Experimental Gameplay

The disclaimer that appears when toggling Experimental Gameplay in the world settings.

Experimental Gameplay (also known in-game as Experiments) is a game option exclusive to Bedrock Edition. When enabled, it allows players to test some unfinished or work-in-progress features that would eventually be released in future updates.

Toggling

Experimental Gameplay is found in the world options when creating or editing a world. Turning the option on does not disable achievements, however it can't be disabled after the world is created. Enabling it on an already existing world adds an "Experimental" tag right next to the game mode name in the world menu. Once the experimental world is created, it cannot be turned off again.

Warnings

The warning message when attempting to play on an experimental world.

The point of Experimental Gameplay is for the player to look at some not-quite-finished features, which could crash, break, or stop working at any point in future updates. When the player attempts to load the experimental world, it will show a warning message before loading it. Attempting to disable experimental gameplay toggle via external tools could also crash and break the world.

Features

There are 7 different toggles of Experimental Gameplay. These are:

• "Caves and Cliffs"‌^{[until BE 1.18.0]}
  • Enables work-in-progress Caves & Cliffs features.
• "Vanilla Experiments"‌^{[upcoming: BE 1.18.0]}
  • Enables work-in-progress features that may be included in future versions such as The Wild Update.
• "Holiday Creator Features"
  • Enables add-ons features added on the holiday update and some further updates that include the creation of custom blocks and items, MoLang enhancements and the run_command method.
• "Creation of Custom Biomes"
  • Enables custom biomes by using add-ons.
• "Additional Modding Capabilities"
  • Enables the old scripting features.
• "Upcoming Creator Features"
  • Used for Volume Driven Fog and entity properties and permutations.
• "Enable GameTest Framework"
  • Enables GameTest Framework automation tool feature.
• "Experimental Molang Features"
  • Enables experimental Molang features.

As of 1.17.40, the following features are behind the "Caves and Cliffs" toggle in Experimental Gameplay:

Blocks

• Sculk Sensor

Items

• Goat Horn

Mobs

• Hostile mobs do not spawn in areas with a block light level above 0.

World Generation

• Terrain in the Overworld uses multi-noise biome source type.
  • Terrain generation is now independent from biomes, with biomes adapting to whatever terrain they happen to generate throughout.
    • This allows for natural variation in the terrain of any individual biome, both in terms of shape and elevation.
    • This additionally allows for smoother transitions between biomes.
    • Sub-biomes, especially hills, are now removed as the result.
• New cave generation.
  • Consists of the noise caves such as "spaghetti", "cheese", and "noodle" caves, and water and lava aquifers.
• New ore distribution.
• The cavern now generates in 2 layers of different stone bases depending on the depth.
  • Cavern layer above Y=0 is made up of regular stone.
  • Stone transitions to deepslate from Y=0 to Y=-7.
  • Deepslate now completely replaces stone from Y=-8 to bedrock.
• New Mountains biomes.
  • Consists of: Lofty Peaks, Snow Capped Peaks, Snowy Slopes, Mountain Grove, Mountain Meadow, and Stony Peaks.
• Increased height limit to 384 blocks, with a maximum height of Y=319 and a minimum height of Y=-64.
• Naturally generated Lush Caves and Dripstone Caves.
• New Mineshaft generation with chains and logs support.
• Ore veins.

As of beta 1.18.0.23, the following features are behind the "Vanilla Experiments" toggle in Experimental Gameplay:

Blocks

• Sculk
• Sculk Catalyst
• Sculk Sensor
• Sculk Shrieker
• Sculk Vein

Items

• Goat Horn

History

Bedrock Edition
1.4.0		beta 1.2.13.8			Added the experimental gameplay option.
					Turning on the experimental gameplay option gives the player access to the following features: stripped wood, prismarine stairs and slabs, tridents, drowned and new swimming animations.
		beta 1.2.20.1			Added nautilus shells, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		release			All above features, except for drowned and nautilus shells, are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
1.5.0		beta 1.5.0.0			Drowned and nautilus shells are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
1.7.0		beta 1.7.0.2			Added the scoreboard command and basic scoreboards, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.7.0.7			Scoreboards are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
1.8.0		beta 1.8.0.10			Added crossbows and their enchantments, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
1.9.0		beta 1.9.0.0			Added pillagers and bamboo jungles, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.9.0.2			Added lanterns and many new job site blocks, which are available only through experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.9.0.3			Added Minecraft script engine, available only through experimental gameplay.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			Added composters, campfires, a new stonecutter block, sweet berries, ravagers, wandering traders, pillager outposts, new village structures, villager_v2, and zombie_villager_v2, which are available only through experimental gameplay.
					Crossbows, pillagers, lanterns, and entity scripting function are no longer only available behind experimental gameplay.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.1			Added raid captains, raids, the Bad Omen status effect and the Hero of the Village status effect, which are available only through experimental gameplay.
					Bamboo jungles are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.11.0.3			Fletching tables, smithing tables, sweet berries, ravagers, the new villagers, pillager outposts, new zombie villagers and the new villages are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.11.0.4			Wandering traders are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
		release			Raid captains, raids, the Bad Omen status effect and the Hero of the Village status effect are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
1.13.0		beta 1.13.0.1			Added structure voids, save and load mode for structure blocks, which are available only through experimental gameplay.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.51			Added targets, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.0.57			Targets, Structure Voids and Structure Block functionality are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
					Added Lodestones, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.0.63			Lodestones functionality are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
1.16.100		beta 1.16.100.55			Experimental Gameplay toggle has been revamped and expanded.
					Added "Custom Biome Add-Ons", "Experimental Scripting Add-Ons", "Experimental Molang Features", and "Next Gameplay Update" toggle.
		beta 1.16.100.56			Added "Experimental Add-On Features" toggle.
		beta 1.16.100.57			Added "Holiday Creator Features" toggle.
					"Experimental Scripting Add-Ons", "Experimental Molang Features", and "Experimental Add-On Features" toggle are merged into "Additional Modding Capabilities" toggle.
					Changed "Custom Biome Add-Ons" toggle name to "Creation of Custom Biomes".
					Removed "Next Gameplay Update" toggle in preparation for "Caves and Cliffs" toggle.
1.16.200		beta 1.16.200.52			Added "Caves and Cliffs" toggle.
					Added goats, goat horns and powder snow, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		release			Removed "Caves and Cliffs" toggle in the full release.
					Goats, goat horns and powder snow have been made inaccessible in the full release.
1.16.210		beta 1.16.210.53			Added powder snow buckets, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.210.56			Added pointed dripstone and sculk sensor, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.210.57			Added all copper block variants, copper ingot, copper ore, and lightning rod, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.210.59			Added glow ink sacs, glow item frames and glow squids, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.210.60			Removed glow ink sacs, glow item frames and glow squids temporarily.
					Added GameTest framework to the experimental gameplay, by enabling "Enable GameTest Framework” toggle to test the new GameTest automation tool.
		release			Removed "Caves and Cliffs" toggle in the full release.
					All Caves and Cliffs content was removed in the full release.
1.16.220		beta 1.16.220.50			Added the new mountain biomes: Lofty Peaks, Snow Capped Peaks, Snowy Slopes, Mountain Grove, and Mountain Meadow behind experimental gameplay.
					Increased height limits to 320 blocks behind experimental gameplay.
					Re-added glow ink sacs, glow item frames and glow squids.
					Added dripstone blocks, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
					Changed and updated the textures of the ores behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.220.52			Added azaleas, azalea leaves, big dripleaves, cave vines, hanging roots, moss blocks, moss carpets, rooted dirt, small dripleaf and spore blossom, which are available only behind experimental gameplay.
					Added glow berries, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.
					Extended the build limit to 64 blocks down, to a total range of 384 blocks behind experimental gameplay.
		release			Removed "Caves and Cliffs" toggle in the full release.
					All Caves and Cliffs content was removed in the full release.
1.17.0		beta 1.16.230.50			Added glow lichen, which is available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.16.230.52			Added axolotls and deepslate and its variants, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.
					Added "Upcoming Creator Features" toggle.
		beta 1.16.230.56			Revamped cave generation by adding cheese caves, spaghetti caves, and flooded aquifer caves behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.17.0.50			Added amethyst geodes, amethyst blocks, budding amethyst, amethyst clusters, amethyst shards, tinted glass, tuff, calcite, smooth basalt, spyglasses, raw metals, lush cave biomes and raw metal blocks, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.
					Glow Lichen, Powder Snow and Powder Snow Buckets are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.17.0.52			All above features and changes, except for the revamped cave generation, new mountain biomes, sculk sensor, and goat horns, are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.17.0.56			Added lava aquifers, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.
					Added description for Experimental features in the world creation screen.
					Added a warning message when attempting to load an experimental world.
					Added "Experimental" label to indicate the world is experimental in the world menu.
		beta 1.17.0.58			Description changes in the previous beta were removed.
		release			Removed "Caves and Cliffs" toggle in the full release.
					All Caves and Cliffs: Part II content were removed in the full release.
1.17.10		beta 1.17.10.20			Description changes in beta 1.17.0.56 was re-added.
		release			Added "Caves and Cliffs" toggle in the full release for all platforms.
1.17.30		beta 1.17.20.22			Hostile mob spawning has been changed to only spawn at light level 0 behind experimental gameplay.
		beta 1.17.30.21			Re-added "Experimental Molang Features" toggle.
		beta 1.17.30.23			Terrain now generates using the multi-noise biome source type behind experimental gameplay.
					Added noodle caves behind experimental gameplay.
					Added ore veins behind experimental gameplay.
1.17.40		beta 1.17.40.20			Deepslate now generates below Y=0, gradually replacing stone and then fully replaces it at Y=-8 behind experimental gameplay.
					Added the stony peaks biome behind experimental gameplay.
					Clouds now float between layers 192 and 196 behind experimental gameplay.
Upcoming Bedrock Edition
1.18.0		beta 1.18.0.20			All above features and changes related to new world generation, new mountain biomes, revamped cave generation, sculk sensors, and goat horns are no longer available only behind experimental gameplay.
					Removed the "Caves & Cliffs" toggle as the result.
		beta 1.18.0.22			Added "Vanilla Experiments" toggle.
					Goat horns and sculk sensors have been moved behind the new experimental gameplay toggle.
					Added sculk blocks, sculk catalysts, sculk shriekers, and sculk veins, which are only available behind experimental gameplay.