Hand of Nilganihmaht

About 4 weeks of waiting or dailiesGuaranteedA step needs 4 players

Shadowlands · Drop

The game's mount journal

Zone: The Maw

Find a character at the top of the page to see whether your account has this mount, and where that character stands on what it asks for.

Look it up on Wowhead

How to get it

Reward of the quest Gotta Hand It To Ya, the end of a secret in the Maw. Five rings are found around the Maw and placed on the Hand of Nilganihmaht, which stands in a cave in the west of the Maw and is only there in the Rift, the Maw's shadow phase: Nilganihmaht's Gold Band, Silver Ring, Runed Band, Signet Ring and Stone Ring. With the fifth ring on, the hand gives the quest and the quest gives the Nilganihmaht Control Ring, which teaches the mount. Rings can be placed one at a time, on separate visits.

Time there about 15 min a visit

Guides Wowhead: Nilganihmaht Control Ring, item page (the top comment is the full walkthrough; newer comments on the Stone Ring's quest) · Warcraft Secrets: Hand of Nilganihmaht Secret Mount Guide

Before you go

The Chains of Domination campaign through the chapter Focusing the Eye: its second chapter opens Korthia, and its last quest, Good News, Everyone!, opens the covenant assaults in the Maw · about 2.5 h
Tier 4 with The Archivists' Codex: from that tier Archivist Roh-Suir in Korthia sells the Repaired Riftkey for 100 Cataloged Research. A key opens a Rift portal in Korthia for 15 minutes, and the Rift is ridden from there north into the Maw; two keys are wanted, one for Torglluun and one for the hand, unless both fit into one. The keys are also a rare find on Korthia's rares and relic caches · about 8.5 h over 9 days
The Animated Levitating Chain from Ve'nari (1,050 Stygia, sold from the standing Tentative): it shows the grapple points used on the way up to the Gold Band and on the walls of Perdition Hold · about 1 h
Gold Band: on a spike at the top of the rock pillars above Calcis (19.2, 32.3). A climb: start at about 18.6, 39.0 (grapple point at 18.9, 38.0) and follow the ledges up. There at any time · about 0.25 h
Silver Ring: in the Domination Sealed Chest in the Desmotaeron (66.1, 57.4, behind the staircase), which opens with four Seal Breaker Keys: one from The Harrower's Key Ring on the back wall of the building entered at 66.9, 56.2 (key at 65.6, 60.0), one from a Helgarde Supply Cache (spots around 67.3, 49.0; 65.7, 61.2; 67.7, 53.1; 68.2, 48.1; 63.4, 52.0), one from the Feeder's Hand and Key dropped by the rare Ylva (66.4, 41.9), and one as a rare drop from the elite Maldraxxi Defectors around 66.6, 52.2 · about 1 h
Runed Band: dropped by Torglluun at Ruin's Cradle (28.6, 25.0), who is only there in the Rift, so a Repaired Riftkey used in Korthia and the ride north · about 0.5 h
Signet Ring, first part, which takes four players: Domination's Calling is made of three Dominion Etchings, one each from Apholeias, Herald of Loss (Crucible of the Damned, 19.3, 41.7), Ekphoras, Herald of Grief, and Talaporas, Herald of Pain (the Tremaculum, 28, 12). Each herald appears only when four players stand on the four platforms of its arena and use the extra action button within a few seconds of each other · about 1.5 h
Signet Ring, second part: use Domination's Calling inside the Altar of Domination in Perdition Hold, in the circle in its lowest room, take the portal it opens up to the platform (20.6, 69.4) and kill Exos, Herald of Domination, who drops the ring. One player can use the item; it is kept, with a cooldown of a day · about 0.5 h
Stone Ring: four Quartered Ancient Rings from Perdition Hold, to be had only while the Necrolord Assault is on and offers the quest Putting A Plan Together (from Mikanikos, after Baroness Draka's first quest). That quest gives the Overcharged Centurion. With it: a Mawsworn Cache on the walls (27.7, 61.6 or 35.0, 69.7); the quest Clearing the Walls, started by the Defense Map from the cache at 30.3, 55.9; the Maw Mad Construct, which runs through the hold shouting the player's name once a first quarter is looted; and a quarter lying on the ground (near 33.7, 66.2, or in the small cave at 30.7, 58.4). Then join the four at a Soulsteel Forge in Zovaal's Cauldron (about 36.0, 41.0) · about 1 h over 4 weeks

In all: about 16.8 h of play, spread over 4 weeks, starting from nothing.

Getting there

Hand of Nilganihmaht, in its cave (cave mouth 25.5, 32.6; only there in the Rift)

The Maw · 25.5, 36.8

/way The Maw 25.5 36.8

From Stormwind (Alliance) about 2.7 min of travel

Take the portal from Wizard's Sanctum to Oribos*
Jump into the Maw from the Ring of Transference
Ride the rest of the way

From Orgrimmar (Horde) about 2.7 min of travel

Take the portal from Pathfinder's Den to Oribos*
Jump into the Maw from the Ring of Transference
Ride the rest of the way

/way is for the TomTom addon. Travel times are estimates: flying at 55 yards a second in a straight line and 30 seconds for a portal. A star marks a portal that needs a quest or other unlock done first.

Notes and sources

The journal says only 'Zone: The Maw'. It still works in Midnight: Wowhead comments of 2026 report the Necrolord Assault up with Putting A Plan Together, and a 2026 comment on Exos describes the Signet Ring route.

Two things set the pace. The Stone Ring's quest: if the assault offers Centurions March! instead, wait for the next one (Warcraft Secrets); the days given are a guess between the reports. And the three heralds, which is why the group size is 4: each needs four players at the same moment (wiki). Their loot is not the ring, only the etchings, and the heralds can be left out by whoever finds a portal already open: Domination's Calling opens a portal that others can take and that stays up for a while (top comment; a 2024 comment advises asking for someone who owns the item).

Exos is not on his platform until the item has been used. The platform can be reached by grapple points or by gliding, but 'he only spawns when you create his portal' (a 2020 comment; comments of 2021 and 2026 agree). Warcraft Secrets offers the climb (grapple points at 23.1, 68.4, 22.2, 71.1 and 22.2, 70.8, seen with a Stygia Dowser in the bags) as a second way to the ring, against those comments; the guide follows the comments.

Wowhead counts the ring in 1,466 of 6,197 recorded loots of Exos, a share that takes in kills from before the ring existed and by players who already had it, so it does not show whether it always drops for someone who needs it. The Bound Shadehound's notes report a 2026 bug at the Altar of Domination (the button of an old Bastion quest in the way of a puzzle there); whether it touches Domination's Calling is not known.

The Rift: besides the Riftkey, a Collapsing Riftstone (a rare drop from rares) opens a portal into it that a group can share, and the Night Fae Assault's quest A Shady Place lends an Unbalanced Riftstone, with which Torglluun cannot be reached (top comment). Korthia's Rift portals, by the top comment:

61.8, 44.6
43.5, 46.8
53.7, 72.0
56.8, 74.6
59.4, 53.7
one more in the cave at 41.5, 41.4 (as given for the Tamed Mauler)

A Cypher of Relocation from Ve'nari works inside the Rift once out of Korthia and saves most of the ride (comments of 2021); one commenter did Torglluun and the hand on one key with eight minutes left. Whether the Riftkey can be bought on the standing of another character was not checked; the wiki has had the Codex as a Warband reputation since patch 11.1.5.

On the Stone Ring:

do not loot the Mawsworn Caches before having the Centurion, or the Defense Map does not come that day (a 2026 comment)
a Centurion stands ready near 38, 64 during the assault (2021)
the Construct despawns after about 30 seconds and comes back, minutes later by the comments, 15 to 30 by Warcraft Secrets
a Trained Gromit Carrier from Korthia finds the quarter on the ground (wiki; a 2021 comment)
Clearing the Walls can be shared by a player who has it (wiki)

On the keys: one commenter's chest opened with two keys in the bags (2023), and a 2024 comment could not find the key ring on the wall, unanswered. Which rings are on the hand, after a 2026 comment: /run for q,n in pairs({"Stone","Runed","Gold","Silver","Signet"}) do print(n, C_QuestLog.IsQuestFlaggedCompleted(64196+q)) end

Names and places differ:

the cave: Forlorn Respite in Wowhead's top comment, the Hollow of the Insolent on the wiki
the forge: 36.0, 41.0 in the comment, 38.9, 39.8 in Warcraft Secrets
Torglluun: 28.7, 25.0, 28.6, 25.1 or 27.6, 25.0

Wowhead has no guide of its own for this mount (its item page lists only the general Shadowlands Mount Guide; a 2021 news post was not opened). wow.gg's guide (2026) is not linked: it has Ve'nari selling the Riftkey, against the wiki and Wowhead.

Hours for the rings are estimates throughout; no source times them. The time on the spot is the last visit: into the Rift in Korthia, the ride to the cave, the rings and the quest. No flying in the Maw. The quest is 64202; the item binds when picked up (Wowhead's tooltip); added in patch 9.1.0.

Confidence in this entry: medium. Looked up in 2026.

Sources