In the Dragon Language, the word for "steal" is "Gahrot." This is a reference to Garrett, the protagonist of the Thief series.

Likewise, the word "Tafiir" translates to "thief". This is a reference to the invented word "taffer" featured in the Thief series.

There is a glitch in Skyrim where the player can pass through walls using kettles. All that has to be done is to pick up a kettle, and then walk or run into a wall. This can be used to leave cities without NPC's or certain graphics loading, walking underneath the map, and more.

If used in the city of Whiterun, it is possible to find a chest underneath Skyforge. This chest contains armor, gold, ingots, and ore.

In Secunda's Kiss, Red Road Pass, Tumble Arch Pass, and Steamcrag camp, you can find a weapon called the giant's club. You can not pick it up, but you can use a glitch to have a companion use it. All you have to do is take all of the weapons from your companion, tell him/her to pick it up, and they will be carrying it. They can even use it and can do damage. However, it is impossible to take it from your companion.

The names of most of the dragon priest masks mean something in Dovahzul, the language of the dragons:

• Dukaan - Dishonor
• Hevnoraak - Brutality
• Krosis - Sorrow
• Morokei - Glorious
• Nahkriin - Vengeance
• Rahgot - Anger
• Vokun - Shadow
• Volsung - Horrible
• Ahzidal - The Bitter Destroyer
• Konahrik - Warlord

The only masks that don't translate from Dovahzul are Otar and the wooden mask.

On February 18th 2011, Bethesda opened a challenge to deliver a baby on Skyrim's release date, November 11th 2011, and name the child "Dovahkiin".

The winners, Megan and Eric Kellermeyer, named their newborn son Dovahkiin Tom Kellermeyer when he was delivered on that date. In return they were given a Steam key that granted them access to every Bethesda Softworks game made, including all future releases.

Silus Vesuius runs a small museum in Dawnstar about the Mythic Dawn cult from the previous Elder Scrolls game, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Inside one of the display cases is a burnt page from the Mysterium Xarxes. The page cannot be stolen or moved, but if the page is struck with a weapon or magic enough times, it will transform into a wooden bucket.

Charles Martinet, voice actor of several main characters from the Mario series, voices Paarthunax, a dragon.

According to senior producer Jeff Gardiner, two minor details for butterflies and ants were removed before the game's release, because they were causing lag. Butterflies were intended to have a mechanic where if they detected flowers in the player's inventory, they would start following the player, but it was not anticipated that since this system affected every butterfly in the game, it would use a significant amount of processing power. Similarly, when artist Mark Teare added ants to the game, every ant was accidentally set to cast a shadow, a feature at the time that was considered "the most expensive thing in the rendering", causing more lag. Gardiner stated these mistakes were an unintended result of the large amount of creative freedom the developers had, allowing them more time to include smaller details after they were finished with assigned tasks.