Brewing

Brewing is the process of creating potions, splash potions and lingering potions by adding various ingredients to water bottles in a brewing stand.

Brewing potions
By placing one or more bottles in the lower three slots of the brewing interface, an ingredient in the upper slot, and blaze powder in the fuel slot, you can distill the ingredient into each bottle and brew potions which may be consumed to grant an effect to the player.

Every potion starts with a water bottle, made by filling a glass bottle at a water source or filled cauldron. Using blaze powder, the next step is to add a base ingredient to create a base potion, usually nether wart to create an awkward potion. By brewing an effect ingredient into the awkward potion in the same manner, you can create a potion with a working effect. A modifier ingredient may be added to make the effect more intense or last longer, or change the effect entirely. Gunpowder can be added to a potion at any stage to convert it to a splash potion, which can be thrown (or fired using a dispenser to disperse its effect in a radius. Finally, dragon's breath can be added to a splash potion to convert it to a lingering potion, which can be used to emit a cloud of the potions effect that can renew the effect (ex. Healing lingering potions will heal you more the longer you stand in the area of the cloud). Each brewing step takes 20 seconds.

Each piece of blaze powder used provides fuel for brewing 20 batches of potions. Fuel is consumed when a brewing operation starts; it is not recovered if the operation is halted prematurely by removing the ingredient or potion bottles.

Base ingredients and modifiers
Base ingredients are ingredients which can be added directly to a water bottle, and are the starting point of all potions. Nether Wart is the most fundamental of the base ingredients, as it is required to make the vast majority of potions.

Modifiers are ingredients used to alter the properties of a potion, or to change a potion effect into a different one. The fermented spider eye is unique in that it is the only modifier which can be brewed directly into an effective potion.

Corrupting Effect: Fermented Spider Eyes will change a potion's base effect, often reversing it or producing a negative potion.
 * A corrupted potion usually does the opposite of the original potion.
 * Corrupting an enhanced or extended potion into an effect which supports the modifier will result in a potion with the same modifier applied.
 * Corrupting an extended potion of Poison will simply result in a basic potion of Harming. Enhanced potions of Leaping or Swiftness cannot be corrupted.
 * Potions of Invisibility are considered a "corrupted" version of the Potions of Night Vision. Instead of seeing at maximum brightness, you turn invisible.

Splash and Lingering potions: Any potion can be turned into a splash potion, and subsequently, a lingering potion.
 * Splash potions and lingering potions can be modified in exactly the same manner as their normal counterparts. For instance, a splash water bottle can be brewed with any of the base ingredients, though the result will remain a splash potion.
 * In Bedrock Edition, splash potions have only three-fourths of the duration of the drinkable form. In Java Edition, splash and drinkable forms have the same duration.
 * Lingering potions have only one-fourth of the duration of the drinkable form. For instance, a drinkable potion effect of 8:00 will be reduced to 2:00 as a lingering potion.

Effect ingredients
Effect ingredients imbue an awkward potion with a particular effect, but do not alter potion duration or intensity. When added directly to a water bottle, most of these ingredients will produce a mundane potion. The exceptions to this are golden carrot, pufferfish, turtle shell and phantom membrane, which cannot be added directly to a water bottle. You must add netherwart in order to work.

Elements
In the Education Edition, or Bedrock Edition with Education features enabled, certain elements can be used as ingredients to brew medicine which remove specific negative status effects.

Base potions
Base potions are potions without effects, brewed by adding a single base ingredient to a water bottle. Of these, only the awkward potion can be imbued with an effect ingredient to produce a potion effect.

Effect potions
Effect potions are primarily created by adding an effect ingredient to an awkward potion, however, certain effects require a potion to be corrupted by a fermented spider eye. The potion of weakness can additionally be created by simply adding a fermented spider eye to a water bottle.

Cures
Cures are brewed from Awkward Potions using different elements. These drinks will remove the specified effect when drunk, and cannot be modified into splash, lingering, extended or enhanced versions.

Unbrewable potions
The Potion of Luck and the Potion of Decay cannot be brewed, and can only be obtained by commands such as, or through the creative inventory. A Potion of Slowness V is also available in the creative menu in Java Edition. You can get potions of decay in survival mode from the Cauldron in a Witch Hut.

Potion type history
Based on information found in minecraft.jar/lang/en_US.lang, the current potion types are listed below:

Due to changes in the brewing system, the following potions are currently not accessible:
 * Potion of Swiftness
 * Potion of Slowness
 * Potion of Strength
 * Potion of Weakness
 * Potion of Healing
 * Potion of Harming
 * Potion of Regeneration
 * Potion of Fire Resistance
 * Potion of Water Breathing
 * Potion of Poison
 * Potion of Night Vision
 * Potion of Invisibility
 * Potion of Leaping
 * Potion of the Turtle Master
 * Potion of Slow Falling


 * Potion of Haste
 * Potion of Dullness
 * Potion of Nausea
 * Potion of Blindness
 * Potion of Hunger
 * Potion of Decay
 * Potion of Resistance

Some potions also do not have a real name in minecraft (i.e. Potion of potion.healthBoost.postFix) and are currently not accessible


 * Potion of potion.healthBoost.postFix
 * Potion of potion.absorption.postFix
 * Potion of potion.saturation.postFix

Trivia

 * As long as at least one of the three bottom spaces is filled, the brewing will continue, and additional bottles of water or potion can be added. However, if the ingredient is removed, or the bottom 3 slots are emptied at any time during the process, the process will stop and nothing will have been brewed.
 * The three potions do not necessarily have to be the same.
 * Upgrading the effect of a potion that has no time parameter (i.e. Instant Health, Harming) with glowstone dust has no downsides.
 * Upgrading the time of a potion that has no level II effect (i.e. Fire Resistance, Slowness, Weakness) with redstone has no downsides.
 * Although Jeb said that in the 1.9 pre-release 3 there were 161 possible different potion combinations with 2,653 in the future, in the actual third pre-release only 22 different potions could be made without the use of external programs. Of those, 19 potions had one of 8 different effects.
 * There are many Potions that were left behind from 1.9 pre-releases that fill up different metadatas that otherwise cannot be brewed or obtained without a multiplayer server command or inventory editor. These potions include but are not limited to: Bungling Potion, Buttering Potion, Debonair Potion, Refined Potion.
 * More water can be taken to the Nether in one trip by filling water buckets, carrying a stack of glass bottles, and using a cauldron. This is because stackable glass bottles do not stack once they have been filled with water.
 * Undead mobs (zombies, skeletons, zombie pigmen, and Withers) are unaffected by splash potions of poison and regeneration, take damage from instant health splash potions, and gain health from instant damage.
 * By modifying the item NBT using an editor or commands, it is possible to get a potion that cannot be upgraded into a splash potion.