Slab

Slabs are half-versions of their respective blocks.

Obtaining
Stone-type slabs and smooth blocks require a pickaxe to mine. Wooden slabs can be mined with anything, but an axe is quickest.

Natural generation
Stone slabs can be found naturally in villages lining the roof of blacksmith shops and inside the Butcher's Shop and the Blacksmith where they form counters. They are also found in strongholds where they are used in some of the stairs, ledges and torch pillars. Sandstone slabs can be found naturally in desert villages, desert wells, and desert temples. Double stone slabs can be found in villages, in the butcher's shop and in blacksmiths. A spruce wood slab serves as a table in igloo basements. Oak, birch, spruce, stone and cobblestone slabs can also be found in woodland mansions.

Creative inventory
Smooth blocks can be found in Creative inventory.

Placement
Slabs can occupy either the top half or the bottom half:
 * Pointing at the top of a block or the bottom half one of its sides will place the slab in the lower half.
 * Pointing at the bottom of a block or the top half of its side will place the slab in the top half.

Slabs cannot be oriented sideways.

Behavior


Slabs are treated as a whole block by other blocks and liquids. Two slabs can be piled on top of one another to make a full-size block, but different slab types cannot be mixed in this way.

Double slabs are handled as a single block instead of two different slabs; as such, breaking one will destroy the whole block and drop two slabs, as opposed to only breaking one slab within the block. "Double slabs" that are not aligned to the grid (i.e. a bottom slab on top of a top slab) are handled as separate blocks and are broken individually.

Redstone can be connected to the wire on the side of the slabs. Redstone placed on top of an upside-down slab can receive signals from an adjacent block of redstone one block lower, but cannot transmit signals to it. This is why "ladders" made from upside-down slabs, as pictured to the right, can transmit redstone signals up, but not down.

Mobs see a slab as a full block. Mobs can also spawn on the tops of upside-down slabs and double slabs, but not on lower slabs.

In Bedrock Edition, mobs standing on right-side up slabs fail to pathfind correctly. They seem to perceive the slabs beneath them to be unwalkable, and will often end up spinning around in a small circle when they try to move. The block directly beneath the slab must be air or another right-side up slab to disturb pathfinding. Also in Bedrock Edition iron golems will not spawn on a slab even if it is the top half of a block.

Due to the way blast rays propagate from an explosion, bottom-half slabs provide extremely effective absorption to explosions directly on top of them.

Sneaking only reduces the player's hitbox height to 1.65 blocks, and so does not allow the player to walk over a single slab with one block of air above it, which is 1.5 blocks of space. A player cannot walk from a block of soul sand directly up to a slab without jumping – this applies not just to soul sand, but to any block $7/8$ of a block high or shorter, because the maximum step height of the player is 0.6 of a block. The player can walk off a slab while sneaking, because the sneaking only prevents falling when the distance is higher than one half block.

If a slab is placed underwater, the empty half of that slab's block will be waterlogged if the block it is in was a source block. If the slab is placed in flowing water upside down, not only can the player grab a quick breath of air there, but the player can see as clearly as if they were above the surface.

Minecarts on powered rails will not be repelled from a slab. They will, however, be repelled by a slab with a minecart on top.

Falling block entities (like sand, gravel, and concrete powder) will turn into their dropped form if they land on a slab, exactly like what occurs when they fall on a torch.

Slabs do not block light.

Fuel
Wooden slabs can be used as a fuel in furnaces, smelting 0.75 items per slab in the Java Edition and Legacy Console editions, and smelting 1.5 items per slab in Bedrock Edition.

Block data
In Bedrock Edition, slabs use the following data values:


 * Double stone slab


 * Double stone slab 2


 * Double stone slab 3


 * Double stone slab 4


 * Stone slab


 * Stone slab 2


 * Stone slab 3


 * Stone slab 4


 * Double wood slab


 * Wood slab

Video
Note: This video is outdated, as red sandstone slabs were added in 1.8, purpur slabs were added in 1.9, and prismarine slabs were added in 1.13.

Trivia

 * Slabs let a small amount of light pass through their edges. This light is only visible when Smooth Lighting is turned on, and does not affect mob spawning or other light-dependent processes.
 * The exception of this is that any light directed through a slab does not affect any block's light values north of the source.
 * Whereas 1x1 dents in a flat floor using slabs are darkened as one would expect, 1x1 dents created using 2x1 or 2x2 stairs will darken less, due to having fewer surrounding solid blocks. This is a completely intentional feature.
 * When water or lava are on top of an upside-down slab, the water dripping particles will appear in midair below the slab instead of from the slab itself, this was fixed in Java Edition 1.13-pre7, but is an intentional feature in Bedrock Edition.