How to get all the new Animal Crossing: New Horizons fencing and how to customise it

Animal Crossing New Horizons Fencing Guide — (Image credit: Nintendo)

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Customize fencing
New fencing

Just when you thought you had perfected your Animal Crossing: New Horizons fences… Just when you thought your perfectly organised island was complete, the Animal Crossing: New Horizons update 2.0 arrives with not just nine new fence types but also fencing customisation options. Time to spend another 800 hours or so to upgrade your island to version 2.0 as well.

The nine new different fence types in Animal Crossing: New Horizons will be available on rotation within the Nook Miles section of the Residential Services machine. There are usually two different recipes available at any time so the nine different options will cycle through, according to the day and season. You’ll also be able to find recipes out in the world as you normally would.

Let’s break down how to customise Animal Crossing: New Horizons fencing, list the new fences on offer, and at the bottom, we’ve got a guide for how to unlock Animal Crossing: New Horizons fencing altogether if you’re entirely fresh to the game.

Customize fencing

How to customise Animal Crossing: New Horizons fencing

To be able to customise your fences, you need to head to the Nook Miles section of the Residential Services machine and invest in ‘Custom Fencing in a Flash.’ This costs 2500 Nook Miles and means that you can take your fencing to a crafting bench and use a Customisation Kit to transform the colour to best match your island. It depends on the fence as to how many different colourful options there are but it will cost 1 Customisation Kit per 10 pieces of fencing. Buying this kit also automatically gives you two new fencing types to get you started. Large Lattice Fencing and Park Fencing will appear in the ‘Other’ section of your crafting menu so you can make things look different straight away.

New fencing

Animal Crossing: New Horizons new fencing list

Helpfully, all of the new fence types were revealed as part of the Nintendo Direct about the update so here are the fence types to keep an eye out for

How to unlock fencing in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Here are the steps you'll need to take to unlock fencing, and I'll warn you, it's not something you get access to quickly.

1. Invite at least one new villager to move to your island

As soon as it becomes an option in the game, you'll want to start saving up your Nook Miles to spend on Nook Miles Tickets. These are made available to purchase through the Nook Stop terminal in Residents' Services as soon as you've paid off your initial moving costs to Tom Nook. They cost 2,000 Miles a ticket, but will allow you to visit another desert island, which is created at random.

These alternative islands are a haven for gathering crafting resources, fruit that doesn't grow natively on your island, and potentially a travelling villager who could be invited to live on your island. If you spot someone you think would make an ideal addition to island life, all you need to do is speak to them a few times and they'll ask if they can move to your island. They'll make a call to Tom Nook about organising things, and for now that's all you'll hear for a while.

2. Wait for Tom Nook to offer you a bridge construction kit

Now, I'll make a note here, that this stage unlocked for me after inviting three new villagers to live on my island. I invited all three of these new faces on the same calendar day, and then Tom Nook offered up this next goal on the day after. It's not clear whether you need to invite three new residents or just one in order for this to happen.

But, Tom Nook will eventually give you the green light for them to start moving to your island, and it'll begin with him offering you a recipe for a bridge construction kit. You'll need to have four log stakes, four clay and four stone in order to build it, but once you've made the kit, you can just place it anywhere on your island where you think you need a river crossing.

3. Prepare the plots for your new villagers

Tom Nook has helpfully told each of your new residents that they'll find fully furnished homes waiting for them when they move to the island. Helpful, right? That means you need to kit out each of the plots with six items of furniture - three interior and three exterior items. Tom Nook will provide you with the various recipes you'll need, but first you'll have to find good spots for each of the new homes.

Once you've done that, Nook will gift you the recipe for the Animal Crossing: New Horizons ladder - a handy tool for accessing the higher-level areas of your island to really reap all it has to offer. Then it's just a case of working your way through the list of furniture that you'll need to kit out each home.

4. Visit Tom Nook in Residents' Services

After you've done all of that, you'll want to return to Tom Nook at Residents' Services to tell him that everything is ready. Not only will he start preparations for your new residents to begin arriving from the very next day, but he'll also recognise all your hard work with a special present. Yes, you've guessed it, a batch lot of fencing. I was given 50 pieces of simple wooden fencing to begin with, but from that point onwards a duo of fence recipes will be available from the 'Redeem Nook MIles' section of the Nook Stop at Residents' Services, meaning you're not restricted to the basic fencing option for long.