Riding

	Riding (Profession)
	Trainers • Mounts

Riding is a secondary profession in which characters may learn to ride mounts, which provide movement speed bonuses and, when applicable, the ability to fly. As of Patch 4.0.1, increasing riding skill grants further increases to movement speed. All ground mounts increase movement speed by 60/100% (Apprentice/Journeyman) and all flying mounts increase ground movement speed by 100% and flying movement speed by 150/280/310% (Expert/Artisan/Master).

More detail on the requirements for each mount can be found on the mounts page.

Skill levels

The following table lists the skill levels available and the cost to train each skill. Due to the high cost of training, the price with discount is also listed in the table. The only discounts available are faction discounts, which vary depending on where you train in the riding skill:

• Apprentice and Journeyman riding are discounted based on your standing with whatever race you buy them from. All playable races have trainers.
• Expert riding can be discounted by buying it in Honor Hold or Thrallmar, which will apply a Stormwind or Orgrimmar discount, respectively.
• Artisan riding can be discounted in Honor Hold (Stormwind reputation is used to determine the discount of riding skill) or Thrallmar in the same fashion as Expert, or it can be discounted with Valiance Expedition and Warsong Offensive rep by going to Valiance Keep and Warsong Hold, respectively.

Also, note that the prices listed for the mount itself refer to the basic mounts available to each race, usually purchasable from a vendor near the riding trainer. Special, reputation reward, or vanity mounts may cost more or require special currency to purchase. To save space, faction discounts on the mounts themselves are not included in the table.

Skill	Proficiency	Riding	Friendly	Honored	Revered	Exalted	Required for	Necessary level
75	Apprentice	10	9 50	9	8 50	8	Mounted riding (+60% movement speed)	10
150	Journeyman	50	47 50	45	42 50	40	Faster mounted riding (+100%)	20 with Apprentice
225	Expert	250	237 50	225	212 50	200	Mounted flying (+150% in the air)	30 with Journeyman
375	Master	5,000	4,750	4,500	4,250	4,000	Fastest mounted flying (+310%)	40 with Expert
Total Price		5,310 10	5,044 59 50	4,779 9	4,513 58 50	4,248 8

Free riding skills

• Death Knights receive the 150 skill at character creation (level 55); they learn to summon an Acherus Deathcharger (ability), a swift land mount, as a quest reward in the Acherus starting zone.

• Paladins and Warlocks receive the 75 skill as soon as they reach level 10, and as of Patch 5.0.3, automatically learn the spell to summon their class mount.

•  Gladiator awards Master Riding, which is automatically received when learning the Custom Gladiator Mount.  What A Long, Strange Trip It's Been did the same until Patch 5.0.3 upon using the  [Reins of the Violet Proto-Drake], but this was removed when the mount became available account-wide.

• All classes receive the 225 skill at level 71.

• Draenor flying is rewarded to the player once they complete  [Draenor Pathfinder], unlocking flying for all characters on the account.

• Increased Broken Isles mount speed and flying for all characters come from  [Broken Isles Pathfinder, Part One] and Part 2 respectively.

• Increased Argus mount speed for all characters is awarded from  [Explore Argus].

• Allied races receive the 75 skill upon character creation (level 10).

Note that like all professions, all lower ranked skill levels must be learned before training further (e.g. Expert skill is required to train Master skill).

This is a summary of the initial class mounts. Obsolete quests for the paladin and warlock mounts have since been removed from the game.

Class	Ability	Level
Death Knight	Acherus Deathcharger (ability)	8
Demon hunter	[Felsaber]	??
Paladin	[Summon Warhorse] (Human) [Summon Thalassian Warhorse] (Blood Elf) [Summon Exarch's Elekk] (Draenei) [Summon Sunwalker Kodo] (Tauren) [Summon Dawnforge Ram] (Dwarf) [Summon Darkforge Ram] (Dark Iron Dwarf)	10
Paladin	[Summon Charger] (Human) [Summon Thalassian Charger] (Blood Elf) [Summon Great Exarch's Elekk] (Draenei) [Summon Great Sunwalker Kodo] (Tauren)	20
Warlock	Felsteed (warlock ability)	10
Warlock	[Dreadsteed]	20

Riding trainers

Alliance Mount Trainers and Vendors
Type	Location	Faction	Trainer
Horse	Eastvale Logging Camp Menethil Harbor Southshore Theramore Isle	Stormwind	Randal Hunter
Saber	Cenarion Enclave	Darnassus	Jartsam
Ram	Amberstill Ranch	Ironforge	Ultham Ironhorn
Mechanostrider	Steelgrill's Depot	Gnomeregan	Binjy Featherwhistle
Elekk	The Exodar (front entrance)	Exodar	Aalun
Gryphon	Honor Hold Wildhammer Stronghold Valiance Keep Stormwind City	Stormwind Honor Hold Valiance Expedition Stormwind	Hargen Bronzewing Ilsa Blusterbrew Maigra Keenfeather Bralla Cloudwing

Horde Mount Trainers and Vendors
Type	Location	Faction	Trainer
Wolf	Valley of Honor	Orgrimmar	Kildar
Raptor	Sen'jin Village	Darkspear Trolls	Xar'Ti
Kodo	Bloodhoof Village	Thunder Bluff	Kar Stormsinger
Skeletal Horse	Brill	Undercity	Velma Warnam
Hawkstrider	Thuron's Livery	Silvermoon City	Perascamin
Trike	Goblin Slums	Bilgewater Cartel	Kall Worthaton
Wyvern	Thrallmar Shadowmoon Village Warsong Hold Orgrimmar	Orgrimmar Thrallmar Warsong Offensive Orgrimmar	Wind Rider Jahubo Olrokk Wind Rider Sabamba Maztha

Neutral Mount/Cold Weather Flying Trainers
Location	Faction	Trainer
Krasus' Landing River's Heart K3	Neutral Neutral Neutral	Hira Snowdawn Pilot Vic Roxi Ramrocket

Patch changes

• Patch 9.0.1 (2020-10-13):
  • Artisan Riding removed. Characters who learned it prior to the squish retain the ability.
  • Learning Flight Form no longer automatically teaches Expert Riding.
    
• Patch 7.3.5 (2018-01-16): [Flight Master's License], [Cold Weather Flying] and [Wisdom of the Four Winds] removed.
  
• Hotfix (2016-07-25): Cold Weather Flying now costs 50 gold, and is automatically learned at level 80.
  
• Patch 6.2.2 (2015-09-01): Flying has been enabled on Draenor for characters that have attained the account-wide achievement,  [Draenor Pathfinder].
  
• Patch 5.0.4 (2012-08-28): Mount Changes
  
  • [Wisdom of the Four Winds] added at level 90 at a cost of 2,500.
  •  [Reins of the Violet Proto-Drake] no longer grants Master Flight.
• Patch 4.0.3 (2010-11-16): Mount Changes
  
  • Master Flying Skill (310% flight speed) can now be purchased from most riding trainers.
• Patch 4.0.1 (2010-10-12): Mount Changes
  
  • Master Flying Skill (310% flight speed) is now available from riding trainers in Dalaran, Valiance Expedition, Warsong Offensive at a cost of 5,000.
  • Characters that already had a 310% mount pre-4.0.1 are given this skill free of charge. All other characters must purchase Master Flying to receive 310% flight speed.
  • Initially, the [Reins of the Violet Proto-Drake] did not give 310% speed, this was corrected in a hotfix.
  • Cold Weather Flying reduced to 500g.
  • Cold Weather Flying can now be purchased at level 68.
  • The heirloom  [Tome of Cold Weather Flight] has been removed from vendors.
  • The  [X-53 Touring Rocket] can now also be used as a ground mount.
  • The speed of nearly all mounts now scales with riding skill.
• Patch 3.2.2 (2009-09-22): Mount Changes
  • Reduced the expert riding skill price to 250.
  • Changed the faction discounts for the riding skill vendors in Honor Hold and Thrallmar to use Stormwind and Orgrimmar faction, respectively. This is because newly-arrived 60s in Outland are unlikely to have any Honor Hold or Thrallmar rep.[1]
    
• Patch 3.2.0 (2009-08-04): Mount Changes
  • The cast time for summoning any ground mount is now 1.5 seconds, down from 3 seconds.
  • Apprentice Riding (Skill 75): Can now be learned at level 20 for 4. Mail will be sent to players who reach level 20 directing them to the riding trainer.
  • Journeyman Riding (Skill 150): Can now be learned at level 40 for 50. Mail will be sent to players who reach level 40 directing them back to the riding trainer.
  • Expert Riding (Skill 225): Can now be learned at level 60 for 600 from trainers in Honor Hold or Thrallmar. Faction discounts now apply (Honor Hold for Alliance; Thrallmar for Horde). Flight speed at this skill level has been increased to +150% of run speed, up from +60%.
  • Artisan Riding (Skill 300): Faction discounts now apply (Honor Hold or Valiance Expedition for Alliance; Thrallmar or Warsong Offensive for Horde).
  • In order to further equalize the number of purchasable mounts available to each race, a new 60% speed ground mount has been added for night elves, and a new 100% speed ground mount has been added for the undead.
  • Flying over Dalaran and Wintergrasp is now possible so long as players keep a healthy distance above the ground.
  • For 1,000 level 80 Main characters can purchase the heirloom  [Tome of Cold Weather Flight] and give it to their alts level 68+ that have a flying skill of 225+ (not 150 as previously stated) to learn Cold Weather Flying.
    
• Patch 3.0.2 (2008-10-14): Cold Weather Flying added at level 77 at a cost of 1,000.
  
• Patch 2.4.3 (2008-07-15): The level requirement for Apprentice Riding was lowered from 40 to 30. It also reduces the cost from 90 to 35, and its respective reputation discounts.
  
• Patch 2.0.1 (2006-12-05): PvP rankings also no longer grant the player an additional 10% discount

  Before TBC, the cost of Journeyman riding was 900, so the total cost of getting an epic mount was the same as before. It has since been reduced to 600 to make it easier to buy Expert riding skill.
  

• Hotfix (2006-09-28): We will be issuing rolling restarts across all realms [...] to apply a hot fix that will address an issue with mount riding skills. Players that had a mount in their inventory but were not given the appropriate riding skill should find that this has been corrected after this fix is applied.
  
• Patch 1.12.1 (2006-09-26): The cost structure and functionality of Riding and Mounts was changed.

  Prior to that patch, Riding was an ability rather than a secondary Profession, and had only one rank. Each faction had its own riding skill (tiger riding, horse riding, mechanostrider piloting, ram riding) and the cost was 20, available at level 40. Exalted reputation was required to learn cross-faction riding skill, but mounts were Bind on Use and purchasable by anyone for 80. This meant that characters who were PvP rank 3 or higher could pass on the 10% discount directly to other characters by buying the mount for them. This is no longer possible because all mounts are now Bind on Pickup, and the majority of the cost is built into the riding skill training (which is no longer faction-specific) rather than the cost of the mount.
  

See also

• Flying mounts
• Content exclusive to flying mounts
• Flight master
• Flight path
• Movement → Transportation
• [Flight Form] (The Druid's flight form)
• [Swift Flight Form] (The Druid's epic flight form)
•  [Flying Machine]

External links

• Wowhead