ESO Witches Festival Event: Start & End Dates, How To Unlock & Rewards

Tamriel will be shrouded with frightful figures and monsters as the Witches Festival returns with more rewards to claim. This recurring event puts a unique spin on the Halloween season as players can defeat these unique monstrosities once the event begins and can turn into haunting skeletons if they please.

As always, there are Plunder and Dremora Skulls, Event Tickets, and more for players to be rewarded for participating in the event. Summon the crows and get the cauldron bubbling as we’ve detailed everything about the Witches Festival, including the event schedule, how to unlock, and all rewards to earn in The Elder Scrolls Online.

7th November 2023 Update: We've updated this guide to reflect the Witches Festival 2023 is currently underway, with plenty of rewards and the 100% XP gain boost to claim until 7th November 2023. The original reporting continues below.

ESO Witches Festival Event: Start, End Dates, And Times

"Last year's harvest won't feed this year's brood. I'll need something fresh to bestow my boon." 🤔 Witches Festival is returning to Tamriel! Get the details on the spooky happenings: https://t.co/rldvM2rlvwpic.twitter.com/ik7xIaWjb0

— The Elder Scrolls Online (@TESOnline) October 19, 2023

The annual Halloween event for The Elder Scrolls Online, Witches Festival, is back for the eighth consecutive year and, yes, takes place during the final week of October, overlapping with Halloween. Throughout this "spookiest of occasions," players can participate in limited-time activities to earn unique bonuses and rewards.

The event kicks off on 26th October 2023 at 7 am PDT / 10 am EST / 2 pm UTC / 3 pm BST, where it will run for 12 days in-game. The spirits and other paranormal creatures will leave Tamriel as the event concludes on 7th November 2023 at 7 am PDT / 10 am EST / 2 pm UTC / 3 pm BST, after which players must have completed the activities and collected their rewards.

How To Unlock The Witches Festival Event In ESO

Unlocking the location for the Witches Festival is relatively straightforward as players can acquire the event quest, "The Witchmother's Bargain," for free from the Crown Store in-game. Another way of collecting this quest is by finding Crow Caller in front of Olyve's Brewery in Stonefalls, Glenumbra, or Auridon.

As expected, they must complete the quest to gain the Witchmother's Whistle tool, which lets players summon crows for the Witchmother's Brew. If players obtained this tool from previous Witches Festival events, it's not mandatory to do the "The Witchmother's Bargain" event quest and can proceed to summon the Witchmother's Brew.

With the cauldron summoned and the Witchmother's Brew bubbling, they must consume the drink "to polymorph yourself into a spooky scary skeleton," thus begins the event. A warning before using the Witchmother's Whistle is that it can't be used to summon the cauldron in Cyrodiil, so any other location should be fine.

Players will receive a 100% XP boost throughout this event, which will be extremely valuable for leveling your main and alternate characters. Additionally, there are some incredible rewards to bag, including Plunder Skulls, Event Tickets, and plenty more.

All Witches Festival Event Rewards In ESO

As mentioned before, players can earn some spooky rewards during the Witches Festival alongside the event bonus of a 100% XP boost. Players can be rewarded with Plunder Skull containers alongside other rewards after defeating bosses for this event.

These unique rewards containers, once opened, can award them with the following rewards:

Additionally, if they collect the Dremora Plunder Skull container when defeating "a different unique type of boss" for the first time daily. These bosses that they can get the Dremora Plunder Skull include arenas, Delves, final dungeons, invasions (like Dark Anchors, Harrowstorms, Volcanic Vents, and more), public dungeons, and World bosses.

Let's look at the terrifying rewards players may obtain from the bosses mentioned above, which are as follows:

A more formidable and horrifying monster can be encountered, the Crowborne Horror, which can be obtained from the Witchmother Taerma inside the Olyve's Brewery or at all Impresario tents throughout Tamriel. You'll need to acquire the "Plucking the Crow" daily quest from Witchmother Taerma, in which you must defeat the monster to receive a unique Dremora Plunder Skull to earn any of the following rewards:

Remember that you can also acquire Event Tickets, two of which you can receive from the first boss. Defeated the boss daily to earn 26 tickets in total. Do remember that at any given time, players can hold up to 12 Event Tickets, which can be exchanged at the Impresario to get any of these items available for the event:

Two additional vendors will be available alongside the Impresario, their colleague Nenulaure, the Indrik Vendor, and the Impresario's Assistant, Philius Dormier. Players can trade Event Tickets to earn these rewards from either vendor: