Trading

The trading system is a gameplay mechanic that allows players to trade emeralds for items (and vice-versa) with villagers and wandering traders.

Mechanics
Pressing on an adult villager with a workstation, or a wandering trader, opens a GUI, allowing a player to trade with the villager or wandering trader. Villagers make offers based on their profession trading either emeralds for items or items for emeralds. Wandering traders offer only to sell items for emeralds. All transactions involve emeralds.

A villager offers to buy or sell items pertinent to the villager's career. Trading with a villager is also the only legitimate method of acquiring the globe banner pattern and woodland and ocean explorer maps in Survival mode.

Different professions are assigned to each villager based on their job-site block. This profession is indicated by their appearance and in the trading interface. A villager's profession dictates the trading pool used to determine its trades. For example, villagers wearing straw hats are farmers, so their trades are based on the Farmer trade pool.

Villagers have five career levels that can be increased by trading with them. Each villager starts at the "novice" level. A villager's level can be seen in the trading GUI. The level can also be identified by the badge they wear: stone for a novice, iron for an apprentice, gold for a journeyman, emerald for expert, and diamond for master. When a villager levels up, it gains up to two new trades, along with keeping their old ones. A villager can gain experience when trading with a player and levels up when the villager's experience bar becomes full. Additionally, a villager receives regeneration and becomes surrounded by purple and green particles for a few seconds. Each profession unlocks a pre-defined and finite set of offers.

Novice villagers who have not traded can lose their profession and change back into unemployed villagers. This can occur if their claimed job site block is removed and no unclaimed job site block is available. Removing and then replacing a job site block can alter the trades offered, and a villager with no experience resets its trades every so often. Once a player trades with a villager, the villager keeps its profession forever, locking its offered trades.

Villagers deactivate an offer after the offer has been used some times. The number of trades before an offer's deactivation is different for each item (see tables below). When villagers work at their job site blocks, they activate their offers again, up to twice per day. When an offer is disabled, a red "X" appears in the trading interface, and the villager displays the same particle effect as an offer being created.

All villager trades reward the player with 3–6 experience, or 8–11 experience if the villager is willing to breed. Wandering trader trades also reward some player experience.

Economics
$$, villagers can have a maximum of 10 trades. Each level unlocks a maximum of two new trades. If a level can pull from more than two trades, the two offered trades are chosen randomly from the set.

$$, villagers have 8–10 trade slots. Some slots with multiple possible trades display only one trade; for example, farmer villagers have 4 potential trades in their first trade slot, so each trade has a $1/4$ chance to be chosen.

Each trade can be used a maximum number of times, after which the trade becomes disabled. Once trades are disabled, villagers must work at their corresponding job site block to resupply their trades.

The price of an item rises and falls depending on three factors. Items with a high price multiplier (0.2) are affected by these changes more than items with a low multiplier (0.05). All price fluctuations affect only the first item involved in a trade; for example, for an initial trade of 32 sticks for 1 emerald, the price might be driven down to 1 stick or up to 64 sticks for 1 emerald, but never for 2 emeralds. Additionally, no quantity can go lower than 1 or higher than the stack size.

The first factor is demand. An item that was sold out gets a price increase for all players when resupplied. If a player does not trade for a higher-priced item, the price is reduced the next time villager resupplies. Demand is tracked per item, not per villager, so a villager can offer a higher-priced trade for a single item while other items are cheaper. Trades that have a price multiplier of 0 are not affected by demand.

The second way to affect prices is the Hero of the Village effect, which temporarily reduces prices for the affected player depending on the level of the effect.

Finally, players get personal discounts or fines based on their reputation with that particular villager. Positive reputation is gained by curing zombie villagers (the villager that was cured gives permanent discount much larger than the temporary discount in nearby villagers). To cure a zombie villager, a player must splash it with a splash potion of weakness and then feed it a golden apple. The permanent discount is capped at 5 cures, while the temporary discount is capped at 8 cures. $$, players can also gain negative reputation by hitting or killing villagers, and positive reputation by trading.

When a player trades with a villager, both the player and the villager gain experience. A villager levels up when its experience bar becomes full, unlocking new trade tiers (while keeping their old trades) and changing their badge. Villagers have 5 levels:

Nitwit
Nitwits are green-coated villagers. They cannot trade,

Unemployed
Villagers without job overlays are unemployed and cannot trade. They wear biome outfits without a profession overlay. An unemployed villager gains a profession by claiming an unclaimed job site block. For example, an unclaimed cartography table converts an unemployed villager into a cartographer when the villager claims it. If a player attempts to trade with an unemployed villager $$, the villager grunts and shakes its head.

Armorer
Job site block: Blast Furnace

Butcher
Job site block: Smoker

Cartographer
Job site block: Cartography Table

Cleric
Job site block: Brewing Stand

Farmer
Job site block: Composter

Fisherman
Job site block: Barrel

Fletcher
Job site block: Fletching Table

Leatherworker
Job site block: Cauldron

Librarian
Job site block: Lectern

Shepherd
Job site block: Loom

Stone Mason
Job site block: Stonecutter

Toolsmith
Job site block: Smithing Table

Weaponsmith
Job site block: Grindstone

Armorer
Job site block: Blast Furnace

Butcher
Job site block: Smoker

Cartographer
Job site block: Cartography Table

Cleric
Job site block: Brewing Stand



Farmer
Job site block: Composter

Fisherman
Job site block: Barrel

Fletcher
Job site block: Fletching Table

Leatherworker
Job site block: Cauldron

Librarian
Job site block: Lectern

Mason
Job site block: Stonecutter

Shepherd
Job site block: Loom

Toolsmith
Job site block: Smithing Table

Weaponsmith
Job site block: Grindstone

Wandering trader sales


Unlike other villagers, the wandering trader does not buy items in exchange for emeralds – it only sells items, using emeralds as a currency. Therefore, the leftmost column of the following tables is how many emeralds the player needs to receive the items listed in the middle column of the table.

Bedrock Edition sales
$$, wandering traders sell 6 random trades. Their trades are unaffected by demand.

Five of the random trades are shown in the table below:

The other random trade is shown below (these items are chosen for each wandering trader and always offered but only one of them):

Java Edition sales
The wandering trader offers five random trades from the list below.

The other random trade is chosen from the table below. It is always the wandering trader's final trade offer.

Video
Video by slicedlime:

Trivia

 * Right-clicking on a villager or wandering trader pauses that villager's or wandering trader's pathfinding.
 * If a villager takes damage while trading, the trading GUI closes.
 * $$, while inside the trading GUI, an emerald appears above the villager's or wandering trader's head.