Crime and punishment in The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim is very straightforward. If the Dragonborn does something illegal, such as steal, pick a forbidden lock, or murder someone, and if someone sees them do it and reports it, they'll get a bounty placed on their head. If the bounty gets high enough, guards will try to arrest or attack the Dragonborn.
Each hold in Skyrim tracks bounties separately, and so if players kill someone in Whiterun they can hide out in Riften without worrying about guards. However, the bounty in Whiterun will remain until players can somehow remove it. This guide will explain which options will completely wipe a bounty off the books (and which options won't).
How to Check for Bounties
While each hold has its own jarl, the list of crimes is constant across Skyrim. These include theft, picking the lock of an owned building or object, trespassing, assault (but not self-defense), escaping from jail, turning into a werewolf or vampire lord, and murder.
If someone spots the Dragonborn committing a crime, they'll add a bounty based on how serious the crime is. For instance, picking a lock is worth 5 gold, assault is worth 40, and murder is worth 1000. However, it's possible to remove this bounty by killing every witness before they can find a guard and report the crime. Players should be careful about doing this since murder carries such a big penalty. If a witness reaches a guard, or if a guard is the witness, the bounty is "locked in" and killing witnesses won't do anything.
If a bounty is worth less than 100 gold, guards will tend to leave the Dragonborn alone since the amount isn't serious. However, if players interact with a guard, they'll recognize the Dragonborn and start the confrontation dialog. If the bounty is 100 gold or more, guards will attempt to arrest the Dragonborn as soon as they spot them.
Players may also encounter hired thugs if they murder or steal. These thugs are hired directly by victims or their relatives, and so this can happen regardless of the Dragonborn's bounty status. They can show up even if players never got caught, but on the bright side defeating them won't affect the mechanical relationship with the NPC who hired them.
If a bounty goes over 1000 gold, players may start to encounter bounty hunters even outside the hold that issued the bounty. A bounty hunter will demand the bounty owed to the hold plus 20 percent on top, and if players refuse the hunter will attack. Whether because of bugs or a nod to realism, sometimes bounty hunters will attack on sight, and other times paying them won't clear the bounty (presumably they keep the money for themselves).
Players can check their bounty levels in the game's General Stats page. The last section is "Crime," and all currently active bounties are listed first. If players have no active bounties, the first entry in this section should be "Total Lifetime Bounty." Note that Skyrim lists bounties based on the name of the hold, not the name of the hold's capital. Players can get the achievement "Master Criminal" by having a bounty worth over 1000 in all 9 holds at once, and this stats page is a useful way to keep track.
Bounty Guard Interactions
Whether the player or a guard starts the arrest interaction, players get several ways to respond.
- Pay the bounty. This option is straightforward but sometimes expensive. By paying the guard on the spot, players can clear the bounty and walk the streets of the hold as a citizen in good standing.
- Pay the bounty (Thieves Guild discount). If players are part of the Thieves Guild and have completed the quest that expands them into the current hold, they can pay half the bounty's value to clear it.
- Go to jail. Players can always choose not to pay the bounty and instead spend some time in jail. Click on the bed in the cell to serve the sentence, which can be 1 to 7 days long depending on the bounty. Each day in jail removes some of the progress towards the next set of skill levels, and a full seven days will wipe out this progress for every skill. On the bright side, players will never lose full skill levels from jail time.
- Appeal to Thanehood. If the Dragonborn is a Thane in the hold, they can use their position to wipe out a bounty worth up to 3000 gold. However, this only works once per hold (or twice if the Jarl changes between attempts).
Paying the bounty or going to jail will remove all stolen items from the player's inventory. To avoid this, be sure to stash stolen items (inventory items with red names) somewhere safe before dealing with a bounty.
Players also have several ways to handle an arrest that won't clear a bounty.
- Escape from jail. Every jail in Skyrim has at least one way for players to escape. In most cases, players will need to find a chest in the jail area that holds all their belongings (including stolen items) on their way out. Players are still stuck with the bounty, now with an extra 100 on top for breaking out of jail, but doing so earns players the "Wanted" achievement.
- Persuade the guard to look the other way. This only works on low-value bounties of 100 gold or lower. Doing so won't clear the bounty, but it will let players go about their business in town.
- Bribe the guard to look the other way. Members of the Thieves Guild and those with the Speech perk Bribery can pay guards to ignore them. The value of this bribe is based on the Dragonborn's Speech skill rather than the value of the bounty, and it doesn't wipe the bounty away, making it a poor option outside of emergencies.
- Resist arrest. Players can refuse to choose the other options, but doing so will cause all the guards nearby to attack the Dragonborn. High-level characters can take out large numbers of guards, but they tend to keep respawning, and killing them adds 1000 to the local bounty each time. If desired, players can usually trigger the arrest dialog again by pulling out and then sheathing their weapons.
Clearing a bounty in Skyrim isn't hard, but players need to be careful who they talk to, where they keep their stolen items, and how they approach guards. Keep in mind which methods work and which ones don't, and always remember to stash stolen items before dealing with a bounty.
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim is available now on PC, PS3, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.