My Stardew mod recommendations

Although I haven't been an avid player of Stardew Valley since I got into modding (the so-called mod author's curse), I do still love to recommend mods that I have come across and really enjoyed! I always recommend using Nexus Mods for getting your mods; there are definitely flaws to be found with it (mostly when you're an author) but it is still MUCH better than the available alternatives (such as ModDrop and CurseForge), in terms of moderation and quantity of mods published. You can also find some good mods in more unconvential places, such as ko-fi, the Stardew forums, and Naver. Always be careful about the files you're downloading though if you go this route, especially .dlls, .exes, .bats, etc. (basically anything that's not a json).

If you're new to modding, I'd suggest starting out without using a mod manager, and to curate your own modlist rather than downloading a collection. It will teach you the basics of navigating your files if you don't already know, and you can actually find mods that you know you will like AND know what exactly they change about the game. If you're already comfortable with all that, I would recommend checking out Stardrop! It's a mod manager specifically designed for Stardew Valley, unlike Vortex which is Nexus Mods's built-in mod manager. It has a lot of neat features that can make installing and managing your mods a lot easier, which is especially useful if you have hundreds of mods and like to play with different sets of mods for different save files.

Anyway, this isn't a tutorial for how to mod so I shall move on to my actual recommendation list. My goal is to give a good variety of recommendations here, mentioning mods that I view as essential to my modded playthrough experience - even if they are mega popular and appear on a ton of other people's lists - as well as highlighting some lesser known, maybe much smaller mods that don't appear on rec lists as often but deserve just as much attention. I would love to expand this list as I continue to experience more mods (I don't feel confident in recommending mods I haven't properly experienced yet)! :)

Pro tip: Check out other mods from the authors included here. Most of them have made a lot of great stuff! Also check out my own mods here!