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When awarding existing answers, people sometimes forget to add the link to the answer they're awarding (or they might not know how to do so if they're not familiar with Markdown yet). Because of this, it would be very helpful to have an optional field that lets you add a link to the answer that you're going to award the bounty to (only for this specific bounty reason, of course). Thus, people would see the exemplary answer in question and upvote it.

hyper-neutrino also suggested that the answer to be awarded could have an indicator that it is going to be given a bounty. They also suggested that the blue +x element showing the bounty amount could link to the answer being bountied.

If this is implemented, another thing that could be done is automatically award the answer based on the link if the person who started the bounty doesn't do it themselves by the time the bounty expires.

To avoid people accidentally copying the wrong link, the field for the link to the answer could perhaps be made editable, although that would probably take a lot more work.

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Bounty sometimes attracts new answers, which are better than the existing answer(s).

There can be cases where a new answer posted during the bounty period would be actually better than the answer you initially had in mind.

Hence, I think it would be a mistake to tie the bounty to specific answer. Better keep it vague, and in most cases people will see the exemplary answer once you award it. You can also post a comment under the answer you have in mind, that's what I usually do, then you can delete it later.

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    I was under the impression that that bounty reason was for answers that you would award no matter what because they were so good. If an even better answer comes along, you can always just start another bounty on it.
    – user
    Commented Jun 29, 2021 at 18:38
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    @user You can only start another bounty if you have enough reputation to do so. In which case, to avoid hurt feelings when 'switching' from the good enough to the even better answer, it's easier to not have committed already. Granted, these are the edgiest of the edge cases. Another edge-case argument for not making it mandatory to state which answer you will award your bounty to might be that it avoids copying the wrong link and getting complaints about that!
    – Tinkeringbell Mod
    Commented Jun 29, 2021 at 19:35
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    @Tinkeringbell, the question seems to be proposing making this optional, not mandatory - thought that wouldn't stop mis-copies/typos, of course.
    – bobble
    Commented Jun 29, 2021 at 21:08
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    @Tinkeringbell I'm certainly not saying that everyone choosing that reason should link to an answer, but it would be nice to have that option if someone wants to. On CGCC, at least, there are lots of bounties without deadlines, and one is awarded a bounty when one meets certain criteria. These bounties aren't for just the best answer - most of the users starting these bounties have enough rep to reward multiple answers.
    – user
    Commented Jun 29, 2021 at 22:37

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