Summary

Out of all the many tasks thatStardew Valleyloves to throw your way, fishing is perhaps the most time-consuming activity. There are dozens of fish to collect, multiple bodies of water to investigate, and a good deal of both skill and luck are involved in becoming a fishing master. Luckily, there are some handy mods that help improve the experience.

These nine fishing mods are a combination of quality-of-life improvements, inclusions of new fish types, and neat visual effects to make fishing feel a little more exciting. If you’re getting ready to complete your fish collection, these mods will help make things go smoother one way or another.

stardew valley player catching a legendary fish-1

9Extreme Fishing Overhaul

Extreme Fishing Overhaul is an interesting random generation mod of sorts. When installed, it adds over 3,000 different fish that can be found in any body of water and during any season. This is a very elaborate mod that’s only intended for die-hard fans of Stardew Valley fishing who are looking for a greater challenge to overcome, especially those who consider themselvesmasters of the ponds.

The names and rarities of these new fishes are also randomly generated, so you can hunt down legendary sea creatures that offer amazing stats and health replenishment. You will need to use an older version of SMAPI to use it in its current state.

Mod title card for Stardew Valley The Fish of Legend featuring Willie and some fish

8The Fish Of Legend

Willie is one of the wisest and most experienced residents of Stardew Valley, and The Fish of Legend mod leans into that. Every time you deliver a legendary fish to Willie, he will tell you an interesting tale related to that fish. It also doubles as a way to earn extra friendship points with him.

It even comes with its own intro cutscene event like many of the villager side quests.Willyalso rewards you with a nice sum for each fish delivered, but you can configure the amount in the options should you consider the money to be too much or too little.

A rainy morning in Stardew Valley with fish jumping from a pond

7Happy Fish Jump

Happy Fish Jump is a simple mod that makes simple farm life feel a little more lively. Every ten seconds, fish you have stored in your ponds will jump out of the water. It’s a nice way to make your collected fish feel like pets.

Though the fish primarily jump out from bodies of water installed on your farm, you can spot them jumping out from other locations as well, such as the town lake or the beach. Ambiance is a very important element of Stardew Valley, and this mod improves on that in a nice, subtle way.

Title card for Balanced Fishing mod for Stardew Valley

6Balanced Valley - Fishing

Fishing can be a very lucrative prospect in Stardew Valley, but some players feel it can be a little bit too much work. Balanced Valley - Fishing is a simple way to rebalance the fish sell prices, so you can do more efficient fishing.

This mod comes with three different settings: Balanced, Normal, and Legendary. Each mode calibrates fishing prices differently based on the playstyle you feel most comfortable with. This mod really comes in handy for legendary fish, as catching even just one can be very time-consuming.

stardew valley fishing in night market submarine

5Fish And Aquarium Reskin

If you feel it gets a little tiresome looking at the same fish textures over and over, this reskin mod is a good way to add more color and detail to the sea critters you’re dedicated to catching and collecting. It also provides a simple redesign to the fish tanks and aquariums, so your indoor fishing collections will have a nice spruce up too.

The Fish and Aquarium Reskin mod must be used with the (WIP) Better Fishing and Beach Forading mod, which can be downloadedherefrom Nexus by cometkins.

Menu for Better Fishing mod in Stardew Valley

This mod also adds some lively animations for fish you’ve caught and placed in fish tanks. It will make your caught fish feel more lively, so you may admire your collections with greater passion.

4Better Fishing

Money isn’t the only thing a fisherman in Stardew Valley needs to worry about - maintenance is an important concern, too. With the Better Fishing mod, you’re able to engage in fishing as you normally would but with a few modifiers to make things less complicated.

A great feature is taking away the ability for junk to use up your bait - which really makes a lot of sense, when you think about it. This mod also makes your fishing rod tackles unbreakable, and you can obtainhidden treasure chestsmuch more easily whenever they pop up alongside a fish.

A view of the docks and beach in Stardew Valley with a fish menu interface

3Fishing Info Overlay

Keeping track of all the available fish in any given area can be exhausting. The Fishing Info Overlay mod keeps track of all fish in the vicinity for you. This makes it so much easier to remember what you want to catch for currently pending quests, and what you’ve yet to catch for future completion.

This mod has a very intuitive feature where it will only display the overlay when you are holding a fishing item, such as a crab pot or your fishing rod. It also brings up informative overlays during the fishing minigame. It’s a very simple and non-invasive mod that can be used with other fish-related mods.

Stardew Valley Player Fishing During Winter

2Animated Fish

One of the most popular Stardew Valley fishing mods is a wonderful set of animations that makes all 69 fish wiggle and waddle in a simple manner that is very reminiscent of retro 16-bit games. These animations apply to fish that have just been caught, in menus, or fish on display in tanks.

It’s especially neat how the mod has animations that are specific to various fish types. The blowfish, for example, will shrink and expand just like it’s supposed to. Inanimate sea objects like seaweed and seashells have an appropriate shimmer and shine to them as well.

Title card for More New Fish mod for Stardew Valley

1More New Fish

The More New Fish mod does exactly what it advertises: adds more new fish. There are 140 new sea creatures here, which triples the amount of fish you can catch. And these aren’t randomly generated creatures, either. Every single new fish is custom-made with its own unique name and artwork.

This is a great mod for newcomers and veterans alike, as fish have been added to every single spot of the game. If you’ve alreadycaught every fish in the game, why not add more? New quests were added for years two and beyond, so this is a long-lasting mod that keeps on giving.