Java Edition 1.15

1.15, the first release of Buzzy Bees, is a major update to Java Edition released on December 10, 2019. It added bees and bee-related items, such as beehives, honey bottles and honeycombs. Alongside adding bees, this update focused on fixing bugs and improving performance, as well as adding numerous features that were originally Bedrock Edition exclusives.

Blocks

 * Beehives


 * Can be crafted using 6 planks and 3 honeycombs.
 * Can house bees.
 * Fills up with honey.
 * The amount of honey in the beehive increases as bees gather nectar and return to their hive.
 * The player can harvest honeycombs and honey bottles from the hive shears and glass bottles respectively.
 * If the player breaks or harvests honey from the hive, the bees will become hostile on the player.
 * Bees inside the hive will not turn hostile if it is harvested with Silk Touch, but bees outside the hive will.
 * Bees will not turn hostile if there is a lit campfire or fire underneath the hive when honeycombs or honey bottles are harvested.
 * Is a block entity and cannot be pushed by pistons.
 * When instantly in Creative mode, they will drop as an item if they contain any bees.


 * Bee nests
 * Spawn naturally in flower forests, plains, and sunflower plains biomes.
 * Functions the same as beehives, but requires Silk Touch to be collected.


 * Honey block
 * Can be crafted with 4 honey bottles.
 * The bottles are not consumed and will remain in the crafting grid.
 * Stickier than slime blocks:
 * Players' height is drastically reduced.
 * Players walk very slow and cannot on them.
 * Effect also works through non-full blocks like carpets and slabs.
 * When a honey block is pushed or pulled by a piston, it attempts to move all adjacent blocks in the same direction.
 * Works the same way as slime blocks.
 * Honey blocks do not stick to slime blocks.
 * If an entity is on a honey block that is pushed by a piston, the entity will be moved with the honey block.
 * Entities touching the side of a honey block slide down slowly.
 * Landing on a honey block reduces fall damage.
 * Fall damage is cut to about $1/5$ of normal: equal to, or in other words, $1/5$ of  for every block fallen after the first 3, rounded up.
 * Mobs will usually avoid walking on them.
 * Does not conduct redstone signals.
 * Bees will occasionally 'eat' from them if near beehives or bee nests.


 * Honeycomb block
 * Can be crafted with 4 honeycombs.
 * Are purely decorative.

Items

 * Honey bottles
 * Obtained by a bottle on beehives/nests with a  of 5.
 * Restores and 1.2 saturation.
 * Removes the Poison effect when consumed.
 * Can be crafted into sugar and honey blocks.
 * Stack up to 16.


 * Honeycombs
 * Obtained by shears on beehives/nests with a  of 5.
 * Can be used to craft beehives and honeycomb blocks.


 * Spawn eggs
 * Bee spawn egg.

Mobs

 * Bees
 * Have health.
 * Live in groups near hives and nests.
 * If a bee does not have a home nest, it will wander until it finds one.
 * Can hide inside hives.
 * Maximum of 3 bees per nest.
 * Are neutral mobs.
 * When attacked, all bees from the same hive try to attack the original attacker.
 * The same happens when their hive or nest is.
 * a campfire or lighting fire under the nest will make the bees passive.
 * Have an data tag, which defaults to zero.
 * When the bee is attacked, this tag is set to around 700 ticks.
 * When they attack, they give poison to the target for 10 seconds and then they die 50–60 seconds after attacking.
 * When in an angry state, their eyes are red.
 * Affected by the Bane of Arthropods enchantment.
 * Can be bred using any type of flower, including wither roses.
 * They will follow any player holding a small flower.
 * If the player holds still the bees will hover around them.
 * Will hover around flowers and will enter a "pollinated" state after some time. When pollinated, pale white particles will come off them. The bee will also have its texture changed to include dots similar in color to the pollen particles.
 * Bees will try to pollinate wither roses despite the fact that they are harmed by the wither effect they give.
 * When they pollinate flowers a small popping noise is heard.
 * Will return to their nest after entering the "pollinated" state.
 * A pollinated bee can accelerate the growth of crops and sweet berry bushes it passes.
 * After enough bees enter a bee nest in the pollinated state, the bee nest will be filled with honey.
 * Will try to avoid water.
 * Being killed by a bee sting results in new death message: " was stung to death".

Command format

 * Can now use  as a source or target, which is general purpose, key/value storage.
 * Each storage is identified by a distinct namespaced ID.
 * Storage is shared between all dimensions in a world.
 * Data in storage persists between on world close.
 * Data in storage persists between on world close.


 * Added subcommand.
 * Evaluates custom predicates, defined in the  directory of a datapack.
 * Added subcommand.
 * Stores the command result to the storage target for the command.
 * Stores the command result to the storage target for the command.


 * Added new optional syntax.
 * Defaults to.
 * Added new syntax to remove existing schedules.
 * Returns the number of removed schedules.
 * Extended to allow scheduling the same function multiple times.
 * Extended to allow scheduling the same function multiple times.


 * Syntax is.
 * – the target entity to spectate.
 * If omitted, makes the player stop spectating.
 * – the player that should spectate the target.
 * Must be in spectator mode.
 * If omitted, @s (the executing player) is used.
 * If omitted, @s (the executing player) is used.


 * clickEvent
 * Added  action.


 * Entity selectors
 * New selector parameter  allows applying custom predicates, defined in the   directory of a datapack.


 * Gamerules
 * Whether phantoms can spawn in the nighttime.
 * Players respawn immediately without showing the death screen.
 * Whether the player should take damage when drowning.
 * Whether the player should take fall damage.
 * Whether the player should take fire damage.
 * Whether the player should take damage when drowning.
 * Whether the player should take fall damage.
 * Whether the player should take fire damage.
 * Whether the player should take fire damage.
 * Whether the player should take fire damage.


 * Loot tables
 * Loot table predicates can now be defined in separate files and used for entity selectors and in execute if command.
 * Added new parameters to the  condition.
 * ,,   – optional offsets to location.
 * Added.
 * Includes condition defined in predicates directory of datapack, selected with name parameter.
 * Added  condition.
 * Checks day time.
 * – range of accepted values.
 * – if present, time will be modulo-divided by this value (for example, if set to 24000, value will operate on a time period of days).
 * New function:
 * – Copies state properties from block to  in dropped item.
 * Parameters:
 * – source of properties (block ID).
 * – list of property names. All must be present on block.

Gameplay

 * Advancements
 * Added "Sticky Situation" for jumping into a honey block, breaking a player's fall.
 * Advancement trigger:
 * Placed in the Adventure tab.
 * Added "Bee Our Guest" for safely collecting honey from a beehive using a campfire.
 * Advancement trigger:
 * Placed in the Husbandry tab.
 * Added "Total Beelocation" for moving a bee nest with 3 bees inside using Silk Touch.
 * Advancement trigger:
 * Placed in the Husbandry tab.


 * Controls
 * and inputs can now be switched between Hold and Toggle mode in the Accessibility Options.
 * Allows players to stay sneaked while opening different GUIs.
 * Also affects flying down in creative mode. When toggled, the player will keep going down until toggled again.

General

 * Entity predicate
 * Now accepts  field, which checks player properties.
 * Fails when entity is not player.
 * Fields:
 * – range of allowed player levels.
 * – same values as command.
 * – list of statistics to match. Entry fields: (like ),  (like ) and  (an integer range).
 * For example,  will succeed if the player has used fishing rods a total of 2 through 10 times; more or less will fail.
 * – map of recipe IDs. Boolean value tells if it should or should not be known to player.
 * – map of advancement IDs. If value is a boolean, checks if advancement is done. If value is an object, checks completion of criterions.
 * Entity predicate now accepts  field, which matches team name.


 * Languages
 * Added Yiddish language.


 * Location predicate
 * Predicate now accepts  and   sub-predicate.
 * Fields:
 * – exact block ID to match.
 * – exact fluid ID to match.
 * – block/fluid ID to match.
 * – matcher for block entity NBT (only for blocks).
 * – map of name/value properties. Value can be integer, boolean or string or object with optional min and max properties.
 * Predicate now accepts the  sub-predicate.
 * Object has one integer range –  – that matches visible light (maximum value of sky-darkening and block light).


 * Predicates
 * Added custom predicates.
 * The condition part of loot tables can now be defined as separate data pack resource in  directory.


 * Particles
 * New particles:.


 * Splashes
 * Added 3 new splash text:
 * "In case it isn't obvious, foxes aren't players."
 * "Buzzy Bees!"
 * "Minecraft Java Edition presents: Disgusting Bugs"


 * Statistics
 * Added statistics for anvil and grindstone interaction counts.


 * Tags
 * Added block tags.
 * Added entity tags.
 * Added item tag.
 * Added new block tag.

Blocks

 * Bells
 * Will now ring if powered with a redstone signal.


 * Campfires
 * Can now be extinguished with a shovel.


 * Composters
 * Now crafted with wooden slabs (like in Bedrock Edition), instead of fences and wooden planks.


 * Dark prismarine
 * Now crafted from black dye instead of ink sacs.


 * Dispensers
 * Can now harvest honeycombs when dispensing shears on bee nests and beehives filled with honey.
 * The honeycomb items will be dropped on the ground.
 * Can now collect honey bottles when dispensing glass bottles on beehives.
 * Can now collect water bottles when dispensing glass bottles on water.
 * Can now place down armor stands.
 * Fire charges launched from a dispenser now light campfires.
 * Firework rockets dispensed from a dispenser now travel in the direction they were fired.


 * End stone bricks
 * Now have a hardness of 3.
 * Now have a blast resistance of 9.


 * Farmland
 * Blocks that can be manually on farmland without turning it into dirt can now also be pushed into (the space above) it by a piston without turning the farmland under the block the piston has pushed into dirt.


 * Iron doors
 * Must now be with a pickaxe for it to be dropped as an item.


 * Large ferns
 * Now drop wheat seeds.


 * Melon stems and pumpkin stems
 * Attached stems now drop their seeds again when broken.


 * Rails
 * Now places facing the player, rather than always north~south.


 * Redstone comparators
 * Can now detect how much honey is inside beehives and bee nests.
 * The output strength is equal to the amount of honey in the hive.


 * Scaffolding
 * Increased scaffolding burn time when used as fuel in a furnace to be able to smelt 2 items, rather than 0.25.


 * Stripped wood
 * Can now be crafted out of stripped logs.


 * Wet sponges
 * Now dry out when in the Nether.

Items

 * Boats
 * When used as fuel, one boat now smelts 6 items in a furnace, blast furnace, or smoker instead of 1.


 * Spawn eggs
 * Drowned, husk, zombie, zombie pigmen, and zombie villager spawn eggs can be used on adult versions of these mobs to spawn baby variants.

Mobs

 * General
 * Mobs are now better at avoiding walking through lava.


 * Ender dragons
 * Removed a black dot on the transparent parts of wing texture.
 * Removed texture for part of wing bottom in the exploding ender dragon.


 * Foxes
 * Foxes now spawn in all taiga biome variants.


 * Iron golems
 * Now use the attribute.
 * Now starts cracking upon losing health.
 * A sound plays on every cracking stage.
 * There are 4 stages, from uncracked to fully cracked, before the golem dies.
 * Can be healed iron ingots.
 * A sound plays each time the golem is repaired.
 * One iron ingot restores.
 * It takes 4 iron ingots to repair an iron golem from 1 HP to full health.


 * Magma cubes, ocelots, and slimes
 * Now use the attribute.


 * Parrots
 * Can now sit on a player's shoulder even when the player is riding an entity.
 * Can no longer imitate endermen, polar bears, wolves, and zombie pigmen.


 * Spawning
 * When breedable mobs in groups spawn naturally they will now sometimes spawn babies in the groups.
 * Has a 5% chance for foxes, cows, sheep, pigs, and chickens, and a 10% chance for wolves, llamas, and horses.


 * Villagers
 * Nitwit villagers no longer have a leveling gemstone in their belt.

Non-mob entities

 * Dragon Fireballs
 * The texture has been changed, which now resembles the fire charge texture after the Texture Update.


 * Experience orbs
 * Experience orbs now appear at the same spatial and temporal location as loot when an entity is killed.
 * Now render as translucent again.

World generation

 * Trees
 * Birch trees generate in the dark forest biome once again.


 * Sweet berry bushes
 * Now spawn in the giant tree taiga biome.


 * Internal
 * Massive upgrade to the creation system of generation features.
 * For example, it makes it easier for modders to implement custom features.

Command format

 * The command now defaults to  if no  argument is given.
 * The command now defaults to  if no  argument is given.


 * The first parameter now defaults to if no  argument is given.
 * The first parameter now defaults to if no  argument is given.


 * NBT components
 * Added NBT text component variant for NBT storage:.

Gameplay

 * Advancements
 * Item predicate in advancements now makes a distinction between actual enchantments and stored enchantments, like ones stored in enchanted books.
 * is used to match stored enchantments.
 * Bees can now be bred to unlock the "The Parrots and the Bats" advancement.
 * Bees are now required for the "Two by Two" advancement.
 * Honey bottles are now required for the "A Balanced Diet" advancement.
 * Spectral arrows can now be used to unlock the "Take Aim" advancement.


 * Controls
 * Elytra can now start to glide immediately after jumping (while rising), not only during the descent of the jump.


 * Food
 * All foods are now edible in creative mode, including cake.


 * Hardcore mode
 * Hardcore game worlds now prompt to return to the menu on the death screen.


 * Recipe book
 * The composter recipe now unlocks with wooden slabs instead of wooden fences.
 * Many recipes changed to only require one material instead of nine to unlock.
 * The recipes affected are:


 * width=175 | || width=175 |  || width=175 |
 * }
 * Many recipes for items that are crafted by placing one of the above blocks in a crafting table no longer unlock when the player has nine of the material.
 * The recipes affected are:
 * }
 * Many recipes for items that are crafted by placing one of the above blocks in a crafting table no longer unlock when the player has nine of the material.
 * The recipes affected are:
 * }
 * Many recipes for items that are crafted by placing one of the above blocks in a crafting table no longer unlock when the player has nine of the material.
 * The recipes affected are:
 * }
 * Many recipes for items that are crafted by placing one of the above blocks in a crafting table no longer unlock when the player has nine of the material.
 * The recipes affected are:


 * width=175 | || width=175 |  || width=175 |
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }
 * }


 * Sleeping
 * Setting the respawn point by using a bed now shows the message "Respawn point set" in chat.
 * If a player tries to sleep in a bed that is occupied by a villager, the villager is now kicked out of the bed.
 * Trying to sleep during the daytime will now set the player's spawn location to that bed.


 * Status effects
 * Instant Damage
 * Added an effect sprite.
 * Instant Health
 * Added an effect sprite.
 * Saturation
 * Added an effect sprite.


 * Trading
 * Librarians now sell one bookshelf for nine emeralds, instead of three bookshelves for six emeralds.

General

 * Block models
 * Inventory models are now brighter than before.


 * Chunk format
 * Biome information now is stored in sixty-four 4×4 arrays, allowing biomes to be changed based on height; previously, biome values corresponded to only the X and Z coordinates.
 * The array in the  tag for each chunk now contains 1024 integers instead of 256. Each number in the array is the biome for a 4x4x4 volume in the chunk. These 4×4×4 volumes are arranged by Z, then X, then Y. That is, the first 4×4 values in the array are for the 16×16 chunk, at Y levels 0–3, the next 4×4 is for Y levels 4–7, etc.


 * Data packs
 * Updated data pack version to 5.


 * Debug screen
 * The "chunk updates" counter on the second line no longer appears.


 * Floating-point precision


 * The floating-point precision used for the location of where certain particles and entities appear has increased to 64-bit (double-precision), from 32-bit (single-precision).
 * This fixes many issues regarding certain types of particles and entities not appearing at the right places when far away from the center of the world, especially beyond 16,777,216 blocks. The following list includes instances that are known and confirmed to be fixed:
 * Particles
 * Fishing particles
 * Squid ink particles
 * End gateway particles
 * Conduit particles
 * Impact particles when entity has fallen from height on to block
 * Sweeping attack particles
 * Damage heart particles
 * Particles appearing when using the command
 * Mycelium particles
 * Underwater particles
 * Nether portal particles
 * End portal particles
 * Brewing stand particles
 * Spawner particles
 * Barrier particles
 * Armor stand breaking particles
 * Particles for suspended blocks affected by gravity, such as sand and gravel.
 * Entities
 * Primed TNT entities
 * Block entities
 * The floating book above placed enchanting tables is now correctly rotated towards the direction of where a nearby player is at high coordinates.


 * Font
 * Modified the font file to change the texture of characters  (Eszett) and  (beta).


 * Game library updates
 * Minecraft now requires OpenGL 2.0.


 * Loot tables
 * Entities are now set for block loot tables in some cases where it was not previously.


 * Menu screen
 * Changed title screen panorama to an image which includes new 1.15 features such as bees and bee nests.
 * Descriptions under buttons on the "Create World" screen are now narrated.


 * Narrator
 * Command suggestions are now narrated if the narrator is turned to system or all.


 * Nether portals
 * Nether portals in the overworld will now correctly link with portals placed in the top half (128–255) of the Nether dimension.


 * Obfuscation maps
 * Are now published with all future versions of the game, including this one.
 * Does not change the existing restrictions on what may or may not be done with game code or assets.
 * Links to the obfuscation mappings are included as part of the version's accompanying .json file.


 * Options
 * The biome blend setting has moved and now has descriptions per setting value.
 * The biome blend setting is now shown in the debug overlay.


 * Performance
 * Tweaked chunk loading calculations.
 * Improved chunk rendering.
 * Optimized explosions.
 * Vertically moving particles now perform better when colliding with blocks.
 * Other performance improvements.


 * Player animation
 * Added the hand use animation for players in first-person and third-person perspectives when performing the following actions:
 * Making tamed wolves, cats or parrots sit or stand
 * Breeding animals
 * Shearing animals
 * Activating redstone ore
 * Dyeing mobs
 * Filling and emptying buckets
 * Placing boats
 * Throwing projectiles
 * Dropping items from the hotbar
 * Using spawn eggs on adult mobs to spawn baby mob variants
 * Using spawn eggs on water
 * Placing lily pads (was only missing in third-person)
 * Curing zombie villagers
 * Feeding pandas
 * Redundant hand use animations have been removed from the following actions:
 * Trying to place paintings in invalid positions
 * Trying to use active buttons
 * Trying to ring bells from angles they can't be used from
 * Trying to eat cake when hunger bar is full
 * Right clicking on fences; this also prevented blocks from being placed on fences from the offhand
 * Right clicking on flower pots with incompatible items


 * Resource packs
 * The resource pack version is now 5.
 * The game now tries to convert some of version 4 resource packs' outdated texture mechanics to the new mechanics.
 * Increased the size limit for the client-side downloading of resource packs from 50 MB to 100 MB.


 * Tags
 * Removed  block tag.


 * Text
 * Tweaked contrast for text colors.


 * Textures
 * Changed texture map for all chests.
 * Banner patterns now use the alpha channel instead of black.
 * Shield pattern textures now use alpha level for determining what gets the color, instead of the brightness.
 * The ender dragon no longer has a separate texture for the bottom of its wing.
 * The glint texture for enchanted items now appears like it does in-game.
 * Made textures for the Java Edition 1.13 panorama menu background 1×1 pixels.
 * Removed textures for customized world type preset icons, except Isles.


 * UI
 * Changed appearance of highlighted buttons used in menu screen and similar UIs.
 * Highlighted buttons now have a white outline.
 * Highlighted buttons no longer have a blue tint on them. Instead, they are now only slightly brighter than unhighlighted buttons.
 * Highlighted buttons now have white text on them instead of yellow.

Trailer
A trailer for the update was released on December 11, 2019. Similarly, this trailer was made by Mojang themselves instead of Hat Films, similar to the 4 previous trailers.

Showcases
Videos made by slicedlime:

Trivia

 * Wax Block.png Crystallized Honey.png Unused textures for a "wax_block" and a "crystallized_honey" item could be found in the game files during development of 1.15; these were added accidentally and were removed in snapshot 19w42a.
 * 1.15 is the first major release update to come out in December since Beta 1.0 was released in 2010.
 * 2019 was the first year that two major Java updates, 1.14 and 1.15, were released in a single year since 2016.
 * 1.15 is also the first major update to focus mostly on bug fixes and performance improvements.