's Cranny, aka the Animal Crossing: New Horizons shop

(Image credit: Nintendo)

No doubt you're at a point where you're wondering how to upgrade Nook's Cranny in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. We've seen the Animal Crossing: New Horizons shop go from a corner of the Resident Services tent to a dinky little store, but now it's time for an upgrade.

How to upgrade Nook's Cranny in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

(Image credit: Nintendo)

Once you've started spending some serious time on the island, there is a way to upgrade Nook's Cranny in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. There's another, bigger, version of Nook's Cranny to unlock, which gets you an increased range of furniture - and more expensive items - and tools with funky cosmetic designs. Although these latter items are adorable, they don't last any longer than your good tools. 

All you need to do to upgrade it is have Nook's Cranny open for at least 30 days, and to have made 200,000 Bells worth of transactions (buying or selling). 

It's unclear as yet whether there's a department store upgrade to the shop to upgrade down the line, but we'll update you if we discover any more.

How to build the Animal Crossing: New Horizons shop - aka Nook's Cranny

(Image credit: Nintendo)

After a few days on the island - three for my playthrough - Tommy and Timmy Nook will ask for your help with a special project. They want to build their shop, and move out of their uncle's tent corner. But, in order for them to do that, you'll have to help them out by gathering some resources from around the island. They're only small, remember?

Well, they need quite a substantial amount of crafting materials though, so prepare yourself to do some real gathering. They need the following resources:

  • 30 wood
  • 30 softwood
  • 30 hardwood
  • 30 iron nuggets

Wood, softwood and hardwood can all be gathered by hitting trees with a flimsy axe or stone axe. You'll get three pieces of assorted wood from each tree once per day, and with your island starting out with dense foliage, it's quite easy to stock up on the various wood types. 

Iron nuggets though are a little scarcer, particularly when you're starting out. In order to find Animal Crossing: New Horizons iron nuggets, you'll need to start hitting the small grey rocks on your island with a flimsy shovel, shovel, flimsy axe or stone axe - not the larger, greyer rocks that just account for part of the island scenery. Doing this will earn you stone, clay, iron nuggets, money, or even gold nuggets, and you can get at least three of the above per day from each rock. 

However, to get 30 - particularly if you want to complete this step as quickly as possible - you'll want to buy Nook Miles Tickets from the Nook Stop terminal in Resident Services (available once you've paid off your initial moving fees for relocating to the island). These tickets let you travel to alternate islands temporarily, and these randomly generate locales are a boon for gathering resources. Handily, these islands will always offer at least two rocks for you to smash in your quest to find more iron nuggets. On a good haul, I was getting at least six iron nuggets per Nook Miles Ticket island hop. 

Once you've supplied Timmy and Tommy with the requested resources though, it's really easy. All you have to do is pick a sport where you want the shop to eventually sit, and then wait until the next calendar day for the Animal Crossing: New Horizons shop to officially open. 

Upgrading the shop from a corner of the Resident Services will unlock more goods to buy, a showroom for furniture and other items to be displayed and more. It's definitely worth doing. 

Sam Loveridge
Sam Loveridge
Global Editor-in-Chief, 12DOVE

Sam Loveridge is the Global Editor-in-Chief of GamesRadar, and joined the team in August 2017. Sam came to GamesRadar after working at TrustedReviews, Digital Spy, and Fandom, following the completion of an MA in Journalism. In her time, she's also had appearances on The Guardian, BBC, and more. Her experience has seen her cover console and PC games, along with gaming hardware, for a decade, and for GamesRadar, she's in charge of the site's overall direction, managing the team, and making sure it's the best it can be. Her gaming passions lie with weird simulation games, big open-world RPGs, and beautifully crafted indies. She plays across all platforms, and specializes in titles like Pokemon, Assassin's Creed, The Sims, and more. Basically, she loves all games that aren't sports or fighting titles! In her spare time, Sam likes to live like Stardew Valley by cooking and baking, growing vegetables, and enjoying life in the countryside.

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