Trident

"If you don't want to throw it away permanently, then you should invest in Loyalty. This common enchantment makes your trident come back to you. Riptide, which makes you lunge with your trident when you throw it (as long as you're in water, or it's raining) is also well worth seeking out!"

- Tom Stone

A trident is a spear-like weapon that can be used in melee or ranged combat.

Obtaining
Tridents are not craftable. They must be picked up as a drop from a killed drowned.

Drowned
15% of drowned in Bedrock Edition, and 6.25% in Java Edition, spawn with a trident of random durability as their natural weapon, and they have an 8.5% chance of dropping the trident (increasing by 1% with each level of Looting). Drowned can also drop a trident as one of its normal drops. The trident has a 11% chance, 13% chance with Looting I, 15% chance with Looting II, and 17% chance with Looting III of dropping itself.

In Bedrock Edition and Console, a zombie converted to a drowned has a chance of carrying a trident that can be dropped. In the Java Editions, only naturally-spawned drowned can spawn with a trident or have a chance of dropping one.

A trident dropped by a drowned can be enchanted.

Thrown tridents
Tridents thrown onto the ground by a player can be picked up. However, tridents thrown by drowned cannot be picked up.

Drowned
15% of drowned in Bedrock Edition, and 6.25% in Java Edition, spawn with a trident as its natural weapon. It throws the trident at its opponent every 1.5 seconds, dealing damage in normal difficulty. A drowned can throw unlimited tridents, and these tridents cannot be picked up by the player.

A villager can be turned into a zombie villager if it is killed by a trident thrown by a drowned: the chance of conversion is 0% on Easy difficulty, 50% on Normal and 100% on Hard and Hardcore.

In Bedrock Edition, a drowned can use the trident's melee attack if its target is within three blocks. The melee attack deals damage.

Melee attack
Pressing while holding a trident deals damage to both mobs and players. In Java Edition, tridents deal more base melee damage than an unenchanted diamond sword. In Bedrock Edition, tridents deal more base melee damage.

Ranged attack
Pressing and holding while holding a trident charges the trident. When released at full charge, the trident is thrown and deals damage to any entity that it hits. It flies on a ballistic trajectory similar to that of an arrow, but at 80% strength. If the trident hits a block, it sticks to the block, and if it hits an entity, it bounces and lands nearby. It is also blocked by shields, and can be retrieved once it lands in the ground. Thrown tridents can press wooden buttons and pressure plates. A trident can be thrown at a chorus flower to break it, which causes the chorus flower to be dropped as an item.

Like other projectiles, tridents can be used as ammunition in dispensers.

Tridents enchanted with Loyalty return to the thrower within seconds, with shorter recovery intervals at higher levels of enchantment. However, throwing a Loyalty-enchanted trident into the Void destroys it. Players should therefore exercise caution when using ranged trident attacks against the ender dragon and other mobs in the End.

Tridents enchanted with Riptide cannot be thrown unless the player is standing in water or it is raining.

Unlike other projectiles, the trident does not slow down when thrown through water.

The Impaling enchantment affects players and all water mobs. It deals extra damage to players and any mobs when in water or during rain.

Similarly to arrows, thrown tridents will despawn after 1 minute.

Damage
Thrown tridents deal damage, which is reduced to  damage for players wearing full diamond armor with projectile protection. The damage remains constant regardless of the trident's speed.

Java Edition
Tridents have an attack speed of 1.1 and take ~0.91 seconds to recover.

Legacy Console Edition and Bedrock Edition
In the Legacy Console and Bedrock editions, tridents have no attack cooldown and do the following damage:

Elytra
A trident with the Riptide enchantment can be used to propel the elytra, but only in rainy weather or while the player is in a body of water.

Enchantments
Tridents can receive the following enchantments:


 * Loyalty (Max III) &mdash; a thrown trident returns to the player after a few seconds
 * Channeling (Max I) &mdash; a thrown trident hitting a mob during a thunderstorm summons a lightning bolt
 * Riptide (Max III) &mdash; throwing a trident when in water or rain transports (throws) the player, also deal splash damage
 * Impaling (Max V) &mdash; deals extra melee or ranged damage to aquatic mobs (not drowned) or deal extra melee or ranged to any mobs in water or during rain
 * Unbreaking (Max III) &mdash; increases durability
 * Mending (Max I) &mdash; when trident is held, XP orbs collected repair it rather than increase the player's XP.
 * Curse of Vanishing (Max I) &mdash; trident disappears upon player's death

Repairing
Tridents have the same durability as an iron sword. Whenever a trident deals damage, its durability decreases by 1.

Tridents can be repaired by:
 * combining two damaged tridents on a crafting table or the 2×2 inventory grid, which removes any enchantments.
 * combining two damaged tridents in the grindstone, which removes any enchantments.
 * combining a damaged trident with another trident on an anvil, which preserves enchantments.
 * the Mending enchantment.

Entity data
Tridents have entity data associated with them that contain various properties of the entity.

Trivia

 * If a player throws a Loyalty-enchanted trident and the player's inventory subsequently fills, the trident hovers around or through the player's skin until an inventory slot opens, which it fills immediately. Multiple tridents can be 'queued' to re-enter the player's inventory in this manner.
 * In creative mode, sword enchantments can be applied to tridents. This includes Sharpness, Smite, Bane of Arthropods, Fire Aspect, and Looting. Sharpness, Smite, and Bane of Arthropods increases their damage against their specific mobs in ranged, as well.
 * Using Riptide on mobs closely packed together deal a "splash damage".
 * A trident has a faster charging speed than a bow or crossbow without enchantments.