minecraft bedrock nether travel

Nether Portal Calculator

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Nether Portal Calculator – A Detailed Guide

The term is tossed around a lot among Minecraft gaming circles these days.

And if you are in one, you would probably know what that term means and how does it associate with your all so loved game "Minecraft".

But if you don't, it's alright, because you are not alone. There is an astounding number of Minecraft players who are still in the dark.

So, bear with me, read this description through to the end, and you'll be wise on the subject.

So, let's begin with the basics.

What is Nether Portal Calculator, After all?

A Nether Portal is an autogenerated framework that connects two dimensions, the Overworld and the Nether. Likewise, Minecraft Nether Portal Calculator is used to compute the relative coordinates between the Overworld and the Nether.

When you've gotten to the point in Minecraft where you're constructing nether portals, you can use the Nether Portal Calculator to figure out where to place your return gate so that it connects as a link between the Overworld and the Nether.

Why Use a Nether Portal Calculator?

Nether portals help speed up movement through the Overworld, but if you're in a world with some other players who build gates, it's not unusual to emerge in an unexpected place while travelling through a Nether Portal and end up at a wrong return gate.

For Instance, you created a portal from your home at X, Y, Z and moved through it only to land in a nether portal room built by someone else. So, when you went back into it, your X and Z coordinates were nowhere near where you had the entry gate, and you had to sidle through the unknown landscape at night, avoiding mobs and hazards.

Frightening! Isn't it?

And this is where Nether Portal Calculator comes in.

By using a Nether portal calculator to find X, Y, Z coordinates from Overworld to Nether or vice versa, you will have the best chances of being hooked back up at the right gates.

Does the Nether Portal Calculator Works?

Nether Portal Calculator is an intuitively designed calculator that determines where portals should be placed in the Overworld and Nether dimensions to appear at the correct coordinates. Simply put, Nether Portal Calculator does the maths for you.

Let's explain this with an Example!

If the Nether coordinates are 2,3 and 5, the overworld coordinates would be:

Inspired? Wanna Learn How to Use Nether Portal Calculator in Minecraft?

Below is a simple stepwise guide for beginners:

Choose a place in the Overworld for a portal and build the frame without lighting it.

Enter your portal frame as if you were going to use it, and press F3 to record the coordinates X, Y, and Z, as well as the Facing (F) number. Remember! This step is important if you want a seamless transition while passing through a portal.

In our Overworld to Nether portal calculator, enter the coordinates. Double-check your entries, particularly if the numbers are positive or negative. Obsidian is difficult to disassemble and shift if you make a mistake. The calculator will convert the data and show the final coordinates that you'll need to position your Nether-side portal.

Light your portal and go to the calculated Nether coordinates using F3.

Demolish and replace the block under your feet at these coordinates with obsidian.

Steer your character until the earlier F3 Facing (F) number matches up. Please note that you will be facing this direction when you exit the portal.

Drop a second obsidian block onto the floor to your right or left (no specific direction). These two obsidians will serve as the base for your portal.

To ensure uninterrupted transition through the portal, build a walkway at least a few blocks from the portal base in the matching "F" number direction. This guarantees that you don't end up staring at a wall after exiting a portal.

Complete the Nether portal frame and then light it.

Disable or destroy the Nether portal created by the game when you first accessed the Nether. Exit the Nether through the newly constructed portal. If you follow the above mentioned steps carefully, you will surely get a pair of perfectly connected Nether portals.

• You can repeat the process and link an unlimited number of portals.

• If the game detects a portal in the other dimension that is precisely at your target coordinates, it will only use that portal, even if other potential portals are within range.

Some Quick Tips

• To prevent the linking problem, ensure that no two Overworld portals are within 33 blocks of each other. You can have them that near if your design calls for it; keep in mind that they will most likely both go to the same place.

• While minor misalignments in portal placement do not matter much, it is best to be as precise as possible in the portal placement to avoid conflicts.

• Due to the scale variations between the two dimensions, Overworld is slacker in the placement of the portals. Generally, you can shift a surface portal up to 8 blocks in either direction without fear of conflict, as long as you don't violate the 33-meter proximity rule.

• This technique is also applicable in reverse. If you want to start a portal pair from the Nether, follow the same steps but switch "Overworld" and "Nether" and use the other calculator.

• When reading F3 coordinates, disregard the decimal portion (round off the numbers). Only the whole number is important.

• The Altitude (Y) coordinate is essential if you create a portal near the Overworld's sky limit; it will be near the Nether's ceiling, and vice versa. Keep this in mind because, if you don't, you can end up having to build a slew of ladders in the Nether to complete a walkway between the portals.

Some Handy Strategies

If you have several overworld locations that you want to be readily accessible, simply travel to the Nether, create a portal, and travel through it. In case you have a specific location in mind for the overworld portal that is close to where the portal was generated, you can simply delete the overworld portal and build a new one in that location. If you're getting short on obsidian, you may want to consider taking the created portal's corners. It may not look as good, but it will give you four extra obsidian blocks. Place cheaper blocks, such as wood blocks or chiselled stone bricks, to enhance the portal's look.

Building tunnels may be one of the best defences against mobs and getting lost, though it takes more time and blocks. Since you can encounter mobs when building tunnels, it is recommended that you keep all of your belongings in a chest except for a stone or iron pickaxe, a large amount of ghast resistant blocks such as cobblestone, and a large number of torches. That way, if you die, you don't risk anything critically important. The exact amount you carry will depend on how certain you are that you'll not die. Bring just a few stacks of blocks and torches if you are a beginner, but you may want to bring more if you are more experienced. For more supplies, you can always return to your Overworld base.

Nether roof is an exclusive feature in Java Edition. It is probably the safest method of fast travel in the Nether and is also one of the easiest. For this, you need to get to the Nether roof, for which there are several ways. Some of which are listed HERE.

If you want to link several portals, you can take advantage of the Nether's 1:8 scale and make a huge map of your Overworld in the Nether that is also at this scale. It takes a lot of time, pickaxes, and bricks, but it's worth the effort, making it unlikely for you to get lost.

Parting Shot

If you carefully follow the above steps, you'll more often than not end up at your desired location. However, in rare cases, the gates may not link as planned. If this occurs, try to do some research to ascertain what's wrong.

Just carry some torches, tools, and supplies, just in case of any eventuality.

So, Try out the Nether Portal Calculator!

We'll be looking forward to Your valuable feedback

Happy Minecrafting!

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How to Connect Nether Portals in Minecraft Bedrock Edition

The ability to connect Nether Portals in the Overworld and Nether is incredibly useful for those players who play the classic Minecraft Bedrock Edition. If you use mods or play on servers, you can quickly travel long distances using teleportation. Classic Minecraft doesn’t have this option, and using nether portals is a great solution for most players.

The most important thing to remember is that one block traveled to the nether world equals eight blocks in the upper world. Therefore, if you can calculate everything correctly and connect the portals, you will be able to quickly overcome long distances, without teleportation.

To successfully connect nether portals, you need to do the following:

• The first thing you need to do is create the first portal in the overworld.
• Stand in the center of the portal, write down its XYZ coordinates, and divide each part of the coordinates by eight. If you get decimal numbers, then round them. For example, if you got 27.5, then you can round to 28, if it came out 27.4, then you can round to 27.
• Next, you need to enter the portal and go to the coordinates that you received after dividing.
• When you get to the right place, build a new portal at these exact coordinates.
• If you did everything right, then your first portal in the overworld and the portal built by coordinates will be connected and you can use them to quickly travel.
• If you want to connect portals while in the nether world, then you need to do the same thing, only instead of dividing the coordinates by eight, you will need to multiply them by eight.

In this way, you can connect as many portals as you want and quickly move around the entire Minecraft Bedrock Edition game world.

Nether Portal Calculator

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Welcome to the Nether portal calculator , where we'll demystify Minecraft's Nether portals and how they work . We'll explain how to make Nether portals in Minecraft , how many obsidian for a Nether portal, and how to link Nether portals up to allow fast-travel through the Overworld. We'll even touch on topics like Nether portal designs and how you can make portals without mining obsidian first!

In Minecraft, the Nether portal is a structure that functions as a gateway to the Nether , the game's malevolent alternate dimension . Filled with both hostile monsters and valuable gold ore, the Nether is a crucial part of the player's progression towards beating the Ender dragon .

Remember — the Nether and End portals are two entirely different structures that work in totally different ways. To learn more about the End Portal, try our Minecraft End portal finder .

So let's grab a stack of obsidian blocks and get right to building a portal !

If you just need to use the Minecraft Nether portal calculator without sweating the details, here's how . The Minecraft Nether portal calculator has two modes: coordinate mode and block mode .

Coordinate mode shows you what the coordinates of a location in the Overworld would be in the Nether and vice versa.

Enter the coordinates of the portal in the Overworld or the Nether.

The Nether portal calculator will find the coordinates of the corresponding portal in the other dimension.

The Nether portal calculator is bidirectional , allowing you to change either set of coordinates and get valid results on the other side.

Block mode lets you calculate details about the Nether portal you're about to build.

Enter your nether portal's dimensions . Nether portals can be anything between 4×5 and 23×23.

Decide whether you want your portal to have corners . Nether portals can function without corners, but some players prefer the full rectangular style.

The Nether portal calculator will show you how many blocks of obsidian to make a Nether portal of the dimensions specified. It will also generate a Nether portal schematic for you.

For example, creating a Nether portal of size 5×5 blocks with corners requires 16 Obsidian blocks.

Read on to learn about the math behind the calculator to better understand Nether portals.

A Nether portal is simply a rectangular frame of obsidian that's been set alight with a flint and steel (or other fire-making tool, like a fire charge). The frame must at least be 4 blocks wide and 5 blocks tall , and can be up to 23×23 . The corners of the rectangle are not necessary . We therefore only need 10 obsidian blocks to make a functional Nether portal in Minecraft and still adhere to the required Nether portal dimensions.

To determine exactly how many obsidian blocks you'd need to build a portal of width w w w and height h h h , you can follow this formula :

This formula excludes the four optional corners that complete the rectangle. You should add 4 4 4 obsidian blocks to the total if your portal will have its corners.

Here's what a complete Nether portal frame looks like:

Once the Nether portal frame is complete, we can activate the portal by setting it alight with a flint and steel . This will fill the frame with the iconic purple swirling texture of the portal. Ready to step through ?

While the basic rectangular frame can suffice, there are some awe-inspiring Nether portal designs out there. We can even build Nether portals to be circular — learn how with our Minecraft circle calculator !

While we've just learned how to make a Nether portal in Minecraft, there are some shortcuts . A common trick, especially for Minecraft speedrunners, is to use the bucket method . We usually obtain obsidian by letting water flow onto lava , thereby forming obsidian. Then we'd mine the block using a diamond pickaxe. But what if we don't have any diamonds? How do we make a Nether portal with just lava ?

In this case, we can use buckets to move lava somewhere so that, if we throw water onto it, it forms obsidian in the shape of a Nether portal frame . We can use low-value blocks (like cobblestone or dirt) to build a rudimentary cast into which we place the lava and water so that it doesn't spill.

Before discussing Minecraft's Nether portal linking , we must examine how the Nether bends space in the Overworld. The Nether and the Overworld's coordinates don't line up in a 1:1 ratio , as distances don't work the same in the two dimensions. Instead, the ratio is 1:8 , meaning that traveling one block in the Nether equates to traveling eight blocks in the Overworld (although this doesn't apply for the Y-axis).

When you make your first Nether portal in the Overworld , a corresponding Nether portal is automatically created in the Nether as the dimension is generated for the first time. In this case, you can easily use the above conversion rates to pinpoint your Nether portal coordinates.

When multiple portals already exist, though, things get a bit more complex .

Upon entering a portal, the game converts the player's location to the other dimension's coordinate system. We'll call this destination point in the other dimension D .

The game then searches the other dimension around the destination D for existing Nether portals. The search range is 17×17 chunks or 3×3 chunks, depending on whether D is in the Overworld or the Nether.

If one or more Nether portals exist near D , the player is sent to the nearest portal in a straight line from D .

If no Nether portals exist near D , the game creates a new portal at D and sends the player there.

💡 In Minecraft, the world is divided into segments called chunks that are 16 blocks wide, 16 blocks long, and reach from the world's floor to its ceiling.

With this knowledge, players can calculate distances between their Nether portals to create vast fast-travel networks to reach far-off corners of the Overworld.

I'm Rijk de Wet, holder of a Master's in Data Science and Industrial Engineering. My achievements are a testament to my dedication, scholarly excellence, and analytical innovation. Beyond my academic and professional pursuits, my zeal for board games shows how much I value strategy, critical thinking, and the joy of shared experiences. I am credible and respected in his field because I combine advanced technical expertise, innovative research, and communal spirit.

All our gaming enthusiasts are well aware that building nether portals is resource-intensive. The obsidian needed to make them requires time to collect. So, I thought a calculator might help players plan to build the portals and reduce resource waste . Our nether portal calculator will also be helpful for all our gaming content creators when creating tutorials for efficient gameplay with accurate information that would benefit the wider Minecraft community.

We ensure our tools are based on authentic information and proper research. After an expert makes the calculator, another expert in the field reviews it thoroughly. Then, a native language speaker proofreads the content, ensuring further refinement; only then is the tool released for our users. To learn more about our commitment to quality, please refer to our Editorial Policies page .

How big is a Nether portal?

Nether portals can be between 4×5 and 23×23 . In previous versions of Minecraft, the portal could only be 4×5, and not bigger nor smaller. Recently, however, this restriction was lifted, and now players can make much bigger Nether portals.

How do I activate a Nether portal?

When you have a complete Nether portal frame constructed, you must set it alight using a flint and steel. That will activate the Nether portal and fill the frame with Nether portal blocks. You can then step into the portal to enter the Nether.

How many obsidian blocks do I need for the Nether portal?

You need at least 10 obsidian blocks to make a functioning Nether portal. In this form, the Nether portal will be a vertically-oriented rectangular 4×5 obsidian frame without corners . To make the biggest possible Minecraft Nether portal of dimensions 23×23, you'd need 84 obsidian blocks for a frame without corners and 88 for a frame with corners .

Can you make a Nether portal in the End?

No, you can't make a Nether portal in the End. A constructed Nether portal frame not in the Overworld, or the Nether won't activate upon being set alight. Therefore, it's impossible to build a functional Nether portal in the End.

How do I light a Nether portal without a flint and steel?

Any tool that sets fire to a block can be used to activate a Nether portal frame. You can use a fire charge, have a wood block's fire spread to the Nether portal, or trick a Ghast into shooting your portal frame. If you're lucky, lightning can strike your Nether portal, setting fire to it that way.

How do I break my Nether portal?

You can break a Nether portal in many ways .

You can mine one of the portal's obsidian blocks.

You can let water flow into the portal.

You can cause an explosion near the portal, which won't break the obsidian but will disable the portal.

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How to build your Nether Highway (and why you should)

Updated to 1.20

with Overworld to Nether calculator – check below

Sometimes in Minecraft you find places of interest that are far away from your base. With places of interest we could have for example Spawners , End Portals , rare biomes, Villages and others. Then, traveling from one place to the other can then become very tedious and time consuming.

But there is a solution to this: a Nether highway . Let’s see how to build one!

Why a Nether highway

The coordinates of one place in the Overwolrd are 8 times the coordinates of its Nether counterpart .

For example, let’s say that you are in the Overworld, standing in front of a Nether Portal . You look at your coordinates: X=800 – Z=800 .

You then jump into the Portal and you arrive to the Nether. Now your coordinates are X=100 – Z=100 .

Given this relationship between coordinates in the Overworld and in the Nether, if you travel one block in the Nether you are also traveling 8 blocks of the Overworld. That’s why it is advisable to travel long distances in the NEther, because they will take 8 times less… time.

That’s also why on 2b2t , the oldest Anarchy server in Minecraft , they built a system of Nether highways to make it easier to travel through its huge map.

How to build a Nether highway

To see how to do this in details, we will follow together the construction of a Nether highway that connects a Desert Village and an Abandoned Mineshaft .

The first thing that you want to do is go to the destination and write down the coordinates. In this example I wrote down the following coordinates:

To see your coordinates you just have to press F3 . You only need the X and Z coordinates, the Y is irrelevant for our purpose. We will see later why.

Now that we have the destination coordinates, we need to go to the starting point.

From there, we will build a Nether Portal, wherever we prefer it to be.

Reminder: for a Nether Portal you will need at least 10 blocks of Obsidian , and a Flint and Steel . When the portal is ready, we will light it with the Flint and Steel and walk through it.

In the Nether

Now we are in the Nether. As you can see, the coordinates are more or less 1/8 of the Overworld coordinates (not an exact match, but pretty close).

The next step is to calculate the Nether coordinates of the destination . You can do so with the help of the Overworld to Nether Calculator :

Overworld to Nether calculator

For example by putting X=-332 and Y=-263 (the coordinates previously seen at the destination), I obtained X=-41.5 and Z=-32.875 .

Now all you have to do is connect with Rails where you are now to the destination coordinates. To craft Rails you will need 6 Iron Ingots and 1 Stick :

It could also help to put some Powered Rails here and there, to travel faster. To craft Powered Rails you will need 6 Gold Ingots , 1 Stick and 1 Redstone Dust :

Finally, to craft a Minecart you will need 5 Iron Ingots:

A few tips on building your railways:

• to prevent mobs from spawning on your railways , you should place them inside 1 x2blocks tunnels (as explained in How to stop Zombie Pigmen from spawning in Minecraft? ):

To do so, the easiest thing to do is to mine your tunnel over the Nether roof , close to the Bedrock level (which is at Y=128 ). This way your tunnel will not be interrupted by any building or empty area.

• Rails can’t go diagonally, so you should mine the connecting tunnel in 2 sections. One section will travel along the X axis and the other one will travel along the Z axis
• If you build your tunnel close to the Bedrock level, the tunnel will be high up and far from your starting Nether Portal.

This is quite annoying, because now every time that you come to the Nether you have to go from the portal to the tunnel (with Ladders , presumably). To solve this problem, you want to first deactivate the portal in the Nether . To do so, just break one of the Obsidian blocks.

Then build another portal next to the tunnel.

Since this new portal is very close to where the old one was, the new portal will be linked to the portal in the Overworld . Now every time that you come to the Nether (going through the Overworld starting portal) you will come out of the new portal.

If you want to know more about Nether Portal linking, you can check the video below.

Destination

At the destination Nether coordinates, we build another Nether Portal.

After walking through it we are in the Overworld again, and we are very close to the destination coordinates.

Now the last optional thing to do is to deactivate this Nether portal and build another one where we want it to be. This way, the new portal will link to the tunnel portal in the Nether, as we saw previously.

Other variations

This is not the only way to build a Nether highway. For example you could build Ice higways , using Ice and traveling through them with a Boat . Or you could first build both Nether Portals in the Overworld before building the Nether tunnel, so that you don’t need to link the arrival portal. But the method that we just saw here is the easiest and most straightforward one.

Traveling in the Nether is 8 times faster, so a Nether highway can be very helpful. It is advisable to build a Nether highway inside a 1x2blocks tunnel close to the top Bedrock level, to prevent mobs from spawning on the Rails. Thank you very much for reading the article till the very end and I hope I’ll see you again around here. See you and take care!

Nether Portal

The Nether Portal  was added in  Update 0.12.1 . It is built by the Player , and when activated a counterpart is created in the Nether  allowing travel between the dimensions.

• 1 Construction
• 2 Portal Block

Construction [ ]

A Nether Portal is constructed primarily by placing Obsidian  in a 4x5 Block rectangle; however, the dimensions can be expanded up to a 23x23 size. The Player needs at least 10 Obsidian to build a Nether Portal. The portal is activated by igniting it with  Flint and Steel  or a  Fire Charge .

Portal Block [ ]

• It can be placed anywhere and doesn't need Obsidian surrounding it.
• It cannot be pushed by Pistons .
• It cannot resist explosions, Lava or Water .
• The portal block cannot be mined in Survival .
• Most Mobs and Items can pass through the portal and teleport to the Nether, and vice-versa.
• To travel to the Nether, the Player has to build a Nether Portal in an Infinite World .
• However, if the Player uses Inventory Editors to spawn in a Nether Portal Block in an Old World, then he/she may travel to the Nether. However, this Nether is very glitchy and can harm the Player's world file.
• A Nether Portal can be activated by using a Dispenser to activate Flint and Steel or shoot a Fire Charge.
• Before the Nether was added to Minecraft , there was a manufactured structure called the  Nether Reactor  which generated a "spire" of  Netherrack  with Nether-related items inside. 
• A Nether Portal can be activated in the Nether by a Ghast shooting a Fire Charge.
• The Player cannot use a Nether Portal while riding a  Pig  or a  Horse .
• It will only do this if the Nether Portal generates next to an ocean and if there is no Cave under it to teleport.
• Also, in Update 0.16.0, when the Player enters a Nether Portal, the "Generating World" screen no longer appears.

Gallery [ ]

Nether Portal/Gallery

Tutorials/Nether survival

This tutorial provides useful survival tips when going to the Nether , whether you want to just visit or make a more permanent base there. This tutorial also explains how to beat the game by starting in the Nether with nothing.

• 1 Introduction
• 2.1.1 Brute-force method
• 2.1.2 On-the-fly method
• 3.1 Tools and weapons
• 3.3 Transport
• 3.4 Enchantments
• 3.6 General supplies
• 4.2.1 Special cases
• 4.2.2 If the portal gets blasted
• 4.3 Fending off ghasts
• 4.4 Fighting hoglins
• 4.5 Resources found in the Nether
• 5 Exploring the Nether
• 6.1 Navigation through a nether fortress
• 6.2 Closing a blaze spawner
• 6.3 Farming a blaze spawner
• 6.4 Living in a nether fortress
• 7.2 Zombified piglins
• 7.5 Magma Cubes
• 7.6 Wither Skeletons
• 7.7 Piglins
• 7.8 Hoglins
• 9.2 Mushrooms
• 9.3 Generated structures
• 9.5 Animals and villagers
• 11.1 Starting
• 11.2 Finding a good place to settle
• 11.3 Mob-proofing your house
• 11.4 Mining
• 11.5 Disabling mining spawns
• 12.1 Bone meal farming
• 12.2 Vegetation farming
• 12.3 Tree farming
• 12.4 Mushroom farming
• 12.5 Mob farming
• 12.6.1 1. Nether Fortress
• 12.6.2 2. Bastion Remnant
• 13 Potion brewing

Introduction [ ]

The Nether is a dangerous place for even experienced players. It is filled with a host of exclusive mobs not found in the Overworld : hostile blazes , wither skeletons , ghasts , magma cubes , hoglins , piglins , and piglin brutes , and the neutral zombified piglin , as well as one passive mob, the strider .

The terrain is much harsher to navigate than in the Overworld: one false step could mean death by fiery lava. Nether fortresses and bastion remnants both spawn in the Nether. Nether fortresses are the homes of wither skeletons and blazes , and piglin brutes , piglins, and hoglins all spawn in bastion remnants.

This guide is intended to help you increase your chances of survival in the Nether and opening up a lot of gameplay such as brewing , nether hubs , the End , and the ender dragon and wither bosses.

Making a nether portal [ ]

To make a nether portal, the player needs to make a rectangular frame of obsidian , though the corners do not have to be obsidian.

• The corners can be any block (including more obsidian) or none at all.
• The frame can be larger, as long as it is rectangular and there are no other blocks inside the rectangle.
• A ruined portal can provide a partial frame for the player to complete, but any crying obsidian must be removed from the frame, as that is not a valid frame block.
• Alternatively, a portal frame can be partly or completely "cast" in place, as described below. This is useful if the player does not have a diamond pickaxe.
• The traditional way to light the portal is with a flint and steel .
• A fire charge also works. Fire charges require a Nether material to craft (blaze powder), but even in the Overworld they can be found in a ruined portal chest.
• Lacking either of these, any other source of fire works; if wooden blocks are placed facing the portal (but not in the frame) lava can be used to set those afire, providing the needed fire block.

Using lava and water [ ]

"No diamond" portal making.

A player can cast part or all of frame in place, by placing lava source blocks and using water to convert them to obsidian.

• This only works in the Overworld, as water cannot be placed in the Nether, not even long enough to convert lava. Water in a cauldron does not work, and in the End, nether portals do not work at all.
• The water does not need to flow over the lava; any lava source block that finds water (source or flowing) next to it gets converted immediately.
• Flowing lava converts to cobblestone, and if lava flows into the water it converts the water to stone or cobblestone; if either is inside the frame it must be removed before lighting the portal.
• The lava can be carried in as many buckets, but if a lava pool is handy, one or two buckets are required to fetch each block as needed.

Brute-force method [ ]

• Build a mold out of dirt for the bottom: a trench 1 wide and 2 or 4 long.
• Fill each block of the trench from a lava bucket, then place the water on a mold block to flood the lava and turn it into obsidian (if it turns into stone or cobblestone instead, then the player may have misplaced a source block. One can fix this problem by mining out the stone or cobblestone and trying again).
• Extend your frame upward and repeat the process to mold the next layers: three levels of two separated pits for the portal sides, then another trench for the top.
• Dig away the dirt frame, and light the new portal.

On-the-fly method [ ]

It is also possible to place blocks to the side and "hang" water off them to make most of the frame. This video illustrates the typical "speedrun" technique.

Preparation [ ]

A well prepared inventory

Being well-equipped is essential for survival in the Nether. Lacking even a seemingly useless item in an unfortunate situation can put you in serious danger. However, be sure not to bring any items that have little or no use for your objective, leaving room to carry the loot you came to the Nether to find in the first place, as well as reduce the number of items lost if you die.

Carrying backup items to handle specific emergencies can take up more inventory space than carrying the minimum supplies to craft what you need as the situation arises, provided you take into account that you need to be in a safe place for the time it takes to place, or craft, a crafting table, then go through one or more steps of crafting to get what you need. For example, gravel is common in all Nether biomes except basalt deltas , so flint and steel can be crafted if that becomes necessary, provided you are carrying iron. It is unwise to bank on finding iron, as the only ways to find it are as rare loot in generated chests or by bartering. The same supply of iron serves in lieu of carrying replacement pickaxes, buckets, or weapons, but could take too long to craft into a bucket to scoop up unexpected lava. Huge fungus stems can provide logs, and thus make sticks, a crafting table, and so on, but they are not as versatile as logs from trees and could take a while to find if you're in the wrong biome. Similarly, you could rely on finding blackstone rather than carrying cobblestone , but it isn't quite as versatile and isn't as easily found as gravel. Always carry logs, cobblestone, and iron, and possibly potions of Fire Resistance. If you have a lot of iron to spare, you may want to carry it as iron blocks, and bring pumpkins or jack-o-lanterns to build an iron golem if you get mobbed.

Tools and weapons [ ]

One of the most important tools in the Nether, especially in a structure, is your weapon. A melee weapon of iron or better is almost essential. A bow or crossbow , along with at least 64 arrows (or one if you have Infinity on your bow), is enough to dispose of any enemy. Glowstone is common in the Nether and allows a dwindling supply of arrows to be extended by turning them into twice as many spectral arrows ,‌ [ Java Edition only ] which are beneficial in their own right. While melee weapons work well in close quarters combat, consider bringing a crossbow or a bow in addition to your melee weapon, as ghasts and blazes can be troublesome without them.

An iron pickaxe or two (or a single diamond pickaxe) can be useful, as you can use it to clear a path, or to gather some blocks if you run out. It can also be used to carve a staircase into the side of a nether fortress to gain access to it.

Always bring along a flint and steel because even if you don't intend to build a new nether portal, a ghast fireball can easily break a portal block inside the portal frame, leaving you stranded until it is relit with fire from a flint and steel, a fire charge , burning blocks adjacent to the portal frame, or even another ghast fireball. If you forgot to bring a flint and steel, all hope is not lost -- you can bargain with Piglins for iron (or find one in a chest), or you can make a fire charge from Nether materials (Wither Skeleton for coal, a Ghast for gunpowder, and kill a blaze for blaze powder).

Ensure your tools have enough durability to last long enough for you to achieve your goal.

Armor is also important. Even if you are not planning on doing much fighting, armor reduces the amount of damage you take from being submerged in lava , making it a potential life-saver should you accidentally fall in lava. A full set of iron armor should be enough to boost your chance of survival. Consider bringing diamond armor only if you are confident in your ability to survive (or if you're playing on Hardcore Mode), or else you may die and lose it. Shields can be useful for fighting the skeletons present in nether fortresses and soul sand valleys . Wear at least one piece of golden armor to stop piglins attacking you, as this earns you their respect.

Transport [ ]

Striders can be the best means of travel in many situations. If you have a fishing rod and saddle, you need only locate some warped fungus and head down to a lava lake to lure a strider. Fishing rods are not found in the Nether, and string to make one appears only in some bastion remnant chests or as a drop from killed striders, so it's better to carry some rather than pulling off a dangerous heist or raid, hoping for lucky finds. You have better odds of coming across a saddle in a nether fortress or bastion remnant chest, but if your plan is to use a strider to find one of these structures, you need to have brought your own ahead of time. Killing striders in desperation as a source of dropped string could work, but it isn't the most practical or reliable means to do so.

If you don't have a saddle but by chance see a zombified piglin riding a strider, you can draw it close, and ideally onto land, by wounding the rider with an arrow (or even a thrown egg or snowball), then kill it and take the pre-saddled strider for yourself. They might even drop their warped fungus on a stick for you, but the odds of that are not high. Building some walls around yourself before trying this is probably necessary, since the zombified piglins in your area are likely to turn hostile when you attack the strider jockey.

Carrying a few boats can be helpful. Boats can help you slide off high cliffs without taking fall damage, and capture angry piglins, zombified piglins or endermen rushing toward you. Remember that boats cannot be crafted from Nether wood types, so you have to bring logs from the Overworld if you want to craft more boats.

It can be helpful to carry some bone meal (or bone blocks if you have a lot). When applied to weeping and twisting vines , these vines can grow downward and upward rapidly with a few clicks. Then the player can climb the vines as a reliable, reusable method of vertical transport.

Enchantments [ ]

Enchantments offer huge advantages for surviving in the Nether, if you have access to a means of obtaining them. For your weaponry, you should consider damage-boosting enchantments on your weapons (e.g. Sharpness and Power ). Be aware that all mobs in the Nether (except for regular skeletons , piglins , hoglins and endermen ) are immune to fire damage, so enchantments like Fire Aspect should not be a priority. Infinity is absolutely a great bow enchantment, as it saves you inventory space carrying arrows, as well as the constant worry of running out of them.

For armor, a combination of both Protection and Fire Protection are helpful. Most water-related enchantments such as Aqua Affinity and Respiration offer no use in the Nether at all; however, Frost Walker allows you to walk normally across magma blocks without taking damage, which can sometimes make traveling in the Nether easier. Enchanting your boots with Feather Falling can save your life by allowing you to drop down onto low terrain more safely. You may also enchant your boots with Soul Speed to traverse soul sand valleys at higher speeds, since walking on soul sand slows you down if you lack that enchantment; but keep in mind that moving too quickly means an easier time walking off ledges (and worse, into lava).

Enchanting your pickaxe with Efficiency II allows you to instantly break netherrack , however mining netherrack too quickly can expose hidden lava that rapidly flows out and engulfs you, so if you do not have fast reflexes, it is recommended that you use unenchanted pickaxes instead. Other pickaxe enchantments useful in the Nether are Unbreaking and Silk Touch . Unbreaking can save you bringing multiple pickaxes (but again, you can choose to devote on quantity instead of quality, and just craft new pickaxes when you need them). Silk Touch ensures that nether gold ore drops the ore itself, guaranteeing you one gold ingot per ore block (instead of 4 nuggets on average with unenchanted pickaxe), as well as obtaining nylium , useful for farming Nether wood and foliage.

In general, blocks are handy to bring along with you in the Nether. They can allow you to pillar jump to reach high places, block off mobs from reaching you, and allow you to bridge across to different masses of land over the lava oceans. Two or three stacks of cheap, non-flammable blocks (e.g. cobblestone) should be enough for a normal trip in the Nether. Blocks that are affected by gravity (e.g. sand or gravel ) can be useful to get down from a high place; for example, from the top of a nether fortress bridge. The Nether's terrain is tough to navigate, so bringing these blocks can prove highly useful. A pickaxe can be useful in the event you run out of blocks, as it can be used to mine some of the abundant netherrack.

Bringing 10-14 obsidian is a good idea too, in the event you get lost and lose your portal home. Bear in mind that you also need your flint and steel to light this emergency portal.

General supplies [ ]

Food is as important in the Nether as it is anywhere else in the game. If you run out of food, you lose your ability to sprint, and, more importantly, regenerate health. Running out of it can be fatal. Think about how long you are planning to be in the Nether, and how much fighting you might do, and bring an appropriate amount of food for it. Keep in mind that different foods provide different amounts of saturation , which is the most important thing for healing. The more saturation a food has, the more health you regenerate from eating it. Steak and porkchops are among the best foods for early gameplay, with bread , mutton and cooked salmon being acceptable alternatives.

Mushroom stew is also a good option, which can be crafted from mushrooms and "wood" found in the Nether. Bringing a few suitable flowers from the Overworld allows you to upgrade that to suspicious stew Using oxeye daisies provides 7 seconds of Regeneration , which can save your life if you are low on health with enemies nearby, or if you have been afflicted with Wither from a fight with a wither skeleton. Suspicious stew crafted from dandelions or blue orchids provides much more saturation than regular foods, which can also be used to heal a lot of health in a short amount of time. However, it is worth noting that stew cannot be stacked, and even the ingredients take up three (mushroom stew) or four (with a flower) inventory slots. Consider bringing around half a stack of "regular" food, in addition to the aforementioned ingredients that can be crafted into suspicious stew as you need. Use the regular food for maintaining your hunger, and the stew as a method of quickly regenerating health in dangerous situations.

Food sources in the Nether are rare but do exist, such as porkchops dropped by hoglins, and red and brown mushrooms that can be found scattered throughout the Nether. However these food sources are usually hard to find consistently, so don't expect to be able to keep yourself fed without bringing food from the Overworld.

If you have already explored the Nether and gotten some blaze rods, and can thus brew potions, you should do so. Fire Resistance potions are extra valuable in the Nether, as falling into lava is always a possibility. Splash potions of Healing can also save your life if you find yourself low on health in combat, like the suspicious stew (mentioned above). If you planned ahead and brought one or more water buckets, enough iron to make a cauldron (you can put water in a cauldron to put yourself out ( Java Edition only), some bottles, and some cobblestone or blackstone (to craft brewing stands), before searching out a nether fortress, you can find everything else you need there to begin brewing potions, putting you in a much stronger position. A few stacks of torches can provide a means of leaving a trail, allowing you to find your portal again if you lose it. (Although, in this case, the use of coordinates is often a more practical solution.) Remember that compasses do not work in the Nether, so do not bring one intending to use it to find your way home unless it has been aligned to a lodestone . Torches are also useful for marking the parts of a nether fortress you have already visited, so less time is wasted exploring areas of the nether fortress you have already exhausted.

A small handful of empty buckets can be useful for removing lava in awkward places. They can also save your life if you run into one of the many single blocks of lava while digging through the netherrack.

Ender pearls can be extremely useful if you fall into lava. They are also useful for crossing lava pits, or reaching otherwise hard-to-access areas. However, you should consider that ender pearls are relatively hard to get, and you may want to save them for activating the end portal later (if you have not already done so). There are two easy ways to obtain ender pearls in the Nether: killing endermen that spawn abundantly in warped forests or bartering with piglins, which can give you almost a stack of ender pearls.

Gold ingots can be useful for bartering with piglins (as well as distracting them if they are angry with you) if you visit the nether wastes or crimson forest . You can get useful items like fire resistance potions, ender pearls, obsidian, and crying obsidian. If you have more than a stack of gold ingots, you can store them as gold blocks . Be careful not to drop gold blocks, as piglins pick them up and without giving you anything in return.

Netherrack can be acquired in the Overworld from ruined portals . This can be smelted, and the resulting nether bricks crafted into nether brick fence. Three stacks of netherrack yield exactly a full stack of fences. Since nether brick fences are blast resistant and can also be seen through, they make a good option for windows and/or perimeters when building your first shelter around your portal. A quick way to do this recipe is as follows:

• Verify your count. If you have 3 stacks even, set aside 12 pieces of your netherrack and put it back in your chest. Alternatively, you can add 6 pieces to fill out one more recipe.
• Smelt your netherrack into bricks; using hoppers or multiple furnaces make this more convenient.
• Spread the bricks evenly across a crafting table's squares, thus making 9 stacks of 20 (or 22) bricks. Take one of those nine stacks and put it back in your inventory, and combine the other 8 stacks pairwise into the 2x2 recipe for nether brick blocks. Craft the lot of those (40 or 44 recipes) with a shift-click.
• Now you can just arrange the saved bricks and the blocks into 10 (or 11) recipes. If you went for the 11th recipe, you end up with a full stack and 2 extra fences.

Entering the Nether [ ]

While the Nether's scenery is captivating, remember the Nether is a dangerous place. For the player's first visit, the main threats are falling, fire , getting lost, hoglins , and ghasts . The first two can be handled in the usual ways, but the most urgent threats are most likely ghasts and then hoglins on account of the fact that the other hazards don't move or shoot at the player, excluding piglins (although they do not attack a player wearing at least one piece of golden armor who is not attacking or opening containers.) That said, don't be careless; sudden drops and holes can be hard to spot in the confusing netherrack landscape. Fire in the Nether is more dangerous than in other dimensions, as water cannot exist or be placed there. Magma cubes are also a threat considering their natural armor and the fact that they multiply like slimes, although the little ones still deal damage.

When you first arrive at the Nether, stay in the portal until the chunks around you load so that you can see what the immediate surrounding area looks like. Often, a nether portal generates right next to a giant lake of lava or a high drop-off. If this is the case, then walking out of the nether portal upon arrival likely results in death.

With a slower computer, the player may encounter a massive lag spike upon entering the Nether. The workaround involves doing the following: after the player steps out of the portal, turn on the F3 debug info , then Esc to pause the game. Note the "Chunks Updated" line—even while paused, the game is continuing to load chunks and update them. It is wise to also note down the coordinates of the portal. The player can then wait for the chunk updates drop to zero, meaning the game has finished loading the region around them. Then the player can resume play. This trick is also useful when the player changes their render distance.

Protecting the portal [ ]

Even though hunting, exploring, and mining may sound fun, it is unwise to start doing this as soon as the player steps into the Nether for the first time. The player's first order of business is to build a cobblestone shelter around the portal. Brick , stone , and other blast-resistant blocks also work, but cobblestone is cheapest in the Overworld. As noted above, nether brick fences can be crafted even before entering the Nether at all (by mining ruined portals for netherrack), and these are both transparent and blast-resistant.

Take the quickest possible look around, just enough to see what kind of ground the player is building on, then start building as fast as is practical. Unfortunately, a first portal has a disproportionate chance of coming out next to an abyss, lava lake, or netherrack wall, and even if it spawns in the open, there may be multiple ghasts in view.

• If the situation is clearly impossible, abandon the original portal, find someplace safer, and build a return portal! Lava flooding the portal or multiple ghasts waiting for you can force this. You also need to get the coordinates of your portal, the same as described for "Lag" above.
• Firstly, if your portal spawned on soul sand, you have the immediate need for a floor that doesn't slow you down. Depending how much stone you brought, you may need to scant the walls, filling in with wooden fences to block mob vision.
• The player may find themselves under fire from ghasts immediately upon entering the Nether. Don't panic, just concentrate on building a wall between the player and the ghast, bouncing fireballs back to prevent too much damage. After you finish the fight or at least get a bit of shelter, relight the portal as needed, and then extend the wall around the portal.
• If you are next to a sudden drop or lava, start with the wall protecting you from that.
• If you are next to a netherrack wall, you can build an initial shelter against it, but expect to put cobblestone there too -- hopefully at a later visit, but if ghast fireballs get in, some of that wall may go away (not to mention being on fire).
• If by ill chance the player wound up with a portal floating over lava, attach the bottom layer to the outside of the ledge blocks, and do just enough to shelter the player while they're starting a bridge to land where the player can make a return portal.
• You need at least two stacks of cobblestone for the walls and ceiling, and the floor and other trimmings may well cost another stack. Because you are right next to the portal, feel free to go back to the Overworld for more cobblestone as needed.
• If your portal gets blown out, don't panic. Flint and steel, fireballs, or extra obsidian, are all you need to relight it. If you have a compass and a lodestone you can use that too.

Your shelter needs to be at least 5 blocks high, but the portal itself can be part of the roof. While it's tempting to do the same with a wall, it's probably safer to be able to walk around the portal on both sides. Use iron bars for windows. Make sure to leave enough space for a crafting table and a chest or two. The chests are important if the player does not want to lose too many of your items whenever you happen to die. Don't forget the door, either - wood suffices until you figure out where an outside button or lever could be placed where it is safe from fireballs. Note that if the player is building against a netherrack wall, you need a cobblestone back wall in front of that. If you want to dig there later, you can always put a door in. Once the player got the walls and ceiling up, likewise cover or replace the floor with cobblestone, extending it to under the walls. The walls should extend a block below floor level, and a little further under the doors. The shelter also needs a few blocks of cobblestone floor outside the doors, in case a ghast shoots the player while they're entering or leaving. You should end up with a space completely enclosed by cobblestone, iron, and perhaps a bit of obsidian.

Make sure you know which biome you're in:

• Crimson Forest : Watch out for hoglins , because they deal high damage and high knockback, and can fling you into the air. However, like pigs, they drop porkchops when killed. Piglins are formidable enemies that frequently spawn here, and they attack players who are not wearing gold. They also become hostile toward those who open chests, ender chests, barrels or other containers, or destroy gold-related items like blocks of gold, ores or gilded blackstone. These mobs barter, so from them you can get crying obsidian and potions of Fire Resistance.
• Warped Forest : Endermen spawn often here, so make sure that you build with blocks they cannot pick up. Make ceilings two blocks high so that they cannot teleport or spawn inside. Because ghasts, magma cubes, piglins, hoglins and most other Nether mobs do not spawn here, this is possibly the safest biome to stay in.
• Basalt Deltas : Building here is a real challenge thanks to the pockets of lava, magma blocks and basalt that spawn on the floor, and the uneven pillars and spikes. You also need to watch out for magma cubes, which deal high damage, even the little ones, and some knockback.
• Soul Sand Valley : You need to change out the floor from soul sand and soil to avoid being slowed down. Watch out for ghasts and skeletons: they spawn most frequently here, and the natural terrain can slow you to a crawl.
• Nether Wastes : Read the info above for protecting the portal. Piglins, magma cubes and ghasts spawn here, but it is a good place to find quartz as it is not obscured by any nylium .
• Nether Fortress : While this is a lucky place to spawn, you must protect the portal well. Make sure the ceiling is 2 blocks high to avoid having wither skeletons spawn there. Make sure to light it up well, as blazes can spawn at higher light levels than most hostile mobs, and they send out alarm calls when attacked. However, you have immediate access to what most players come to the Nether for: blaze rods and wither skeleton skulls , as well as naturally-generated fortress loot.
• Bastion Remnant : While slightly less lucky a spawn, you have access to magma cube spawners and a partly laid-out base. Watch out for piglin brutes: they aren't fooled by gold armor, have high health and powerful attacks. Piglins attack you if you attack a brute. See Tutorials/Defeating a bastion remnant to learn how to get the large quantities of gold blocks that it contains.

Later on, you can start to make nice houses and bigger bases in the Nether, but for now, a cobble shelter with the portal, a chest, and a crafting table is sufficient. The only necessities are iron armor, a pickaxe, sword, and shovel (all iron), food, bow and arrows, cobblestone for making quick shelters, dirt or gravel for pillar-jumping or stopping lava, and your trusty flint and steel. The rest of the items or extra supplies can be stored in the chests. If the player is going any distance, bring enough obsidian to make an emergency portal.)

To prevent mobs from spawning in the player's Nether home/base, one can use transparent items or half-blocks as the floor. However, be warned that mobs can spawn on the nether portal itself. Now that your nether portal is safe, the player can start doing what they came to the Nether for!

Special cases [ ]

• If the player's portal emerges floating over a lava lake, the portal generates a few extra blocks of ledge at the bottom, but it is still recommended to build that out into a platform, then continue building a path to safety. Upon reaching a safer location, the player can build a shelter there, and a new return portal within it. Deactivate the old portal before the player starts using the new one so that the portal in the Overworld gets linked to the new one.
• To get a portal to a new place in the Nether, you need to travel at least 1000 blocks from the matching location of where the portal actually came out , and make your new portal there. The next question is, which direction? If you go back toward and past your original portal, your new portal might come out on the other side of the hazard that blocked the original portal, and you need to get back there to decommission that. So, you're better off going away from your original portal, and 1000-plus blocks past where the nether portal you got would have matched. With luck, that may get you to a better location in the Nether. Aside from replacing your old equipment, this jaunt requires much the same preparation as the first, including cobblestone and obsidian.
• Once you're back in the Nether at a safer location: First, see if you can do a quick run to retrieve any surviving items, shuttling them back to your new portal if needed (If that looks dangerous or everything's gone into the lava, just forget that and start anew). Build a shelter for your new portal, go back to restock on cobblestone and then go back to where the old portal was. If the location turns out to be salvageable, you may be able to just build a shelter and continue, otherwise:
• If the old portal hasn't been broken by ghasts, decommission it by mining a block. Now, scout out a Nether location that comes out someplace more reasonable, as close as possible to your base. You may even be able to make a better location, by building a platform over lava or tunneling into a netherrack mass to get within 16 blocks of your base portal's "natural" coordinates. Now, you can build your new shelter first, then put your return portal inside.

If the portal gets blasted [ ]

The player's first resource should be their flint and steel . If for some reason the player does not have one, relighting the obsidian portal frame becomes much more difficult. If the portal was exposed enough to get hit by a ghast fireball , the player could persuade a ghast to hit it with another fireball by getting into the line-of-sight long enough to shoot the fireball . If the player dodges the fireball quickly enough and it hits the obsidian of the portal, the portal gets re-lit.

Using wood and lava to light a portal.

Another possible method is to take any flammable block and place it on one side of the block. By getting lava close to the flammable blocks, the lava can eventually light the wood, thus lighting the portal frame. Having the lava right on the opposite side of the frame of the flammable block is the fastest method. Also, the higher the difficulty , the faster the blocks catch on fire, so this method is more difficult in Easy or Peaceful difficulties. If the player also lacks a bucket , one can channel lava past the portal, or even build a trail of flammable blocks (planks are cheap, but wooden slabs are cheaper) to the nearest fire. That last method is especially tricky, as fire doesn't always catch. If this happens, try making it wider than one block.

A new set of flint and steel can be acquired. Looking in nether fortresses or ruined portals , there is a chance of finding a flint and steel in a chest . Also, gravel occurs naturally in the Nether , so a player can collect flint from there. Iron nuggets can be bartered from piglins, even or made from smelting down armor or tools. This process requires having a furnace and fuel source (such as a bucket of lava). Iron nuggets can also be obtained from bartering with piglins.

Another option is to create a fire charge . This is trickier as it requires gunpowder , coal , and blaze powder , so the player may have to kill a ghast , wither skeleton and blaze to collect all three of these items. Fire charges work just like flint and steel , except each use uses up one item. Fire charge may also be found in ruined portal chest. Fire charges can also be obtained from bartering with piglins.

As a last resort, if the player has (or can make) a chest or two (they appear in nether fortresses, so you might be able to locate one), the player can stuff all their equipment into the chests (not forgetting armor ), and then commit suicide. However, you lose your XP levels if you do this. Assuming the player is not playing on hardcore and has not used a respawn anchor, they respawn in the Overworld , and can re-equip themselves at leisure (this time, not forgetting the flint and steel ) before going back through the portal to collect their items. Note that this is more difficult on a multiplayer server because another player can come by and steal your items. If you have previously brought blaze rods back to the Overworld, you might even be able to use an ender chest , which can let you stash your stuff and pick it up back home from another such chest.

Additionally the player if holding a diamond pickaxe can break a block of the portal replacing it after and relighting the portal.

Fending off ghasts [ ]

Ghasts are one of the hardest and most annoying mobs to fight in Minecraft , mainly because of their floating ability and their long-ranged fireball, which does considerable damage to both players and the landscape. If you are bridge-building across a lava sea, they might shoot you off. (One direct hit can kill an unarmored player.) That said, they do have several weaknesses:

• They do not actually chase the player (nor flee), even after being attacked. They just move randomly around the landscape, firing at any player who comes into the line of sight (and range).
• Also, ghasts have 10 points of health (two fully charged shots with an unenchanted bow), so sniping them is not too difficult. A bow enchanted with even Power I or a critical hit can one-shot them.
• The fireballs are fairly easy to dodge, but they also tear up the landscape, not to mention setting it afire. However, the player can also bounce a fireball away by hitting it (fist, weapon, tool, anything works) as comes near. The fireball usually goes in the direction of the player's gaze. If the player manages to hit the ghast with its own fireball, it dies instantly, awarding the player the "Return to Sender" achievement / advancement . Be forewarned that this takes practice, so don't expect to use this method as the sole defence against ghasts. The player can also deflect the fireball by hitting it with an arrow, a snowball or even an egg .
• The classic defense is to build a mini-shelter out of cobblestone, 3 blocks high with a ladder to let the player poke their head (and bow) over the top, and preferably a 3×3 roof two squares above that for protection. Note that if the ghast can't see you, they don't fire.
• If a ghast does come into reach the player can also hit them with a sword. This can happen when they spawn in a cave, or just randomly fly into one, or happen to fly close to the ground. Besides this being a rare opportunity, you may also need to dodge or bounce fireballs at close range.
• If there is more than one ghast attacking the player, the best option is to run and/or hide. If the player sprints, fireballs cannot hit the player. If they can get out of sight from all but one, they can then focus on shooting down that one.
• Ghasts don't spawn in crimson forests and warped forests . On the contrary, you may want to avoid soul sand valley biomes as ghast spawns are abundant there, however if a ghast spawns in a biome where ghasts can spawn, such as a Nether Waste or Soul Sand Valley, a ghast can end up drifting into a crimson forest or a warped forest, on random.
• If a ghast is spotted in the distance and if you do not have any ranged weapons, It is recommended to leave the area, and take cover. tunneling into a wall and sealing the entrance, ghasts are unlikely to enter small or isolated areas, such as caves or ravines. Ghasts also do not enter structures, such as Nether Fortresses and Bastions, making these areas good places to hide from ghasts. Do not head directly to a nether portal to escape a ghast , ghast fireballs can destroy the portal, making it hard for players to return if they do not have a flint and steel.

Fighting hoglins [ ]

Hoglins have high health and a lot of knockback resistance. However they can be burned, and they fear warped fungi. Some ways to get away from them are:

• Let the piglins kill it.
• Use warped fungi to scare them, which prevents them from attacking, then hit them as they retreat.
• Burn them with fire or lava.
• Dig a 1-wide hole on the nearby wall and hit them from inside.
• Sprint/critical hit them.
• Spam click to knock them back while damaging them.
• More risky, build 3 blocks up and crouch to melee attack them. However, Hoglins can still occasionally get you from this height and knock you off the pillar. If you are not on a flat area, they can get up on another block enabling them to hit you. Always examine where you are building up.
• If you lack any tools or ranged weapons, it is best to avoid crimson forests and some bastion variants, if you spawned in a crimson forest, avoid hoglins, hide behind blocks or trees, hoglins do not attack you if you are not close to them, or if you are not in their line of sight. If a hoglin does spot you run to a group of piglins, as piglins are known to kill hoglins, hiding or getting to a high area is also a good idea, as hoglins have a hard time of reaching these areas. Placing down a warped fungus can scare hoglins away, as well as luring them into lava lakes and ruined portals.

If there is nothing around to scare off a hoglin and your armor is low, you are best using ranged weapons or fire to kill hoglins.

Resources found in the Nether [ ]

• Netherrack , soul sand , gravel , lava , magma block , glowstone , nether quartz ore , soul soil , blackstone and its variants, nether gold ore , basalt , crimson stem , warped stem , are all freely available. Note that while the player can pillar-jump to mine a high glowstone formation, a little exploration may reveal more accessible blobs of the stuff (look for places with low ceilings).
• Crimson and warped fungus are found in crimson forests and warped forests
• Red and brown mushrooms are likewise found scattered about.
• Ghasts sometimes drop ghast tears and/or gunpowder .
• Magma cubes can drop magma cream .
• Zombified piglins sometimes drop rotten flesh and gold nuggets . They can drop golden swords and gold ingots . However, attacking these is unwise until the player is prepared to handle a lot of them.
• The player can also mine nether quartz , used for advanced redstone components, and decorative purposes as well. Fortune is a true gift here.
• Obsidian can be farmed with nether portals. View the nether portal for more details (the diamond pickaxes needed to mine these can rarely be traded for emeralds by some villagers, making them renewable).
• Blackstone can be used as a substitution for cobblestone in the Nether, or as a good building material.
• Nether gold ore can be mined to get gold nuggets , which can then be crafted into gold ingots .
• Ancient debris can be used to craft netherite items.

Once the player finds a nether fortress , they can obtain several other resources:

• Nether bricks , nether brick fences , and nether brick stairs . These are ghast-resistant and non-flammable building materials. They can also be crafted from smelted netherrack, but that takes some time and effort. The nether fortress is made of nether brick, including those massive support pillars and all the decorative fencing.
• Nether wart , which the player can grow on soul sand . The player can also grow it back in the Overworld , provided they brought back some soul sand.
• Blazes drop blaze rods , and are the only source of them.
• Wither skeletons occasionally drop their skulls, which can eventually be used to spawn the wither . They also provide coal , and bones (bone meal for plants).

Once player finds a bastion remnant , they can obtain several other resources:

• Pigstep music disc
• Nether wart (alternative way)
• Gilded blackstone , which generates only in such structures
• Several blocks of gold

Piglins can be bartered with for a variety of resources:

• Blocks: Blackstone , Crying Obsidian , Gravel, Obsidian , Soul Sand
• Materials: Ender pearls , Leather , Iron nuggets, Nether bricks (individual bricks), Nether quartz , String and Water bottles
• Other useful items: Fire charges, potions of fire resistance (regular or splash), spectral arrows (regular arrows in Bedrock Edition ), and boots or books with Soul Speed .

Exploring the Nether [ ]

When exploring the Nether, there are a few things to remember:

• Wear a piece of gold armor if possible, because if you don't wear gold armor, piglins attack you.
• You can actually use the netherrack you mined to make nether bricks, smelt it with lava, which is plentiful. This is time-consuming, but nether bricks are as good building material as cobblestone, and it's plentiful. You could actually make an automatic smelting facility to cook your netherrack.
• You can also use Blackstone for an alternative block, especially if you're in basalt deltas.
• If you're playing in multiplayer, this may not apply - if there are other players nearby in the Nether, they can keep the chunk loaded and the clock running. Also, they might save and/or steal your items!
• Even in single-player, if the Overworld side of the portal is loaded, it can spawn zombified piglins, which may wander through the portal. Every time they do this, the Nether side of the portal is loaded for about 15 seconds — not much, but if you spend too long before heading back, it can add up.
• If you use a respawn anchor to respawn in the Nether, you need glowstone to charge it, and it requires rare crying obsidian to craft it. You can get crying obsidian from bartering or mining them from ruined portals.
• Use lodestone compasses for navigation in the Nether, which require lodestone crafted from a netherite ingot and chiseled stone bricks.
• You can activate a blank map in the Nether, and use a crafting table to zoom it out a bit. However, such a map shows only the bedrock "roof", and the direction indicator spins randomly, so it's not nearly as useful as an Overworld map. On the other hand, it does give some idea of where you've explored, and the marker is in the correct location on the map. While maps are not centered exactly at their creation, you can put framed clones of the map on your portals to make those green markers appear in the correct locations.
• When exploring, try to keep going in one direction until you reach an impassable obstacle (wall, cliff, lava lake), and leave a trail of markers along the path from your base, so you can easily find your way back. Dirt and torches are recognizable, but jack o'lanterns let you point the direction to your base (all the above are vulnerable to ghast fireballs, but unlike torches, Jack o'lanterns remain if the netherrack supporting them is blown away.) Cobblestone arches (as well as any paths you've made) also work well as they resist Ghast fireballs, are easily distinguishable from surrounding netherrack, and can be positioned so that passing through them orients you to the direction you came.
• Tunneling through netherrack: Making a 1×2 tunnel is a sure way to get killed by lava. Instead dig a 2-wide tunnel with the floor of the left side one block lower than the right, or vice-versa. This makes a trench for the lava, and if you're standing on the high ground, the lava does not touch you. Staircases are trickier: When digging down, lava can appear below or in front of you and can be bucketed or blocked off. When digging up, dig 2-wide, and regularly put 2-long areas with a one-block pit in front of the next step. This gives you someplace to dodge flowing lava, and the pits capture the flow. Also, watch out for lava "drips" when mining upward. Ladders or signs can also help block lava until you have a chance to do something about it.
• And again, the debug screen provides your coordinates and facing—this is also helpful for choosing where to place a new gate back to the overworld.
• This cannot be restated enough: be sure to build a base. This way, if you accidentally attack a mob of zombified piglin or have a ghast on your trail, your base must protect you, and consist of more than just an exposed nether portal. Again, as ghast fireballs can blow large holes in netherrack walls, you should construct your base out of cobblestone , stone , or, for a decorative look, stone bricks . Not only do these blocks have the necessary blast resistance to withstand a ghast fireball, they also are not found naturally in the Nether. This makes it much easier to identify your base from a distance.

Nether fortresses [ ]

One of your main objectives in the Nether is to locate a nether fortress . To see all the features of the nether fortresses visually, try this video "here" . Basically, their straight walkways and tall pillars are unmistakable but may be dimmed by distance. Be sure to look carefully into the abyss beyond the edges of the areas you explore; if you're not using Far render distance already, you can occasionally switch to it to see farther. If you do not see any, remember that the lava seas that generate in the Nether allow the player to spot more land, and a saddled strider can help in this regard. Be aware that sometimes most of the fortress is engulfed in netherrack. Therefore, open your eyes and look for signs of fortress-like nether bricks, blazes, and wither skeletons.

Even after spotting one, you may well need to find a way to get to it, or even build a bridge to it. (Suggestion: three-wide cobblestone, with two-high iron bars or nether brick fences for railings, and a roof. Those ghast get really annoying when you're out on a bridge… you might even put in a couple of turrets for sniping at them, too.)

Once you do find one, it is a good idea to make sure you have the necessary supplies to gather its many resources. So, head back to your base, or even back to the Overworld, and get, at a minimum, a stone pickaxe , an iron sword and lots and lots of food. An enchanted golden apple is handy when it's time to take on a blaze spawner, but you may want to stash that nearby and go back for it when you actually find the spawner. Trading with piglins can also get you potions of fire resistance before the fight. Lots of walls of any non-flammable material or nether brick fences are handy too: safety railings on the walkways are really nice when ghast starts taking potshots at you and blocking off unused areas and broken bridges helps cut down on fights.

There are a few things that are of the utmost importance when exploring a nether fortress:

• Explore the nether fortress thoroughly. You might not find much, but every once in a while you can find nether wart plantations, which usually generate behind staircases, or a blaze spawner. These are your key prizes, as the only places you can find these are in the nether fortress, or in bastion remnants , which is both rarer and more dangerous. Details on nether wart farms can be found on the nether wart farming page.
• Wither skeletons are scary but they can't go through a 2-block high passage.
• When exploring a nether fortress, always place torches to your right - that way when you want to get out you just make sure that the torches are on your left. Jack o'lanterns make this even simpler — always face them toward the exit (or where you need to go to reach said exit).
• If you come across a nether wart plantation, collect as many (if not all) of them as you can, as nether wart can be used to brew awkward potions——the base for most potions, then replant the plot (you'll have plenty leftover). Then go back to your base and create a nether wart farm by planting it on soul sand . Nether wart doesn't care about light or water and grows in the Overworld and The End, so you can take the farm back to your overworld base. Note that you don't use all that much, so four to six blocks of soul sand support a brewery and then some. You can use excess nether wart to trade with Cleric villagers and get a couple extra emeralds, which is better than throwing them away or hoarding them.
• You may well want to build a portal leading back to the overworld from the nether fortress. Having an Overworld base handy provides all the supplies you need.
• When you find a blaze spawner, you have a choice: turn it off, or farm it. There are usually at least two blaze spawners per nether fortress, and if multiple nether fortresses have joined together there may be more. So, don't assume the first one you find is your only option, but you do need to fight blazes at least once "the hard way" if you didn't get a fire resistance potion by bartering (enchanted golden apple notwithstanding). That first fight may be fairly tough, but together with the nether wart, you gain the means to make potions , including potions of fire resistance. Those make return engagements much easier.

Navigation through a nether fortress [ ]

The way to navigate through a nether fortress needs torches. When you finish a part of the nether fortress, put a torch at the entrance of the room to help you explore the nether fortress easily. Or you could block off the entrance with a certain block (like cobble). Wither skeletons can give you the Wither effect——a health draining status effect made by both a wither projectile or wither skeletons hitting you. Blazes are extremely dangerous and can be in the hallways and rooms, so make sure you are aware of that.

Closing a blaze spawner [ ]

The lighting pattern shown in a 3D image. Notice the additional light block above the spawner.

While a blaze spawner can be destroyed as usual with a pickaxe, you probably shouldn't do that unless you're sure you'll never, ever, want to hunt there. Blazes can spawn up to light level 11, up to 4 blocks away from the spawner (and a block above or below it), so simply placing torches on the spawner doesn't stop them from spawning. You'll need to plaster the area with a mix of jack-o-lanterns (or glowstone, shroomlight).

This lighting pattern should suffice to squelch a Blaze spawner: (Top view, all on the same level.)

An additional light block is needed above the spawner, as shown in the 3D image. If the area around the spawner is to be cleared, another light block is needed below the spawner as well.

Farming a blaze spawner [ ]

There are many hints for fighting blazes on their page. Here are some useful ideas:

• For your first fight, kill blazes that are not in the spawner room. This lesser number of blazes are easier to fight when you don't have a potion of fire resistance.
• If you haven't brought out the enchanted armor, now's the time. Fire Protection and Protection are both helpful.
• An enchanted golden apple is good to bring, but if you haven't acquired one yet potions can act as a substitute. Specifically, potions of fire resistance, strength, and regeneration can be a huge help. Although Potions of Fire Resistance make you immune to blaze fireballs, you are not immune to their touch attack. Armor and regeneration potions can help.
• An iron golem may be helpful, especially once you've got the spawner contained. One big disadvantage is the golem's huge knockback, which can throw Blazes and their drops out of reach. The golem's distractibility is also an issue — between spawnings, they're liable to wander off after zombified piglins and wither skeletons. The zombified piglins don't mob you or the golem for the golem's attacks, but the repeated fights soon wear down the golem. (A splash potion of regeneration or repairing the iron golem with iron ingots can help with that)
• A creative option is to mine under their platform to make a bolthole with a narrow opening up to their platform, perhaps 1×3. As they descend into the hole to reach you, you'll be able to get in several hits before they can respond. Nether fortress stairways (the narrow sort, not like the one leading to the Blazes) can provide a similar bolthole.
• A fishing rod can be useful for pulling blazes into melee range so their drops aren't lost.
• Create a "ceiling" above the spawner-this prevents blazes from flying out of reach and makes it easier to obtain their rods.
• It takes 7 snowballs to kill a Blaze. Water can't be used in the Nether, as it simply fizzes and vanishes. You can try making a Snow Golem, but they'll quickly "melt" due to the Nether heat. (Again, splash potions of fire resistance can help.)
• With fire resistance assured, you may want to seal yourself in the spawner room, so that wither skeletons, magma cubes, or other Blazes can't ambush you from behind.
• Bring a shield to block the fireballs.

Living in a nether fortress [ ]

If you've mastered the Nether, you can go in and start making a nether fortress more habitable. If you can have control of a nether fortress on a multiplayer server, you can control who enters the area, and also control who gets blaze rods (as blazes spawn only in nether fortresses). Mine down most (if not all) the netherrack covering the fortress. Make any surface where you don't want mobs with trapdoors or slabs . With the addition of nether quartz , the one who controls a fortress can also control who gets nether quartz from the area.

First, you should repair any bridges, as this can prevent falling deaths in the nether, though it gives mobs more access to the nether fortress. In many places, lava may be leaking in, so it is advisable to close off the area.

Almost all forts have a single roofed, large building, which you can use as the main building, where you can store all the necessities. You should put doors on the building, to prevent destructive mobs from entering.

DO NOT make a bed, beds explode in the Nether and the End if you sleep on them, though crafting tables are needed, and an ender chest might be useful (if one leaves the Nether in a hurry, they can get their items via another chest). Use a respawn anchor instead.

You should disable blaze spawners, so you can use them for mob grinding purposes later on, but also prevent blazes from overrunning the nether fortress, as they are extremely hazardous.

Some parts of a nether fortress have been filled in with netherrack and it can be a pain to dig it out. TNT is useful, though this risks damaging the fort, creating more hassle for the user. However, digging netherrack can give you a good source of nether bricks ——a good source of building material back home in the overworld.

Nether wart plantations are in most nether fortresses, with many warts in one plantation. They usually generate behind staircases, so keep an eye out when hunting for them. For more about nether wart, see Tutorials/Nether Wart Farming .

If one finds a nearby fortress that is not attached to the first one, nether bricks can be looted to repair the nether fortress if in survival. Large parts of the fortress itself such as the pillars for bridges are solid, and nether bricks can be looted from the inside of these pillars.

Killing the various mobs that spawn there is tricky. Blazes, zombified piglins , and ghasts pose a threat, though wither skeletons are a minor annoyance. Mobs spawn at a faster rate in a nether fortress, and trying to kill all the zombified piglins is impractical, so it is best to just leave them alone, as a large pack of zombified piglins could knock you off into a lava ocean. A few of these mobs can be prevented from spawning at all with proper light levels. Blazes spawn at light level 11 and under and wither skeletons at 7 and under, so lighting up the entire area with torches is recommended. Ghasts need a large space to spawn, 5x4x5 blocks with a solid block beneath them, so light sources should prevent all those mobs except zombified piglins from spawning. The zombified piglins are neutral, so avoid accidentally hitting them and you'll be fine.

If imported farming does not work, you should use the naturally growing mushrooms to make soup, so you have a bit to eat, though it is preferable to make better food, such as bread , with imported dirt and wheat seeds. This, however, may prove difficult, due to the inability to hydrate farmland in the Nether. Chickens can also be brought in using eggs to provide raw chicken .

Obstacles [ ]

Lava is plentiful in the Nether, in huge lakes (a sea of lava is near the bottom) rivers, and falling from the ceiling. You must be careful around lava as water buckets do not work in the Nether, and ice disappears instead of melting into water. Also, lava spreads much faster and farther in the Nether than in the Overworld (7 blocks instead of 3). Two good ways of crossing lava are to make a potion of Fire Resistance or eat an enchanted golden apple; while this effect is active, you can swim through lava without taking damage. Fire Protection on your armor can also protect you from lava: if using iron armor or better with the maximum possible protection, you take only half a heart of damage every couple seconds (with higher tier armor reducing how often you take damage), which is small enough that it can be outpaced by the natural regeneration you receive from a full hunger bar. This level can be achieved by wearing 1 armor piece with Fire Protection IV and 3 with Protection IV, or by wearing 2 armor pieces with Fire Protection IV and 1 with Protection IV. Note, however, that this rapidly damages your armor's durability. This can be mitigated with the Unbreaking and/or Mending enchantments, or completely negated by using Netherite armor, which doesn't lose any durability from fire and lava damage. It also uses up food as you'll need to keep eating in order to keep healing, so it's not as suitable as a Fire Resistance potion for crossing large bodies of lava, but it does remove the danger of dying from accidentally falling into lava without having to constantly drink potions "just in case." Fire Protection also has the side benefit of reducing the amount of time it takes for you to stop burning if you catch on fire from the lava. If any lava is in the way of your builds, simply clear it out using a bucket or fill it with blocks, and then continue on.

If you can find and reach a lava flow's source block, you can bucket it just like in the Overworld. Unfortunately, in the Nether, much of the lava is pouring down from great heights. Normally, use cobblestone, or iron bars to contain lava or direct it away from you (if you use flimsy blocks like dirt or netherrack, a ghast fireball can undo your work in a moment!) As always, if you mine upward, then watch for dripping red particles (if you have particles turned on). The drip itself does no damage, but if you mine a dripping block, lava pours down. If you wish to get rid of lava flowing from the ceiling (in your way, or immediate hazard), you must block jump up to the source (or simply aim at the ceiling), and cover the hole with any non-flammable block (if it's flowing straight down from a flat ceiling, you may need an extra block next to the flow to place the dam). One must be extremely careful about the placement of the block, however—if misplaced, the block can just spread the lava wider.

You can ride a saddled strider and control it with warped fungus on a stick to cross a lava ocean. Make sure you know how to get back, though. Lava oceans are sometimes big and easy to lose direction in. If you want, you can drink a combination of Night Vision and Fire Resistance potions while exploring lava seas, because you can swim across lava to the bottom to scan the ground for ancient debris, which can rarely generate under lava seas.

Zombified piglins [ ]

Zombified piglins are common in the nether wastes and roam in packs of 4-10, and they also spawn in crimson forests. Before 1.16 , Zombified Piglins were instead known as zombie pigmen. They are neutral mobs, meaning that they don't attack unless you attack them. However, if you attack one Zombified Piglin in a group, the whole group (and any others in a wide range) swarms you like wolves, easily killing any unprepared player. When a Zombified Piglin is attacked, all others in a wide range (33 to 55 blocks horizontally and 10 blocks vertically) of the victim become hostile and give chase if you are within 40 blocks of them. This can be avoided if you kill the zombified piglin in one blow, but that's easier said than done. Do this by using a diamond sword enchanted with Smite IV or above and a critical hit. They can see you only in a 40-block radius — any Zombified Piglins between those distances are turned hostile, but do not move toward you (instead of wandering as normal) until you come into sight. This can be a nasty gotcha: When you defend yourself, any zombified piglin within a new 33 to 55 block range become enraged. As of version 1.8, Zombified Piglins forgive you over time if you leave them alone for 20 to 39.95 seconds, although if you are still within their 40 block pursuit radius, they continue to attack. If you really need to get gold from them, stand on a two-block high pillar in an open space and then kill them. However, Piglins and Ghasts get really annoying on the platform.

It is usually better to leave these creatures alone, but if you want gold nuggets , or you want to increase your level (killing many zombified piglins gives you a lot of experience), you can safely attack the zombified piglins in various ways. Also, if you have to fight Zombified Piglins, make sure there isn't much (or even better, no) lava or fire surrounding you. You may have to move around a lot to fight all of them at once, and distractions make it worse (also, you may need to collect your stuff after getting killed).

Note that Zombified Piglins wield and carry golden swords , which can sometimes be enchanted, but they usually drop only rotten flesh and gold nuggets, rarely dropping gold ingots or their swords. Their swords can sometimes be enchanted, with the level of the enchantment varying depending on the difficulty.

• Build a killing ground - Near a large group, fence/wall off a controlled area, and set up gates, one-way doors, and suchlike so that you can limit them to approaching one or two at a time, and block them off altogether when needed. Don't forget an escape route! Note that this can be much more difficult as of 1.8 as they now have path-finding AI.
• Bow and arrows - Using a bow , you can pick off Zombified Piglins one at a time at a safe distance. Just make sure you have enough arrows and they don't get to you——Zombified Piglins run faster when provoked, so being in high ground is a good choice.
• Separation - Isolate the Zombified Piglin and kill them, but make sure they are far away from any other Zombified Piglin, or else they attack. Time-consuming, but safer than the bow-method. This is no longer as effective as of 1.8 since their anger radius has been vastly increased, though if you stay away long enough they forgive you.
• Nether portal - Mobs can travel through portals. So, if you can push or lead them into a portal, you can follow and deal with one or two at a time in the Overworld. Some Nether mobs, especially Zombified Piglins, can spawn inside portals, so they can be teleported into the overworld. If you attack a Zombified Piglin in the Overworld, it makes no impression on ones in the Nether.
• Diamond/netherite sword, iron or better armor, and full hunger bar - If you have a diamond sword (preferably enchanted with something like Knockback, which help for fighting groups), a full set of diamond or iron armor, and you are regenerating, you may be able to beat the whole group. NOTE, this is not recommended as, if you die, you could lose a diamond sword and a full set of armor. It helps if you staged the fight somewhere away from lava and close to your spawn portal. DON'T FORGET: they may pick up your armor and/or weapon if you die! If your armor has Protection 4, however, this becomes much safer as the protection greatly reduces damage. However, still be aware that they can knock you into lava, fire, or off a cliff.

• Cacti - It is possible to create a cactus fence in the Nether by placing some sand and cactus blocks. You can then bump into zombified piglin to push them into the cacti until they die and drop items. If you are careful not to actually attack them (no clicking!), the nearby piglins stay neutral.
• Iron Golems - When an iron golem attacks a piglin, that piglin does not strike back. Also, they kill the piglins in 2-3 hits and usually aren't hurt at all. This tactic works better if you have a lead. If your Overworld portal is in a village, then you can easily drag golems into the Nether when need be.
• Tower - Just build a three-block high tower to stand on, and the piglins cannot jump to reach you. Don't do this near ghasts; they can blow you off your tower.
• Bed Bombing - Place down a bed and blow it up. Remember to have a block in between you and the bed, otherwise you may kill yourself too.

As mentioned earlier, ghasts shoot deadly fireballs at you when you're in their sight of 100 blocks, so stay alert for incoming fire any time you're in the open, or exposed to open space. Their noises, which sound like crying babies, can give some warning, but their fireballs travel even farther than their sounds, in fact the fireballs travel for one minute before despawning (or until the ghast is dead)., so this isn't a reliable warning. Cobblestone resists the fireballs, which is why you should bring a lot.

However, ghasts can give you trouble with zombified piglins around! If you bounce back one of their fireballs, the fireball now counts as your attack, and if a zombified piglin so much as gets touched by the blast, it becomes provoked (along with all its buddies in and out of sight).

Pro tip: when the fireball is within the player's reach, aim at the Ghast and punch. As long as the fireball is in your FOV you can hit the ghast. NOTE: If surrounded by multiple ghasts, constantly hitting attack while aiming at a Ghast throws all fireballs in that direction, regardless of which direction they are coming from (they still need to be within reach). Do be careful, however, with bouncing fireballs back at Ghasts on the ground, as the explosion from the fireball can not only damage the vicinity, but provoke zombified piglins as above.

Remember that unlike shulker bullets , ghast fireballs do not follow the player. If you are in a difficult situation, just run to a safe place. You can always outrun the impact area.

• Bow And Arrows - Simply run to a safe place without other mob distractions and finish it off with a bow & arrows.
• Sniper Turrets - If you are crossing a bridge over a lava sea, build sniper turrets . They consist of walls with holes on them. Fire arrows or charges at ghasts from the turrets and quickly duck behind a two-block-tall wall when the ghast fires at you.

Although they cannot be found in the "general" Nether, blazes can spawn in nether fortresses, both naturally and through spawners. For the first run, it is strongly recommended to find an enchanted golden apple . As of the new Minecraft 1.9 update, these can no longer be crafted but can be found in chests in various locations: dungeons , desert temples , mineshafts , and woodland mansions . Failing that, loading your armor up with Fire Protection and Protection enchantments can help; maximum protection comes with 10 levels total of Fire Protection, with each two levels of regular Protection counting as one of Fire Protection.

After that first run, your first two blaze rods (and some nether wart) let you brew potions of fire resistance; use the first one to make a brewing stand , then craft the second into blaze powder . The first piece of blaze powder fuels the brewing, the second can make magma cream if you haven't picked any up yet, but if you do have some it can be used to make Potions of Strength (with a bit of redstone , your potions last even longer). At this point, you can run away and come back with potions of Fire Resistance. This makes you completely immune to their fireballs, and if you keep a block or so distance, you can avoid their melee attack.

Once you've gotten more comfortable with the blazes, you can build one of the spawners into a farm, by casing over the spawner area with nether brick fence, and digging a hole underneath for the blazes to slowly descend into.

Magma Cubes [ ]

Magma cubes are slime-like mobs that spawn in the nether wastes and spawn abundantly in basalt deltas, generally near lava (hence the name magma cube). They look like burnt slimes with yellow eyes, and seem to have springs under them (they jump fairly high and the "springing" is visible). Their properties are much like slimes, as killing a large one results in it splitting into 2-4 medium-sized ones, which splits into 2-4 small ones. The large and medium Magma cubes have a chance of dropping magma cream and experience when killed. You can prevent magma cubes from spawning in your base by making the floor out of transparent blocks. As mentioned earlier, you can stand on a pillar to kill magma cubes, but any ghasts or crossbow-wielding piglins might really annoy you.

Wither Skeletons [ ]

Wither skeletons are tall, darkened skeletons, wielding stone swords. They inflict the wither effect for 10 seconds with a hit. They walk when idle, but sprint toward a player when they see one. However, they can't pass through a two-block-high space, which makes them somewhat easy to deal with. They drop bones, coal, and occasionally their stone sword. They also have a small chance to drop a wither skeleton skull, which are essential to summoning the wither boss . These types of skeletons are found only in nether fortresses. They can roam in groups in fortress hallways, so be careful of blazes and being withered in this situation. Knockback is good for packs where you want them as far away as possible.

Piglins [ ]

Piglins commonly spawn in Nether Wastes , Crimson Forests , and in Bastion Remnants and are armed with either golden swords or crossbows . The adults are by default hostile, but if you have at least one piece of gold armor on they become neutral toward you, and the babies are always passive. Throwing a golden item at them pacifies them for a moment. When killed, they have a small chance of dropping their golden sword or crossbow, any armor they naturally spawned with, and they drop any picked up items. If you barter with them by throwing or using [1] a gold ingot on them, they throw something back, as seen on the bartering page. You can prevent them from spawning by thoroughly lighting up the area as they spawn at light levels 11 or below. They also run from soul fire related blocks and zombified piglins. If they go into the overworld through a nether portal, they start to shake and turn into zombified piglins shortly after.

Hoglins [ ]

Hoglins are large pig-looking mobs, which drop raw porkchops , leather , and experience upon death. They spawn in Crimson Forests and Bastion Remnants . They are naturally hostile with 40 health points. They run from warped fungus , nether portals , and respawn anchors . They run toward players and fling the player into the air upon hitting. Unlike most hostile mobs, hoglins can be led with leads and bred with crimson fungi . If they go into the overworld through a nether portal, they start to shake and turn into a zoglin shortly after. Hoglins make good sources of food when you run out of them in the Nether for long periods of time or if you get lost.

Brewing [ ]

Many resources in the Nether are essential for brewing potions :

• Blaze rods , from killing blazes , are needed to make a brewing stand , where all potions are brewed. They are also required for making an eye of ender (making the rod into powder), which can locate an End portal.
• Nether wart can be found in nether fortresses or bastion remant and is used to brew the awkward potion, the base for most potions.
• Blaze rods can also be crafted into blaze powder , for strength potions, and fuel for the brewing stand.
• Magma cream is dropped from killed magma cubes , and can also be crafted from blaze powder and slimeballs . It can be used to brew fire resistance potions.
• Gold nuggets dropped by zombified piglins and also when mining gilded blackstone and nether gold ore , can be used to make glistering melon slices , for healing potions , and golden carrots , which is one of the best kinds of food in Minecraft and can also be used to brew night vision and invisibility potions.
• Ghast tears drop from killed ghasts , and are used to brew regeneration potions.
• Glowstone dust is mined in the Nether, and used to increase potion potency ( e.g. , from poison to poison II).
• Gunpowder is used for creating splash potions .
• Piglins can give you water bottles when bartering.

Settlement [ ]

Turns out it wasn't enough for you to explore the Nether. You've decided it looks like a nice place to live (or if you're in a multiplayer world, perhaps you seek strategic control of the rapid-travel capability). So, what do you need to survive here?

You can start by importing some dirt to grow plants. You can even use a hoe to till it into farmland , but there's a catch: With no water available, you need to till the ground, then plant your seed immediately , before the farmland reverts to dirt. Likewise when harvesting wheat, replant immediately and keep the hoe on your hotbar. This works for all the farmland crops: wheat , melons , pumpkins , carrots and potatoes and beetroot . Melons would be the most reliable as after the stem is fully grown, hydration does not affect the rate at which melons grow. Wither skeletons can provide bones for bone meal to speed this process. Cocoa plants are farmable on jungle logs as usual, so that gives you cookies too. You can also farm sweet berries. While you're at it, you can layout a few blocks of soul sand for a nether wart farm.

Mushrooms [ ]

It is also possible to build an 8 by 8 platform, plant mushrooms on two opposite edges, and then use bone meal. This can provide you with a steady source of Mushroom Stew , and you can put torches or saplings in the other corners. On dirt or grass, mushrooms need a light level of 7 or below, but on podzol, mycelium, or nylium, applying bone meal causes them to grow into their respective huge mushroom type at any light level. Nylium is also the only block in the Nether on which you can farm mushrooms, and that is crucial (or alternatively, bring podzol or mycelium from the Overworld).

Generated structures [ ]

Once you've gotten used to Nether dangers, you can invade and repair a nether fortress, as it provides many Nether commodities, such as blazes and nether wart . However, falling is a real danger, as there might be a lava ocean below you. If you're in survival, and you've found multiple nether fortresses (not connected but nearby) you can loot nether bricks to repair your favorite nether fortress. You can smelt netherrack into individual nether bricks, then craft your own walls, stairs, and fences. You can also transform bastion remnants in similar ways. For bastion renmants, block off any lava, and fill in any gaps. Try to fix up the jagged edges of the bridges/walkways. Make the bastion into an bartering farm/magma cream farm. Add decorations and fix up the bastion.

You'll want wood for tools and torches (and perhaps to smelt into charcoal), so make a tree farm as well. Wood also provide charcoal for torches and smelting. Oak trees also provide the occasional apple for golding , but that's not really a food supply. If you want Nether woods variants, you can grow Huge fungus as they don't need dirt, but nylium to grow. Also Nether wood is inflammable.

Another catch: Trees need space to grow - and ghasts need space to spawn. Happily (and contrary to popular belief), ghasts do spawn on blocks, and they need a 5×5 space free of transparent blocks and slabs. You can scatter slabs, glass and glowstone around the floor of your tree farm. You can plant saplings with glowstone adjacent, and slabs on top of the diagonal blocks. You can do this in rows for max efficiency. If you're low on glowstone, jack o'lanterns and torches suffice. You also need at least 4 blocks of air above the sapling. Using this method of tree farming, you can have a large enclosure for mass wood farming without ghasts! If not too densely lit, your tree farm also serves for bone-meal assisted huge mushrooms , which is useful for Mushroom Stew . The most basic way to safely farm trees is to have a 5×5×7 room with a floor made out of glowstone or glass (if you are using glass, make sure to put torches next to the sapling) and have 1 dirt in the middle of the floor.

Animals and villagers [ ]

Chickens can also be farmed in the Nether (by bringing in eggs or by killing Chicken Jockeys ), but likewise, take space, and warrant anti-ghast measures. There is gravel around for flint and Nether wood for sticks, so with the chickens for feathers , you can make arrows .

Cows , pigs and sheep can be brought through the portal, which can provide you with wool , leather , and meat. Sheep require special measures: You'll need to get a grass block with a Silk touch tool or killing an Enderman holding one and use that to start grass on a well-lit dirt floor, so they can regrow their wool. You can also just breed the sheep until you have a lot, and then shear some of them and kill the sheared ones. However, the sheep do not re-grow their wool.

Villagers can be brought into the Nether through a portal, either using a boat or minecart. Make sure the portal is protected, so ghasts don't fireball you or damage the villager. Villagers can use beds without blowing them up, allowing for artificial villages and iron golem farms to function properly. They do run away from zombified piglins even though zombified piglins don't attack them.

Some things can't be produced in the Nether, and need to be brought in from the Overworld: There are no ores, besides nether quartz ore , ancient debris , and nether gold ore . There is no diamond unless you import it from the overworld or you find it in bastion remnant or nether fortress chests. Emerald, iron, redstone and lapis lazuli are renewable through villagers, and gold is renewable through zombified piglins. Iron is also renewable from bartering, as well as water, though it has to be stored in cauldrons . Coal is renewable from wither skeletons or smelting overworld wood. Blackstone can be used as an alternative to cobblestone. You can get the Pigstep music disc and the snout banner pattern from a bastion remnant, and diamonds and horse armor can be obtained through a nether fortress.

Paper and sugar is crafted with sugarcane , which can't grow without water. You can get string from killing striders or bartering with piglins. Fishing rods cannot be used for fishing as there no water, but can be used to craft warped fungus on a stick to ride striders or reel in mobs. The same applies to some ingredients for brewing: Besides sugar, there are no spider eyes . They must be brought in from the Overworld. However, the piglins can provide occasional water bottles.

• A player can crouch when near lava as a safeguard to avoid falling in. However, you still get knockback from being hit.
• Mobs such as the ghast can surprise the player, so the player should be watchful of their environment, especially when in bad positions, such as bridging a gap.
• A zombified piglin farm can be created by walling the player off, then killing the piglins through a small hole.
• Killing magma cubes can help the player collect magma cream, which is used for brewing potion of fire resistance, an extremely useful potion in the Nether. One can also get Potion of fire resistance from piglin barter.
• Avoid getting lost in the Nether's low visibility by placing markers, such as torches or jack o'lanterns. Any markings suffice, but make sure they are not native to the Nether.
• The player should be careful on gravel, as gravel can generate with no supporting blocks, making it fall when it receives an update.
• Glass and string block a ghast's vision, allowing the player to see ghast filled areas without being shot at. This is useful for bases in the Nether.
• Bringing 10 obsidian and a flint and steel (or fire charge) allow the player to return to the Overworld if they become lost. Compasses don't work in the Nether, unless linked to a lodestone . A respawn anchor charged with glowstone in a base you've built avoids you having to find your way back entirely.
• Bring a pumpkin or a jack o'lantern. They can help you find your direction, as the stem on the top of the pumpkin always faces Northwest even in the Nether, no matter what direction the Pumpkin itself is facing.
• As long as there are no ghasts or blazes present, traversing the Nether by mining along the edge of a wall is fast, safe, and efficient, unlike tunneling through said wall, which requires a fast reaction time and/or the constant digging of pits for lava to drain to.
• Or place a soul fire based block to scare them away. Torches and campfires work, but only the soul kind.
• Bring some warped fungus as a defense toward hoglins.
• Know your biome: Knowing the threats of the biome you're in can be invaluable. In Nether Wastes, zombified piglins , piglins , and magma cubes roam, with the occasional ghast or enderman . In Crimson Forests, Piglins, Hoglins , and Zombified Piglins roam. In a warped forest, only endermen spawn. In Soul Sand Valleys, ghasts are abundant, along with skeletons and the occasional enderman. In basalt deltas, Magma Cubes spawn abundantly, along with some ghasts. The lava oceans are home to the striders .

Nether survival challenge [ ]

This is a challenge where you start in the Nether with nothing and leave. This section assumes you play in a release of the Nether Update. Both Java and Bedrock editions use the same mechanics. There are no impactful differences except that Bedrock mob spawning is different and less stable, and Bedrock Edition has worse loot in chests.

Starting [ ]

Create a Creative world. Build a nether portal and go to the Nether. Break the nether portal. Usually players start with a respawn anchor and four glowstones. If you are setting your spawn, make sure to right click on it even after it is charged so that you set your respawn point. You can avoid placing nether portals and respawn anchors and set your spawnpoint in the nether permanently with this set of commands:

• /gamemode c
• /execute in minecraft:the_nether run tp ~ ~ ~
• /spawnpoint @s ~ ~ ~
• /gamemode s

Make sure to stand on solid ground before executing /spawnpoint.

In either a crimson forest or a warped forest, obtain around 20 stems. The wart blocks can be broken with hoes faster. You do not need to break them, but they make the landscape ugly if you leave them floating. Make wooden pickaxes and start mining right away. Lava pockets generate at all levels in the Nether, so you could directly mine into lava. You must be careful, and if you run into lava, quickly block it off. Blackstone can be found in large blobs from levels 5-28. In a Basalt Deltas biome, it can generate with basalt on the surface. While you are mining, look for some nether gold ore. It gives you gold nuggets, which you should turn into gold ingots. (If you have Silk Touch, you'll get more gold by smelting the blocks.) With Blackstone, which can be used as a substitute to cobblestone, upgrade to stone tools, and make a furnace. After crafting many bowls, look for brown and red mushrooms and craft mushroom stew. Your priority is to mine any nether gold ore you see, so that you can get one piece of gold armor (most easily boots), so that the Piglins don't attack you. Continue mining any gold you see, and collect wood and mushrooms for mushroom stew. (You need a bowl, a red mushroom, and a brown mushroom for stew)

Finding a good place to settle [ ]

There are five different biomes, each with their advantages and disadvantages. Find one to base up in.

The safest of all Nether biomes, but can be unexpectedly dangerous. Nothing spawns there except for endermen and striders. You need to be careful about the endermen, and make the entrance to your house only two blocks high so that you can run inside and kill endermen if you want to/have to.

One of the more dangerous Nether biomes. It's inhabited by hoglins, piglins, zombified piglins, and striders. hoglins are the best way to get food in the Nether, and piglins are rarely an issue if you have gold armor. Zombified piglins are neutral, and don't attack you unless you attack them. Because the main use of this biome is to get wood and porkchops, it's better to base up on the edge of the biome, since there is no need at all to be inside it. Put warped fungus near your house to scare away hoglins, and put soul fires (fires lit on soul sand or soul soil), soul torches, soul lanterns, or soul campfires to scare away piglins. Idle piglins are scared by soul things, and if they are attacking you they do not ignore the soul things. No matter what, whether idle or hostile, they are scared of zombified piglins, so trapping and nametagging a zombified piglin and place it outside your house can scare away piglins under all circumstances.

This is the one of the most dangerous biomes. It is definitely not recommended to base up here. Because of the jagged terrain, magma cubes, and lava, it is easily the most dangerous biome to be in. The only benefit of this biome is easy access to magma cubes for magma cream (for brewing fire resistance potions), and easy access to blackstone (used as a substitute to cobblestone), and an easy access to basalt (no usage other than building). Do not build your house inside this biome, but building it close would do no harm.

This is one of the more dangerous biome. Mobs that spawn there include skeletons and ghasts, however they do not spawn in large packs, so you occasionally bump into these mobs. Soul fire does twice the normal damage, and skeletons and ghasts can easily overwhelm you. Soul sand also slows you down a lot, which is terrible paired with skeletons and ghasts. However, if you have Soul Speed boots (iron boots enchanted with a random Soul Speed level can be obtained from bartering with piglins), you can traverse this biome a lot easier. The benefits include easy access to nether fossils, which provide a large quantity of bone blocks, and skeletons from which you can get bones. You can also obtain soul sand and soul soil, the latter exclusive to this biome, however soul sand can generate near lava in other places and is obtained from bartering.

One of the safer biomes in the Nether. This biome is mainly inhabited by a mass of zombified piglins, but is also inhabited by piglins, more rarely. The piglins are scared of the zombified piglins so the piglins should not be an issue most of the time. This biome is known to be flat and easy to explore, which makes it perfect for building. Since this biome has exposed netherrack on the surface, there is more easily accessible nether quartz and nether gold ores than any other biome. You can build a gold farm, which is extremely useful.

Mob-proofing your house [ ]

You can prevent any mobs from spawning by placing bottom slabs on your house. Bottom slabs refers to slabs that are placed on the bottom of a block, with one more half-block vertical layer above it. You need to also prevent mobs from entering your house.

Hoglins are scared of charged respawn anchors, lit nether portals, and warped (blue) fungi. This is easiest with warped fungi. It can be planted on any nylium or on soul soil. Soul soil can be obtainable from a soul sand valley. If you break a soul campfire, which can be crafted using soul sand, it drops one soul soil block. Soul sand can be obtained from soul sand valleys or with a 8.5% chance from bartering with Piglins.

Piglins are scared of all soul fire items, which includes lit soul campfires, soul fire, soul torches, and soul lanterns. They are also scared of zoglins and zombified piglins. They ignore all items that usually scare them when hostile, except for zombified piglins, meaning that everything besides zombified piglins only scare idle/non-attacking piglins. Placing zombified piglins in a trap is not normally viable because being mobs in the hostile category, they despawn after the player is outside a 128 block radius. Naming a zombified piglin with a name tag prevents this. Keeping idle piglins away is actually useful because opening chests inside your house angers them. The best solution, if you don't have a name tag, is to just wear gold armor and not do anything to provoke piglins. If provoked, they cease hostilities in 30 seconds if you do nothing to further provoke them.

All other mobs cannot be deterred, but can be easily blocked off.

Gold is the most valuable resource in the Nether. Bartering allows the player to obtain many items and though obtaining a full gold suit of armor does not sound useful, it gives 44% protection and allows the player to take 2x more damage, about. The resources that you must get while mining is:

• Nether gold ore. It drops 2-6 gold nuggets, and attempts to generate 10 times per chunks from levels 10-117 in blobs of size 1-10. It generates 20 times per chunk in basalt deltas, because it can replace only netherrack. Keep in mind that it is still slower to mine in basalt deltas because basalt is slow to mine.
• Blackstone. Mining consumes a lot of stone pickaxes, and stone is needed for all tools, furnaces, and brewing stands. It is found in blobs of up to 1-33 from levels 5-28, generating 2 blobs per chunk. You can easily find more than 33 blackstone in one blob if it connects to other blobs
• Ancient debris. Ancient debris is essential to obtaining netherite ingots and is found in blobs of 1-3 from levels 8-119. A blob of 1-3 ancient debris attempts to generate once per chunk from levels 8-22, and an additional blob of 1-2 ancient debris attempts to generate once per chunk from levels 8-119. It is difficult to find ancient debris from levels 8-119, and better in low places (levels 8-22). It is the most common at level 15

This means that the best level to mine at is y=14, because it covers the most ancient debris, nether gold ore, and blackstone possible.

Disabling mining spawns [ ]

Most people mine by having a main "hub" tunnel, and having a lot of seperate tunnels that go off of that.

You do not want to have your mines where you are farming mobs. More spawn in your mines and less spawn where you are farming. To prevent this, know where your main hub mining system is in proportion to your base. You need to make sure all of your biomes where you are farming things are outside of your mines. For example, if your base is at X point, and all of your biomes where you farm mobs are south of your base, then your mining tunnels must go north in proportion to your base. That means that your main hub mining tunnel must go between east and west, with the seperate mining tunnels going north, in that specific example.

Farming [ ]

Bone meal farming [ ].

A bone meal farm is essential to obtaining mushroom stew through a mushroom farm, and farming trees and fungi. Most vegetation items in the Nether can be composted in a composter, including nether wart, shrooslights, nether wart blocks, warped wart blocks, weeping vines, twisting vines, warped roots, crimson roots, nether sprouts, crimson fungi, and warped fungi. However, weeping vines and twisting vines are the best, preferable twisting vines. Twisting vines and weeping vines can be farmed in a similar manner to sugarcane, with the whole plant growing from a single block. However, twisting vines grow upward and weeping vines grow downward. Farming these vines are quite simple. For twisting vines, plant a lot on the ground. When you need to harvest it, harvest the second block off the ground, to destroy all blocks but the one from which the plant is growing, to save a lot of vines. For weeping vines, it is a lot harder to farm. Ideally, you plant them on the top of wherever you are, and make a platform for you to go up and harvest them (second block from the source block from which the whole plant is growing), and then the plants fall on the ground. You can then use a composter to turn it into bone meal by using it. Most importantly, allow your plants space to grow. They can both grow to a maximum height of 25 blocks.

Vegetation farming [ ]

Vegetation farming is essential to tree farms, hoglin farms, and strider farms. When you bone meal nylium of any type, it generates vegetation on that nylium block and surrounding nylium blocks. The vegetation includes fungi of both types, roots of both types, and nether sprouts. Certain types of nylium generate more of their color type of vegetation, for example crimson nylium generates mostly crimson fungi and roots, but can generate warped vegetation. The only thing you need to obtain from these farms is warped and nylium fungus, used for breeding animals and growing trees. All other items are used only as decoration. There is no setup for this, but make sure you are doing it on the maximum amount of nylium possible so that there is space for it to generate. If your area of nylium is not wide enough, you can spread it by putting bone meal on netherrack adjacent to nylium. You can also obtain nylium in the Warped Forest, where endermen are often found holding it

Tree farming [ ]

When a fungi is placed on its corresponding nylium and then fertilized with bone meal, it can turn into a huge fungi. Warped (blue) fungi can turn only into a huge warped fungi if placed on warped nylium (blue nylium), and vice versa with crimson. There is no special setup, but you need to destroy the nether wart blocks (fastest with a hoe), because it needs space to be able to generate a huge fungi. Also, after it grows into a huge fungus, the nylium below it decays into netherrack, and you need to apply bone meal to it, which turns it back into nylium if there is adjacent nylium next to the netherrack.

Mushroom farming [ ]

Mushroom stew is the easiest food to farm. When bone meal is applied to a mushroom placed on any nylium, it can grow into a huge mushroom. They can be placed on nylium only to be fertilized, and unlike other blocks like dirt, they do not require a low light level to grow. Setup:

• They need space to grow.
• After it is grown into a huge mushroom, the nylium below it decays into netherrack, so you need to put bone meal on it, which turns the netherrack back into nylium if there is nylium adjacent to it.
• The blocks are fastest broken with an axe. They can be hard to reach from the ground, so you can build stairs up to a platform that lets you jump on top of the mushroom.

Mob farming [ ]

The iron age, after the stone age [ ].

After the establishing food and wood farms, you can begin the next stage of progression. Next, you need to explore. Exploring is the most essential part to the next step of your progression. While exploring, you need to

• Find a nether fortress. You can find 1-3 diamonds as loot for a 19% chance in both Java and Bedrock, You can also find other loot including saddles, and golden armor, golden swords, golden and iron horse armor. The armor you can wear to be protected against Piglins. You can also smelt it into gold nuggets, and you can smelt the iron horse armor into iron nuggets too. You want to also find nether wart, and in the future, blaze rods
• Mine a lot of nether gold ore. Since this can be found through the Nether, it is definitely worth it to get all of the gold that you can, since it is valuable in bartering. Get any in sight.
• Find a Bastion Remnant. There are four variants, and each one has different treasure. Bastion Remnants can provide a large amount of gold and various items in treasure, including large quantities of iron, arrows, gold, and even diamonds, diamond armor, or diamond tools, which can be enchanted. This is definitely worth the exploration since it speeds everything up by a lot
• Find a ruined portal. If you are planning one escaping the Nether, having a nearly finished portal is helpful. The treasure can also be good, including obsidian, gold armor for Piglins, enchanted gold tools, and iron nuggets sometimes. They also have gold blocks near them, which you can't mine with a stone pickaxe.
• Discover the rest of the biomes. Each biome has helpful things about it, and having access to all of the biomes is extremely helpful.

Next, you want to do bartering with the Piglins. Hopefully, you have around two stacks of gold ingots, which can be a grind to get. You can drop a gold ingot near Piglins or use it on them. They'll pick it up and drop you a random item.

You are looking for several items in particular:

• Iron. There is a 2.18% chance of Piglins giving you 10-36 iron nuggets, which you can craft into ingots. Since you cannot afford the luxury of making iron tools, your first priority would be to make a shield. Next you need to make an iron pickaxe. The reason for this is that gold blocks generate in bastion remnants, and you cannot obtain them with a stone pickaxe. You cannot afford to make any other tools, but if you have enough you can make a hopper. That makes your total iron to explore a bastion remnant 9 iron
• String. Piglins have a 4.36% chance of giving you 3-9 string. Striders drop string as well, dropping 2-5 string, without Looting on a sword. You need string to craft a bow, which you need for taking down a bastion. You also need it to craft wool for beds for Netherite mining, however that is late-game.
• Spectral arrows (Java Edition only). Piglins have an 8.71% chance of giving you 6-12 spectral arrows. These function like normal arrows, and do the same damage, however they give entities the glowing effect for 10 seconds. That causes a white outline to appear around the target that shows up through obstructions, which is effective in bastion remnants
• Potions of fire resistance/splash potions of fire resistance. Piglins have a 1.74% chance of giving you a 3:00 Potion of Fire Resistance or a 3:00 Splash Potion of Fire Resistance. These are useful for fighting blazes, and useful for lava and fire if you slip by accident.

That's all you should need for exploring the bastion remnant or the nether fortress. However, you can receive many more good things. Visit the bartering page for more information.

1. Nether Fortress [ ]

Find a nether fortress and break in. Use the right hand torch rule for exploring. Take the loot from the chests and try to find diamonds. Get nether wart and blaze powder. Make some ender chests and put your loot inside. Have some spare eyes of ender if you don't yet have silk touch. Avoid blaze spawners, as you don't have a lot of armor. Kill lone blazes and as many wither skeletons as possible. You need 3 wither skeleton skulls to spawn the Wither. There is no way to craft enchanting tables, so you can get Looting only through ruined portals. When fighting, make sure piglins, other skeletons, other blazes, and endermen cannot get to you when you are fighting.

2. Bastion Remnant [ ]

Find a bastion remnant. Be careful with piglins. When looting chests, block yourself in or place hoppers under the chests. If you have one, put the loot in an ender chest. Kill the piglin brutes as they aren't distracted or scared by anything, and they always pursue the player. If the bastion is a treasure bastion, you can get diamond armor, tools and diamonds. Keep raiding bastions until you get enough diamonds.

Once you get enough diamonds, make only a diamond sword and pickaxe. Don't make the other tools. If you can, make some diamond armor. The next step is upgrading your items to netherite. Make a smithing table and start mining. If you have a strider farm, breed striders and kill them for string. Make as much wool as possible and prepare beds. Go underground, and use beds to blow up areas. 4 ancient debris yield 4 netherite scraps. 4 netherite scraps + 4 gold ingots makes an netherite ingot. Using the smithing table, upgrade your equipment to netherite. Next, find a good place to spawn the wither. It is recommended to spawn it in a large flat area. Reinforce the area with obsidian, as many layers as you want. You should reinforce the base with as much obsidian as possible, just in case the wither flies away and hits your buildings.

Potion brewing [ ]

Potions are not necessary but vital if you are taking on the Wither. Craft a brewing stand with a Blaze Rod and 3 Blackstone. You need nether wart to brew potions, so set up a farm with soul sand. You also need blaze powder to fuel it. Now, Water Bottles are obtained through Bartering with the piglins. The only way to obtain water bottles in the Nether is through bartering. Piglins have a 2.18% chance to give you a water bottle when bartered with. Using water bottles, you could make potions with the ingredients limited to those that occur only in the Nether, which include blaze powder for potion of strength, ghast tears for potion of regeneration, glistering melon slice for potion of healing, golden carrots (from various loot) for potion of night vision, and magma cream for potion of fire resistance. You can use glowstone dust to to increase the potency of your potions, however reducing the duration, or gunpowder to turn it into splash potions you can throw, taking less time to use the potion on yourself.

After you got the skulls and soul sand needed, and have picked the place to spawn the wither, place 4 soul sand in a T shape, and place 2 skulls on top, but don't place the 3rd one until you are ready to fight. Prepare at least a full set of iron/diamond armor with a piece of gold armor. Bring fire resistance, and a netherite sword/pickaxe. Bring a bow with as many arrows as possible. (You can get arrow from bastions, or you can barter for spectral arrows.)

Go to the wither spawning location, and block up dangerous areas with obsidian, including the floor. If you can, fight in a warped forest, as withers attack endermen.

At the start of the fight, fire fully charged arrows at it. Watch out for the skulls and hide to restore hunger/health. If the wither breaks the obsidian, reinforce it. At half health, use your sword to hit the wither until it is dead. Do critical hits to kill faster. Once the wither is dead, pick up the nether star, and prepare the beacon base. (You cannot make the beacon yet because there is no way to obtain glass). Once you have all the mineral blocks you need, build the portal to the overworld. Set up your beacon to show you beat the Nether survival challenge. You can continue on this world and do what you want.

Watch the Nether survival challenge on Pixlriffs' channel on youtube. Pixlriffs

Also Watch the Nether survival challenge(Season 2 ) on Binary Vigilante’s Channel on YouTube [1]

• Achievement guide
• Advancement guide
• Best enchantments guide
• Breaking bedrock
• Complete main adventure
• Creating a village
• Downgrading
• Dual wielding
• End survival
• Exploring caverns
• Gathering resources on peaceful difficulty
• Getting food quickly
• Headless pistons
• Indestructible end crystals
• Measuring distance
• Minecraft in education
• Ancient Debris
• Nether portals
• Nether survival
• Organization
• Pillar jumping
• Spawn-proofing
• Summoning jockeys
• Time-saving tips
• Thunderstorm survival
• Units of measure
• X-ray glitches
• Acquiring a conduit
• Curing a zombie villager
• Defeating temples
• Defeating a village raid
• Defeating a Nether fortress
• Defeating a bastion remnant
• Defeating a monster room
• Defeating a pillager outpost
• Defeating a woodland mansion
• Defeating a monument
• Defeating an End city
• Defeating the Ender dragon
• Defeating the Wither
• Exploring an ancient city
• Obtaining every music disc
• Adding beauty to constructions
• Architectural terms
• Building a cruise ship
• Building a metropolis
• Building a rollercoaster
• Building safe homes
• Building water features
• Color palette
• Creating shapes
• Desert shelter
• Endless circling pool
• Glazed terracotta patterns
• Making nice floors
• Curved roofs
• Roof construction guidelines
• Roof decorations
• Secret door
• Settlement guide
• Underwater home
• Walls and buttresses
• Water-powered boat transportation
• Enchantment mechanics
• Anvil mechanics
• Automatic smelting
• Manual smelting
• Blast chamber
• Igniting TNT underwater
• Wither cage
• Playing on servers
• Multiplayer Survival
• Griefing prevention
• Joining a LAN world with alternate accounts
• Improving frame rate
• Minecraft help FAQ (IRC channel)
• Update Java
• Building micro shelters
• Custom texture packs
• Door-based iron golem farming
• How to get a crash report
• Installing mods
• Man-made lake
• Managing slimes in superflat mode
• Minecart booster
• Potion farming
• Repeater reboot system
• Survival with no enabled data packs
• Update LWJGL
• Update Minecraft
• Village chaining
• Water ladder
• ↑ right-clicking with a mouse or press-hold on touch screen
• 3 Smithing Template

Nether Calculator for Minecraft

Instructions.

• Build your nether portal in the overworld, but do not light it yet .
• Press F3 while inside your portal frame and note your portal's coordinates. Fill these overworld coordinates in in the calculator. The nether coordinates will automatically be calculated.
• Light your portal and go into the Nether
• Go to your coordinates in the Nether: (0,65,0) .
• Place a obsidian block on these coordinates
• Use the obsidian as the base of your portal, finish your portal and light it
• Important! Remove/disable your old portal you came through in step 3
• Go through your newly built portal in the nether at (0,65,0) . The portals should now be linked

Information

Introduction

Are you using nether portals a lot in your Minecraft world? This tool will help you with placing your nether portals in the correct places so that they correctly link. This Nether Calculator for Minecraft will convert Overworld coördinates to their corresponding Nether coordinates. This is done by dividing your coördinates by 8 (except for the Y-coördinate). These Nether Coordinates will tell you where to put your portal in the Nether so they will be linked up correctly.

How to calculate Nether coordinates in Minecraft?

You can calculate nether coordinates by dividing your overworld X and Z coordinates by 8. Your Y coordinate will stay the same. The Nether Portal Calculator will do the calculating for you so you will always have the correct coordinates. Check the instructions for the linking process.

Where are you in the nether when you are in the overworld at (700, 700, 700)?

For the x and z axis, you need to divide the overworld coordinates with eight. The y axis stays the same in the nether. If you calculate this you find out that (700, 700, 700) is at (87, 700, 87) in the nether.

Why can it be useful to link up portals in Minecraft?

In Minecraft, it can often be quite tiring to cover great distances in the overworld. By linking up portals, you can shorten your travel time significantly, because travelling 1 block in the Nether is equal to travelling 8 blocks in the overworld. This is really useful for having a quick way to get to your villages, strongholds and creations around your world. Follow the instructions above to know more about how you can link up your portals.

What is the purpose of Nether Calculator for Minecraft?

The purpose of this tool is to convert coordinates in Minecraft to Nether coordinates, and the other way around. It will also give you clear instructions on how to use these coördinates to link up portals in Minecraft. I created this tool because I found converting coördinates using a regular calculator inconvenient and because I found it hard to find the right instructions for linking up portals in Minecraft.

What is the size of a Nether Portal?

The minimum size of a nether portal is 4x5. The maximum size is 23x23. These sizes both include the border of the structure. You can build a nether portal in any size between these two sizes, as long as the shape is a rectangle.

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Nether Calculator

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Minecraft Guide to the Nether: World, mobs, loot and more

Filled with heat and hate, the Nether isn't a place to explore in blissful ignorance.

Ever since its fiery debut on Halloween nearly a decade ago, the Nether has been the closest rendition to Hell you've been able to find in Minecraft. Lakes and waterfalls of bubbling lava, swarms of hostile mobs, and shadowy fortresses towering above it all dominate the Nether's desolate landscape, leading to a place you don't want to visit without a little know-how. Much like the lava blanketing the floor of the Nether, we've got you covered.

Related: Everything you need to know about the Nether Update for Minecraft

Getting to the Nether

Fortunately, there's zero chance that you'll carelessly meander into the Nether one dark night. The Nether is essentially on another plane of existence, and you need to construct a Nether portal to travel there.

What is the Nether?

The Nether is a place entirely separate from the Overworld that you know and love in Minecraft. Gone are the varied and lush biomes, lively animals, and hidden secrets. Instead, you get a place built primarily out of netherrack, a dark red stone-like substance that is extremely flammable and burns for literally eternity if the fire isn't put out manually. On top of that, the Nether is filled with a myriad of waterfalls, lakes, rivers, and hidden underground pockets, all filled with lava.

The Nether is also notoriously convoluted to trek across, being a very vertical world with no rhyme or reason to the design of its multiple levels. If you're not overtly cautious (such as strategically placing torches at precise intervals), you risk becoming hopelessly lost in a world in which maps don't work, you can't sleep, and there's no consistent supply of food. Ouch.

If that wasn't enough, there's a large number of hostile mobs that will not hesitate to interrupt your innocent adventures with poison, arrows, swarms, and even exploding fireballs. These dangers and more combine to make the Nether a dangerous place, but it's not without reason. There are resources and materials you can only find in the Nether, as well as Nether fortresses that have potentially lucrative loot for you to discover.

There's also no day/night cycle in the Nether, so you can always expect to be cast in pseudo-darkness, meaning you can't sleep. In fact, trying to use a bed results in a massive explosion greater even than TNT, so do with that what you will. As mentioned before, maps and compasses also don't work and instead go haywire, which is helpful, and water instantly turns to steam. If you thought you were clever by bringing those buckets of water, the Nether is even more clever. Everything in the Nether wants you to die.

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Finally, distance is a little weird in the Nether. For every block you travel there, you actually travel eight blocks in the Overworld. That means if you build a second Nether portal separate from the one you used to get to the Nether, an identical portal will appear in the Overworld. It will also be miles away from the first one. In this aspect, the Nether could potentially be a useful way to travel vast distances quickly if you're willing to accept the risks and put in the time.

What can you find in the Nether?

There are several things to find and do in the Nether, including a bunch of Nether-exclusive blocks that are useful for potions, building, and more. Let's start with the naturally spawning blocks:

• Bedrock: An utterly indestructible block, even with TNT and diamond tools. Bedrock forms the lowest and highest layers of the Nether, creating an inescapable hell-prison around you.
• Gravel: The most infuriating of the blocks in the Overworld, it's no wonder gravel managed to find its way into the Nether.
• Netherrack: Burns indefinitely when it is set alight. It can be mined quickly with any pickaxe. It isn't very durable but can be useful for fireplaces, beacons, and other things that need light.
• Nether quartz: Drops Nether quartz, which is used in a variety of crafting recipes, including creating quartz pillars.
• Glowstone: Hangs in clusters from the roof of the Nether. It produces its light and can be broken without a tool. It drops glowstone dust when broken.
• Nether wart: Nether warts naturally spawn in blocks around stairwells within Nether fortresses. They can also be planted on soul sand, but growth can not be sped up by bone meal. It has three growth stages, fully grown being a thick cluster of red warts sprouting tall from the block. Useful for brewing potions.
• Soul sand: Slows down anything that walks on it, and can be used to grow nether warts and build Withers. It can be mined with or without tools, but spades are faster. The default texture has ghostly faces within it. Spooky.
• Nether brick: What Nether fortresses are constructed out of. Nether brick looks similar to stone bricks but is dark red. It's immune to Ghast fireballs and resists explosions, making it useful for defense. It can be mined with a pickaxe with a similar speed to stone.
• Nether brick fence: A fence constructed out of Nether brick and is also found in Nether fortresses. It has similar properties to Nether brick but behaves like any other fence or cobblestone walls.

Monsters of the Nether

The Nether is also home to its own suite of baddies, all of which possess unique attributes and attacks. If you couldn't tell, the Nether is a fun place. Here are all the mobs you can expect:

• Skeletons: One of the most common mobs found anywhere in Minecraft, skeletons fire ranged arrows at you. They drop bones, feathers, arrows, and occasionally bows and enchanted bows upon death.
• Endermen: Another mob that can be found elsewhere, endermen are passive and relatively rare. They move blocks around and generally prefer to stay out of the light. Endermen will attack if you look them in the eye, and can teleport instantaneously.
• Zombie pigmen: Zombie pigmen are Nether natives. They are one of the most common mobs found in the Nether and are often found wearing gold armor and weapons. These can be dropped on death, and equipped by the player. Zombie pigmen are usually passive, but if one of them takes damage from the player, every zombie pigmen in the area will immediately turn hostile and attack. On their own, they're not a huge threat, but a horde can quickly overwhelm even well-equipped players.
• Ghasts: Ghasts can spawn anywhere in the Nether if there's room for them to fly. They're one of the largest mobs you can find in Minecraft and can shoot explosive fireballs from a vast range away. Their fireballs can be batted back at them, and they are also vulnerable to ranged projectiles. They are immune to lava, and often take baths in it. They drop ghast tears, which are useful for potion brewing.
• Magma cubes: Magma cubes spawn anywhere in the Nether at any light level, but are more likely to generate within the Nether Fortress. They behave identical to regular slime, in that they have multiple "stages" in which they split into numerous, smaller copies when taking damage. There is also a possibility that on death, a magma cream will be dropped.
• Blazes: Blazes are found in the Nether fortresses. They have limited ability to fly and rapidly shoot small fiery projectiles. They may drop blaze rods on death, which are used in crafting and potion brewing. They often spawn out of spawners, so if you're not careful, you can easily be overwhelmed.
• Wither skeletons: Speedy and dangerous, wither skeletons take no prisoners. They most often spawn within Nether fortresses. These merchants of chaos can pick up and use dropped weapons and armor. Beyond that, they also deal a relatively large amount of damage and can "wither" you, meaning you'll take additional damage over time, and your hearts will turn black. Wither skeletons are easily amongst the most dangerous mobs you can find in the Nether and elsewhere. Wither skeletons have a small chance of dropping a wither skull upon death.

Outside of these naturally spawning mobs, there is one other hostile mob that can only be summoned with materials gathered in the Nether: the Wither. The Wither is a super powerful boss mob that should only be summoned if you're fully prepared to fight for your life. It is summoned similarly to iron golems, except with different materials. The player needs to gather four blocks of soul sand and arrange them in a "T" shape; then three wither skulls (collected from killing wither skeletons) arranged on top.

The Wither deals massive amounts of explosive damage, can destroy almost any block in the game, and has positively gargantuan health bar to accompany it. If you choose to go up against the wither, good luck. You'll need it. If you manage to kill the Wither, it does drop a nether star, which is a rare item used in creating beacons.

Nether fortresses

Nether fortresses are monuments that naturally occur in the Nether. They generally hold a lot of loot but are easy to get lost in due to their seemingly endless corridors, turns, and staircases. They are home to blazes, wither skeletons, and regular skeletons. The fortress is made of Nether blocks, and they sometimes have a tendency to spawn partially within netherrack. This can make finding the fortress slightly difficult, as outer exterior markers may be covered. There's also a decent chance of chests spawning within the corridors of a Nether fortress, and there's some good loot to be had if you find them. The list below is in order from least to most rare.

• Gold ingot: In almost half of Nether fortress chests you find, it's not as though gold is that hard to come by. It's a fairly common ore and can be found almost everywhere in the Overworld. Not precisely useless, though.
• Saddle: Used to ride horses, donkeys, mules, and pigs. It can be used as part of the When Pigs Fly achievement.
• Gold horse armor: Gives moderate defense to your horse. If you get armor, why not your horse?
• Nether wart: Nether warts naturally spawn in blocks around stairwells within Nether fortresses. They can also be planted on soul sand, but growth can not be sped up by bone meal. It has three growth stages, fully grown being a thick cluster of red warts sprouting tall from the block.
• Iron ingot: A common and abundant ore in the Overworld. It is used to build first-tier tools and weapons; it could be handy for crafting on the fly if you run out of materials to make stronger weapons.
• Diamond: A rare gem used to create the higher tier weapons and armor. Found in small pockets deep underground in the Overworld.
• Flint and steel: Can ignite Nether portals and most materials and animals.
• Iron horse armor: Provides less defense for your horse, but still a good idea to keep it safe.
• Golden sword: Strong but has low durability. Good to have as a spare, just in case.
• Golden chest plate: A decently strong chest plate, but not very durable.
• Obsidian: The hardest placeable block in Minecraft. Since this is the rarest block you can find in the Nether, this probably isn't the most efficient way of obtaining it.

Can you build in the Nether?

The answer is yes. Depending on how high your difficulty is set determines whether or not monsters will spawn within the Nether. If you're playing on peaceful, you can build to your heart's content. If you are playing on any other difficulty, you're at risk of attack while building.

The main enemy to watch out for as soon as you spawn into the Nether is a Ghast. Ghast fireballs can break your Nether portal, but you can build a cobblestone wall around it if you're worried. If you're unfortunate enough to spawn into the Nether in an open area, protecting your portal is the wisest option. Imagine getting stuck in the Nether after having summoned a Wither, and not being able to get back out. Since water turns to steam in the Nether, and Obsidian is so difficult to find in chests, if you didn't bring spares... RIP you.

Beware when mining into the netherrack if you're planning on building into the cliff faces. Lava blocks tend to spawn within netherrack clusters, so be prepared to block up any sudden lava appearances. Taking a Potion of Fire Resistance (or twelve) with you into the Nether is a good idea, as it protects against lava, fire, and blaze attacks. The only downside is it requires taking on magma cubes to get magma cream, so watch your fingers — things could get hot!

Keep in mind that it's not possible to permanently live in the Nether, though. Beds violently explode, and farming isn't very productive without water, so you'll always have to go back to the Overworld eventually. That said, it's still useful to have a base that you can run your Nether operation out of, and this could double as much-needed protection for your Nether portal. Wouldn't want to get stranded.

What's next for the Nether?

While it was a pretty substantial update when it was first released, the Nether hasn't changed all that dramatically since its debut. That's going to change in the future, however, as Microsoft and Mojang announced a pretty substantial update that will be arriving in the first half of 2020 next year. More biomes, more features, and more danger (of course).

Have you been to the Nether? Tell us about your experiences!

Zachary Boddy (They / Them) is a Staff Writer for Windows Central, primarily focused on covering the latest news in tech and gaming, the best Xbox and PC games, and the most interesting Windows and Xbox hardware. They have been gaming and writing for most of their life starting with the original Xbox, and started out as a freelancer for Windows Central and its sister sites in 2019. Now a full-fledged Staff Writer, Zachary has expanded from only writing about all things Minecraft to covering practically everything on which Windows Central is an expert, especially when it comes to Microsoft. You can find Zachary on Twitter @BoddyZachary .

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Visit the Nether!

Get familiar with the location of our next major update!

Do you ever wish for more out of your Minecraft life than simply mining and crafting ? Are you tired of seeing the same picturesque Overworld landscapes day in, day out? Bored to tears by the incessant mooing, bleating and adorable-ing of Minecraft’s cutest animals? Often dream of your relatively safe life suddenly becoming incredibly dangerous? On a scale from 1 to 10, how on fire is too on fire, for you?

Then step right up, for a life-changing opportunity!

Soothe your troubled soul with the trip of a lifetime to the not-at-all-troubled Nether dimension! It’s a treat for all the family (particularly fireproof families) with its heady mix of thrilling vistas, ancient fortress ruins, enthusiastic wildlife, and rich (only slightly hostile)  local culture. If you’re looking for a break from the daily grind of the Overworld, then you just found it! Warning: may contain literal break. Of you.

So before we release the upcoming Nether Update , treat yourself to a vacation to the current Nether , and learn more about Minecraft’s hottest holiday destination!

Honestly, we should just have the Minecraft Festival here.

SOUNDS GREAT! FLY ME THERE, FIRST CLASS!

Hold on, friend. Visiting the Nether doesn’t involve a lengthy plane flight or boat trip.. This is actually one of those special holidays where you have to build your own transport. Fun! All you’ll need are a dozen or so blocks of obsidian and a flint and steel, with which you’ll be building a portal.

You can make portals in all kinds of shapes and sizes, but if you’re low on resources then the simplest, smallest portal is a vaguely door-shaped frame with two blocks on both the bottom and top, and three blocks on the left and the right.

Hey, I’m helping you with portals, just like GLaDOS! Er, actually, don’t make that comparison.

Once you’ve constructed your mode of transportation, you’re going to need to light it on fire with the flint and steel. It may seem risky, but a little fire is just what we need to grease the wheels of interdimensional transportation, and you should see a translucent, purple, liquid-like substance filling the portal. Yuck! I mean, yay!

True, you’ll probably hear some, er, unique sounds coming from the portal too. But don’t worry, they could be anything. I like to think of them as a friendly “ahoy-hoy!” from several interdimensional beings that exist outside of time and space, screaming at you through your freshly weakened gap in reality. Ahoy-hoy to you too, friends!

Just step inside the frame, try not to throw up as your vision gets all blurry (all the best holidays start with the nausea of anticipation!), and wait for a moment as you’re violently flung between dimensions. Wheeeee!

WHAT YOU SHOULD PACK

First-time Nether travellers often find themselves ill-equipped to deal with the delights of their new home. They complain about the waterfalls of fire, the precipitous drops into oceans of lava, and the endless screaming/oinking of the local wildlife. But honestly, once you get used to those screamy sounds, you’ll find them more beautiful than birdsong. Possibly.

To fully appreciate the beauty of the Nether, it’s worth bringing a few things with you. Any seasoned traveller/sweater enthusiast knows it’s very important to dress in layers. In this case, I’m talking specifically about layers of iron or diamond armour . They’ll ensure that you’re insulated from at least some of the more deadly exciting experiences that you’ll encounter!

It’s also a good idea to bring a sword, bow, and arrows (in case you attract unwanted attention from the locals), a pickaxe (for collecting souvenirs) some of your favourite foods and a bowl (so you don’t get too homesick), your flint and tinder (to ensure your return ticket is still valid if for some strange reason you ever want to leave), and a stack or two of cobblestone (in case you fail to secure accommodation and need to build something in a hurry). Leave the rest of your possessions - especially anything valuable - in a chest at home. Or with me. Giving you a tour of this paradise doesn’t come cheap, y’know.

Getting Around

A common complaint we get from first time visitors to the Nether is “arghhh! My  extremely flammable body!”. The other common complaint we get is that it’s not easy to find your way around. Nonsense! It’s easy to navigate the Nether, so long as you keep a few lifehacks in mind. Mark your path by placing down blocks of cobblestone pretty regularly as you explore, so it’ll be easy to retrace your steps if you get lost (just like Hansel and Gretel! And it’s not like anything bad ever happened to them ).

If you’re feeling fancy, you can even make cobblestone arches that point you in the right direction. Some previous guests I’ve taken to the Nether have even built signs like GO THIS WAY and DO NOT TRUST THE TOUR GUIDE and SERIOUSLY, THE NETHER IS A DREADFUL PLACE AND HE’S LURING YOU INTO A TRA—actually, let’s move on.

See? Nothing to worry about.

Another handy tip for exploring the Nether is that if you hold down the “walk” key, you’ll never fall off a cliff. Sure, you don’t get anywhere very fast, but it’s nice to slow down once in a while, take a deep breath of the sulphurous air, and gaze across the beautiful fiery hellscape before you! It’s also a handy, if terrifying, way to build bridges over lava seas.

My final piece of travel advice for the Nether is to take care while tunnelling through netherrack . Lava in the nether is a bit more, er, free flowing than in the Overworld, and sometimes you’ll come across a seam of molten rock that gets a little too friendly. Avoid this by always digging tunnels two blocks wide, walking on one side and making sure that there’s a gutter on the other. That way, any lava you uncover will flow into the gutter and not into your shoes.

The first time I thought of this, I started jumping for joy! That ended very badly.

THINGS TO SEE

A myriad of exciting local flora and fauna await you on your adventures through the Nether. The first species that you’re likely to encounter are the zombie pigmen (now known as the zombified piglins ). What could be the mysterious origin of these undead oinkers? Mojang refuse to tell me, but I have my own theory: 

I believe a zombie and a pig wandered into a Nether portal at the same time.  The resulting fusion of the zombie’s tenacity and the pig’s natural inquisitiveness proved remarkably successful in the harsh environment of the Nether, and the species proliferated into the huge populations that it exists in today. I tried to recreate these conditions to prove this theory, by shoving a pig and a zombie into my portal, but I just ended up with a hot dog that groans a lot : (

Well hello there, handsome

Travellers should be aware that family ties among zombie pigmen are strong, and hurting one will likely attract the attention of other nearby pigmen. You have been warned!

Another common sight are magma cubes , which are rarely aggressive, but are extremely hot to the touch. We advise caution when walking near them, and especially when attacking them - chop them in half and the pieces will retain a mind of their own.

What’s that? You’re not enjoying this holiday tour? You’re bored of being on fire and attacked by cubes, and wish you’d booked that fancy high-tech spa weekend instead, the one with the ASMR? Buddy, we’ve got all the ASMR you’ll ever need down here!

Close your eyes for a moment in the Nether, and you’ll get to experience one of its most exquisite delights. The soundscape is unlike anything you’ll hear in the Overworld - a glorious blend of lava bubbling, zombie pigman chatter, and the occasional childlike shriek of one of the Nether’s most charismatic denizens - the Ghast .

Ghasts have been the undoing of many a traveller. They may look like just big, fluffy sad clouds, but they have a bit of a temper and have been known to spit fireballs at people they dislike. Give them a wide berth, and if you do attract their ire then the best approach is simply to hide behind something until they get bored and wander off. I use similar tactics when tourists demand refunds.

SEE THE SIGHTS!

The main hotspots in the Nether are its ancient, imposing fortresses. The stunning architecture of these fortresses makes them well worth a visit. But such a visit is not without danger - today, due to the ravages of time, the fortresses are filled with unexpected drops, dead ends, and a few unique, noteworthy creatures.

The most dangerous are Wither Skeletons, which gave up the bows of their Overworld cousins long ago in favour of swords coated with a toxic substance that can continue to cause pain for some time after a strike. You did get your shots that I never mentioned before entering the Nether, right? Oh dear.

The other hazard of Nether fortresses worth mentioning are the Blazes , which are sentient beings made of pure lava that fling fireballs at intruders. It’s theorised by scholars that the Blazes were created as guards by the original inhabitants of the fortresses. Some speculate that the builders lost control over their creations, and as a result were destroyed by them.

But don’t be put off by that! You’ll probably be fine. Probably. Where’s that form you had me sign, promising that you’d be perfectly safe on this trip? Er, I think the Blaze got it, sorry.

Where to Eat

The Nether’s up-and-coming culinary scene is still in its infancy, and as a result it can be hard for travellers to find a good place/anything to eat. It’s best to bring food with you, but in a pinch, it’s possible to harvest edible mushrooms and turn them into mushroom soup (with the aid of a bowl brought from home).

This hearty dinner has saved many a hungry traveller attempting to find their way back to their portal. Give me the rest of your soup, and I might even remind you where that portal is.

WHERE TO SLEEP

Here, at the Nether Tourist Board, we’re working hard to entice hoteliers to set up shop. Total amount of hoteliers persuaded so far? Pessimists would say ‘zero’ but as an optimist, I prefer to say ‘slightly less than one.’ 

So travellers may be tempted to bring their own bed, but we would strongly recommend against this. For some unknown reason, beds prove explosive in the Nether. Our scientists are working flat-out to understand why, but working flat-out is very tiring, and they inevitably put a bed down to get some rest and then they get to enjoy some very, er, permanent sleep.

Simply place the bed down, and you’ll soon enjoy...

...an explosion more powerful than TNT. Sweet dreams!

THAT’S IT, I’M GOING HOME

Wait, really? But we were having so much fun! OK, OK, put down the sword, I’ll show you out. When the time has come to travel home to the Overworld, it’s a simple matter of just stepping into your portal again, enduring the wobbly vision for a few seconds, and then stepping out on the other side. Home sweet home! Who removed all your emeralds from your chests while you were gone? This tour is over, bye!

Want to learn more about how the Nether will be even more cuddly and cosy in our upcoming Nether Update? Let Jens and Agnes take you through it in the video below:

We hope you enjoyed this surprisingly expensive tour of the Nether and hope to see you agai... hey, who smashed up my portal?

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