Zelda Tears of the Kingdom: Where and how to catch Fairies
While The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom eschews many of the series' main conceits to craft a larger and bolder game and world; many of the franchise's core tenets remain. For example - Fairies are an essential tool fo players to use to safeguard themselves from an avoidable "game over". Much as with their use in other games in the series, whenever Link takes what would be fatal damage while having a Fairy in his inventory, he will be revived with a portion of his health returned to him. Therefore, if you're looking to tackle many of the game's hardest challenges - or explore the dangerous Depths - it's in your best interest to bring at least a Fairy or two along for the ride. The only question remains, where can you actually find some?
Where to find a Fairy
The good news, is there are plenty of locations in Tears of the Kingdom that offer a chance to snag a Fairy (or 3) of your own; while many of them can be found within Zonai-made springs in the Sky above Hyrule, such as this specific Island pictured below in the East Gerudo Sky Archipelago - there's one location that many players will easily be able to access at short notice, and offers perhaps the quickest route to refilling Link's Fairy supply. The secret lies in the Outskirt Stable - directly Northwest of the Great Plateau - and its well.
As players will quickly learn, Stables are notable for a few things beyond acting as a simple checkpoint - a spot for Link to refuel during the middle of his journey. Much more importantly, every Stable will have a Zonai Shrine nearby, offering players near-instant access to any of the Stables that they have already visited. Similarly, Stables will always have a well installed nearby - complete with a miniature cave to explore underneath the Stable proper.
It just so happens that Outskirt Stable in question's well is home to a school of Fairies; meaning that players can very easily teleport to the nearby shrine, run over to the well, hop in and quickly get to work grabbing a few for the road ahead. While you'll have to wait until a Blood Moon for your winged friends to respawn, this is a consistent method of topping up your supply - and it's easily the most consistent, not to mention the fastest, method of gathering fairies in the game.
How to catch Fairies
Fairies are friendly creatures, but they're more than a little skittish. You won't simply be able to run up to one and grab it - without a healthy dose of luck, anyway - so your best option would be to employ stealth. What startles Fairies isn't so much the sight of Link, but rather the noise. If you crouch and tiptoe up to a Fairy then it won't run away - even if Link stands fully upright in order to gain the height needed to nab one out of the air. While you certainly could use stealth-enhancing items and armor, it's wholly unnecessary with the slightest amount of caution.
As another note; whatever you do, don't use your new Fairy companion as an ingredient while cooking. Not only is it needlessly cruel to the poor thing, but the only real reason to grind out Fairies is for the ability to revive from lethal damage. Using up a Fairy for an elixir will nullify that benefit for very little reward. With all of that out of the way; good luck with the game's challenges! We can only assume you're off to attempt something treacherous if you were on the lookout for this guide.