The Elder Scrolls series is known for its breathtaking open worlds that players can lose themselves in. From fighting dragons in Skyrim to exploring the alien landscape of Morrowind, almost every game in the franchise emphasizes the player's place in an enormous world and some of gaming's most impressive maps.
Skyrim, Vvardenfell, Cyrodil, and many other locations are iconic in their topography and size. Size doesn't grow with each game, however. Some of Bethesda's older Elder Scrolls games are much larger than their most recent titles – and some of the most recent mobile titles have little to no explorable area at all.
Updated March 24, 2024 by Erik Petrovich: With the release of the newest game in the Elder Scrolls universe – the mobile game The Elder Scrolls: Castles – comes a new way to experience Tamriel. But this new game is not exactly about exploration, and it's far from one of the biggest Elder Scrolls maps – if it can be called a map at all. Ultimately, the largest Elder Scrolls game of all time by explorable area will likely always be the Daggerfall map, but even this newest, management-oriented entry has more "area" than, say, the card game Elder Scrolls Legends. This list of the biggest maps in Elder Scrolls games has been updated to include this newest Elder Scrolls title, as well as to include new maps for each game – if the game has a proper map, that is.
12 The Elder Scrolls Legends
An Elder Scrolls Game With No Exploration
Technically, The Elder Scrolls Legends is an Elder Scrolls game. Being a card game and all, though, there's not exactly the same level of exploration as the mainline RPGs. In fact, there's none at all - unless you count exploring flavor text, that is.
Even if you were to hypothetically line up every unique Elder Scrolls Legends card and measure their surface area, the total "explorable" size would still be too small to do anything. Though it's not an RPG, Elder Scrolls Legends could be considered to have the smallest explorable world of an Elder Scrolls game - although nothing isn't quite the same as 0 miles sq.
The Elder Scrolls: Legends
- Released
- March 9, 2017
WHERE TO PLAY
- Franchise
- The Elder Scrolls
- Developer
- Dire Wolf Digital, Sparkypants Studios
- Genre(s)
- Digital Card Game
11 The Elder Scrolls: Castles
Castle Interiors & Combat Arenas Technically Count, Right?
The Elder Scrolls: Castles came out of nowhere in late 2023, and after a few months, it became available for the public to download in early 2024. TES Castles is more of a castle management game than a true Elder Scrolls game, and doesn't offer the same exploration as some of the most iconic and best Elder Scrolls worlds.
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Though The Elder Scrolls Legends technically has no explorable world at all, The Elder Scrolls: Castles displays a "map" of your castle from a side view as well as small, disconnected combat arenas during fights. You won't be wandering the wilderness in The Elder Scrolls: Castles, but because it technically offers these two "explorable areas", it lands near the bottom of this list comparison of Elder Scrolls map sizes.
10 The Elder Scrolls Travels: Stormhold, Dawnstar, and Shadowkey
Few Dungeons & Tiny Open World Areas Make For A Middling Mobile Map
- The Elder Scrolls Travels: Stormhold (2003)
- The Elder Scrolls Travels: Dawnstar (2004)
- The Elder Scrolls Travels: Shadowkey (2004)
There were three mobile games released in 2003 and 2004 that brought the Elder Scrolls brand on the go under the "Travels" brand – perhaps to symbolize TES players on mobile devices. Though these games weren't anything compared to the vast, elaborate worlds of the mainline entries (which at the time would have been Morrowind), they were a nifty bit of fun for the time. However, depending on which version a player got (mostly dependent on their phone's strength), more content was unlocked, including new areas and even new classes.
The smallest versions of each of these games only had eight dungeons and six classes, while the largest versions held 36 dungeons and an extra class. Elder Scrolls Travels: Shadowey was developed for the Nokie N-Gage, a mobile phone and mobile gaming device. Despite this relative boost in what the game was capable of, Shadowkey is still smaller than the later mobile title The Elder Scrolls: Blades, which included a number of explorable open areas rather than a select few tiny dungeons.
9 The Elder Scrolls: Blades
Linear, Small Zones Connect Players Across Tamriel
The Elder Scrolls: Blades is without a doubt the smallest world in an Elder Scrolls game. It has dungeons, a world map, and towns and settlements to check out, but because of the limited mobility and linearity of Blades, the actual explorable area is miniscule.
No one has taken an exact measurement of Blades map size, but even compared to Battlespire and Redguard – two other Elder Scrolls with no consensus on their map sizes – Blades feels constrained and tiny. Battlespire and Redguard at least have relatively explorable open worlds, while Blades is a much more linear, much more guided experience through small zones.
The Elder Scrolls: Blades
- Released
- May 12, 2020
WHERE TO PLAY
8 An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire
Unconfirmed Size, But Likely Smaller Than Redguard
An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire, more commonly called just Battlespire by fans, is a spin-off from Daggerfall that takes place in quite the unexpected location: the Elder Scrolls' closest equivalent of a space station. Hidden in a pocket Oblivion realm is the Battlespire, an "elite training center" that has been overrun by Daedra.
Just like Blades and Redguard, nobody really knows the exact map size of Battlespire. However, Redguard had a proper outdoor world to explore as well as dungeons, cities, and other locations that expand the world. Battlespire takes place entirely on this elite training center, and thus is a fair bit smaller in scope than Redguard.
An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire
- Released
- December 2, 1997
WHERE TO PLAY
- Developer(s)
- Bethesda Softworks
- Franchise
- The Elder Scrolls
- Platform(s)
- PC
- Genre(s)
- Action RPG
7 The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard
The Small Island Setting Sets Constraints On Exploration
Between the time Daggerfall and Morrowind were released, Bethesda made a few spin-off titles in The Elder Scrolls universe. One of these games was The Elder Scrolls Aventures: Redguard. This game takes place on the island of Stros M'Kai, located on the southern coast of Hammerfell. Unlike most main Elder Scrolls games, this game is focused on completing levels in a certain order rather than exploring a massive world.
As a result, measuring the size of the map is rather difficult. With how short the game is and how small the overworld is, it is safe to assume that this is one of the smallest Elder Scrolls games of the bunch that still allows a modicum of exploration. After all, a small island is no match for the main provinces the other games take place in, though it is more developed than the Battlespire or Blades' linear levels.
The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard
- Released
- November 16, 1998
WHERE TO PLAY
- Developer(s)
- Bethesda Softworks
- Franchise
- The Elder Scrolls
- Platform(s)
- PC
- Genre(s)
- Action-Adventure
6 The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
Around 16 Kilometers Of Explorable Area in Vvardenfell
Veteran Morrowind fans might be surprised that Morrowind is the smallest open-world Bethesda game in the series. Vvardenfell has a grand total of about 16 kilometers of playable space. The reason it felt much larger than the likes of Skyrim was this game didn't have fast travel, and players had to go practically everywhere on foot if they couldn't afford a ride.
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Well, it didn't have convenient fast travel. Players could either pay a fee to use the silt striders dotted across the landscape to travel between towns, or those adept in the arcane arts could mark locations to teleport between. Coupled with the game's slow movement speed, the Morrowind map size feels much larger than it really is – but that hasn't stopped it from being a popular game to mod more than 20 years later. Those that own the Bloodmoon expansion can also travel to Solstheim by boat or by having a high enough Acrobatics skill to jump over the ocean.
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
- Released
- May 1, 2002
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- T For Teen due to Blood, Violence
- Developer(s)
- Bethesda Game Studios
- Platform(s)
- PC, Xbox (Original)
- Genre(s)
- RPG
5 The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Around 37 Kilometers Of Explorable Area in Skyrim
It's a meme amongst the community that Bethesda has resold Skyrim half a dozen times by now, including the Special Edition of the game, the Greymoor expansion for Elder Scrolls Online, and there's even a port for your Alexa. There is always something interesting happening near the player, whether that's random encounters or unexplored dungeons.
Skyrim is much larger than Morrowind, more than doubling that game's size at 37 kilometers (which doesn't include the impressive verticality of the fifth Elder Scrolls title). Some of that space is water and mountains, but nearly all of the landscape has something for players to discover. Its breathtaking vistas and quests keep fans coming back almost a decade since its release.
This world feels relatively small compared to others, though, because it's incredibly easy to get around quickly, making exploration both more efficient and less exciting.
Skyrim
- Released
- November 11, 2011
WHERE TO PLAY
4 The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
About 41 Kilometers of Explorable Area in Cyrodiil
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion has the opposite problem of Morrowind. Many fans look back on this game as much smaller than other entries, but it is the opposite. Oblivion is a larger game compared to the latest three main entries, allowing players to explore the province of Cyrodil.
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At 41 kilometers, this game has a massive landscape for players to explore. Like other Bethesda games, major towns and dungeons keep players busy while exploring. This size gets even larger when the Shivering Isles is considered—a unique zone that is roughly 10 kilometers in size. When all of Oblivion's content is accounted for, it is one of the largest games Bethesda has made in recent memory.
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
- Released
- March 20, 2006
WHERE TO PLAY
3 Elder Scrolls Online
More Than 400 Kilometers Spanning Almost All Of Tamriel
It seems like cheating putting an MMO beside single-player RPGs, but The Elder Scrolls Online is surprisingly not the largest Elder Scrolls game. Unfortunately, no one truly knows how large ESO is. Not only is it difficult to measure since each region is instanced, but new zones are frequently added in major expansions.
The developers of the game commented before launch that Cyrodil is around 100 kilometers while most regions are around 10 kilometers. Adding every region together and assuming the major expansion zones are around 100 kilometers, the map of ESO is around 400 kilometers. This dwarfs the size of the past three main Elder Scrolls games combined! It is the largest Elder Scrolls game ever made that didn't utilize procedural generation for its landscapes.
Elder Scrolls Online
- Released
- April 4, 2014
WHERE TO PLAY
- Developer(s)
- ZeniMax Online Studios
- Franchise
- The Elder Scrolls
- Platform(s)
- PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Stadia, PC, macOS
- Genre(s)
- MMORPG
