Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom - How to make Money and what to Sell

Just as in the previous game in the series, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom does away with the age-old mechanic of chopping tall grass and smashing pots to make money. If you want Rupees, you’re actually going to have to do some work.

Link might be less of a reckless vandal in this iteration - but he still has a need for cash. In fact, in TOTK the need for cash is arguably more pressing, because there’s a wealth of useful armor sets that can only be purchased from the shops across Hyrule - so you’ll need to make money.

How to make Money in Tears of the Kingdom

First of all, it’s important to note that side quests and side activities often give Rupees as a reward. However, these generally come in small amounts - 20 or 50 Rupees, most commonly. Occasionally you’ll find Rupees in chests, too - and certain types of enemies such as Yiga grunts and Like-Likes will sometimes drop cash.

The real answer of how to stack up the cash is pretty simple, though: you have to sell items. The huge open world of Hyrule and the lands above and beneath it are filled with items - and every single materia food,l or armor item in the game has some worth.

Any shop in the game can be used to sell as well as buy, be they a traveling salesman or a static shop in one of the main towns scattered across Hyrule. All you need to do is pitch up to a shop, tell them “I’m here to sell,” and then choose what you’re going to sell.

There will be minor differences in purchase prices at different shops, depending on what exactly you plan to sell and how desirable it is to the vendor in question.

But… ah. Good question. What should you sell?

Items to Sell in Tears of the Kingdom

The interesting thing about TOTK when compared to BOTW is that pretty much every item in the game has multiple proper uses - which means that there’s a less obvious clear-cut set of items that are primarily used to inflate Link’s Rupee wallet.

Take Diamond, for instance. In BOTW this was an item that only existed to be sold - but in Tears of the Kingdom it’s a strong weapon fusion candidate, as it has a Fuse Attack Power of 25. Rubies were previously a great candidate to sell - but now they can be fused to give weapons or arrows the power of fire, and so on.

With that said, precious stones remain the best things to sell. Diamond is worth 500 Rupees each, for instance. Ruby and Sapphire go for 110 and 150 Rupees respectively; the pricing goes on from there.

Only you know your best setup here, but we’d recommend selling as many of these materials as you need in order to buy whatever you’re after, but also hold a few back in case you need a specific element for weapon fusion. Despite the fusion power, Diamonds can be sold - they have no elemental benefit.

To get precious stones, look in underground caves, wells, and cliff faces across Hyrule for the heavy black deposits of ores. Smash them with explosions or heavy weapons - and you’ll find ores drop. Remember, these deposits replenish whenever there’s a Blood Moon - so you’ll have plenty of chances to farm.

As a final note, precious stones also drop from certain amiibo scans - making amiibo a nice cheat way to get your hands on some Rupees in a hurry for minimal effort.

If you're short of precious stone materials, there is one other option to consider - selling prepared meals. While the values vary greatly depending on the type of meal you're offering, prepared meals will sell for significantly more Rupees than their component ingredients - and the better the meal, the more they're worth, right up into the hundreds of Rupees. This isn't a very time-efficient way to make cash, however - we recommend you get to mining those stones instead.