How to Remove the Compass and Crosshair in Skyrim
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The compass and crosshair are the only two elements of the HUD (heads-up display) that are visible in Skyrim all of the time. While they can be very useful tools, for many serious role-players who like to give themselves a bit of a challenge, they are a source of distraction and annoyance.
This mini-tutorial will show you how to disable the crosshair and compass to improve your immersion, or simply to take better screenshots.
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Removing the Crosshair
Skyrim allows you to remove the crosshair by changing a setting in-game, which is very convenient.
To remove the crosshair, just open the System menu by pressing Esc (on default settings), then go to Settings, Display and scroll down to the Crosshair option. To enable or disable the crosshair, just select it.
The Sneak Crosshair Icon
Note that this only removes the regular crosshair, the small four-pointing arrow that you see when you walk around normally. The sneak icon, which looks like a line-drawing of an eye that opens and closes as enemies become more or less aware of you, is not affected by this change.
The sneak crosshair is special because it is animated and interacts with the game instead of being a more or less static fixture of the HUD. I don't know how to disable it yet, but I will update this hub as soon as I do.
Only On the PC Version
You can only edit the SkryimPrefs.ini file if you are playing the PC version of Skryim.
Removing the Compass Using the SkyrimPrefs.ini File
To disable the compass, you need to edit the SkyrimPrefs.ini file as the game does not have a setting to disable it in-game. The SkyrimPrefs.ini is located in your game folder, not your Skyrim executable folder. Typically, this is Documents/My Games/Skyrim/.
After making a backup (always, always, always keep a backup!), open the SkyrimPrefs.ini and look (or search) for this section:
[Interface]
bDialogueSubtitles=0
bGeneralSubtitles=0
bShowCompass=1
You want to change the last setting, bShowCompass to 0, like so:
[Interface]
bDialogueSubtitles=0
bGeneralSubtitles=0
bShowCompass=0
This will disable the compass so you will no longer be able to use it. If you want to restore the compass, just change bShowCompass back to 1 and resave.
(You can also enable and disable subtitles here. They are off by default in Skyrim.)
Removing the Crosshair Using the SkyrimPrefs.ini File
Incidentally, you can also disable the crosshair in the SkyrimPrefs.ini file by changing the bCrosshairEnabled setting from 1 to 0. Here is the default:
[MAIN]
bGamepadEnable=0
bCrosshairEnabled=1
And here's what your .ini file should look like after the change:
[MAIN]
bGamepadEnable=0
bCrosshairEnabled=0
Note that you will still be able to re-enable the crosshair in game.
These HUD elements can be enabled and disabled independently, so, if you like the crosshair but don't like the compass, you can just disable the compass and leave the crosshair.
It's hard to see in this picture, so I've circled it in red.
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@skyrimfan: You can also just turn down the opacity in the Display settings. The problem is that it removes the other HUD elements as well, like Health/Magicka bars, notifications about quest updates, etc. I need to rewrite the article to make that a little clearer. Thanks for reading.
I think you can avoid all that.
Just go to the console with ~ and type tm and hit enter. Then hit ~ again to leave the console. All interface should be gone. I think you do it again to get it back.
@billymad: Yeah, it's pretty confusing the first time you try to make any changes!
I had that problem and couldnt find the line in the skyrimPrefs.ini. Than I noticed I was in skyrim main file and not in my documents where your saved games are located. Guess the game keeps a backup of a similar file in the main folder which has the same name.
Thanks, easy and quick to the point!
Cheers for that buddy :3
@NooDLe: If there is no bShowCompass entry, you can add it manually. Just copy it from the article and paste it in the location shown. Make sure you're adding it to the SkyrimPrefs.ini in your My Games folder. There are lots of ini files, so make sure you use the right one. And ALWAYS make a backup of this file before editing it.
I've opened my ini file, but there's no ShowCompass entry :S Please help!
@Ray VN: You're welcome!
Much appreciated
alividlife 3 months ago
Just wanted to quickly mention with Screenshots.
The best way to take a screenshot is to type into console
TFC 1
ToggleFreeCamera "1" allows you to move about the screen while everything is "paused" in realtime. In conjunction with TM (or ToggleMenu) you can take almost whatever type of screenshot you want in your own sweet time.