Game mode

"Gamemode" redirects here. For the command, see Commands/gamemode.

This article is about how a player interacts with the world. For the difficulty modes, see Difficulty.

A game mode dictates how a player may interact with a Minecraft world.

List of game modes

Animation summarizing the game modes in Java Edition.

The number of different game modes in Minecraft depends on the exact definition of a game mode. In practice, there are most commonly considered to be four:

• Survival
• Creative
• Adventure
• Spectator

Demo Mode, which may also be counted as a game mode, is Survival with the --demo attribute, which defines if the game is from a trial version or not.

True game modes

The following game modes are controlled by the "gameType" variable, and all‌/some‌ are accessible in-game via the /gamemode command as well as the game mode switcher.‌

Survival

Main article: Survival

In this mode, players have to gather all their materials to build, craft items and tools and gain experience points. There is a health, hunger, and armor bar, an inventory, and also a oxygen bar when underwater, suffocating,‌ or in lava.‌ If a player runs out of hearts (health), the player dies and returns to the spawn point. Upon death, the player emits smoke, loses all experience and items, and a death message. Maximum reach is 5 blocks.

Creative

Main article: Creative

The player has access to an infinite amount of almost all blocks and items available, and can destroy them instantly. Players are invulnerable, unless they fall into the void,‌ and do not have health, armor, or hunger, and can fly. The player has access to items not available in Survival mode, e.g. spawn eggs. The player cannot see command blocks if they look through the Creative GUI - they need to spawn command blocks with the /give or /setblock commands. Max reach is 6 blocks.

Adventure

Main article: Adventure

Players can interact with objects such as levers and buttons, and can interact with mobs. However, they can break blocks only with tools having a CanDestroy data tag, and place blocks only if the block they are holding has a CanPlaceOn data tag, making this mode good for adventure maps. Max reach is 5 blocks.

Spectator

Main article: Spectator

When in Spectator mode, players can clip through blocks and fly freely. The player can't interact with blocks, entities or their inventory.

In Java Edition, the player can enter the perspective of other entities by left-clicking on them, and are invisible to all players and mobs except for other spectators. When in third-person mode, they look like a transparent, floating head with no body. The player can use the scroll wheel to adjust the speed at which they are flying, unlike flying in Creative mode.

In Bedrock Edition however, the player can access this game mode by typing /gamemode spectator. The Spectator game mode has slightly different mechanics from the Java version, because the feature is still in development.

Other game modes

Default

The "Default" game mode can be access by typing /gamemode 5. The player can set game mode based on what default game mode is set. In a world setting, there's a dropdown to select the default game mode. The player can override the default game mode by setting the game mode to another game mode.

Invalid game mode

Any invalid game mode will be a mix of Creative mode and Survival mode. They are only accessible with third-party software so using the /gamemode command will not work because the game is preventing the player from doing it.

Like in Creative mode, the player has the ability to fly, can't take any damage and they're not affected by hunger. Despite this, health and hunger bars are still visible. Tools have infinite durability and can't break.

The inventory is like the one in Creative mode, except it's broken and you will not be able to take blocks nor items from it.

Game states

Hardcore

Main article: Hardcore

In this mode, which plays in the same way as Survival mode, the difficulty level is permanently set to "Hard", and when the player dies, they must either delete the map or permanently switch to Spectator mode, effectively preventing them from interacting with the world ever again.

Hardcore is not technically a game mode, but rather a game mode modifier, as it cannot be enabled with the /gamemode command. However, without cheating, it is possible to get only "Hardcore Survival". To obtain "Hardcore Creative" mode, the player must edit the game world with external tools, or opening to LAN, and turning on cheats. There is almost no visible difference between "Hardcore Creative" and "Non-Hardcore Creative". Because of this, "Hardcore" usually refers to "Hardcore Survival". On a server, a player who dies gets put into Spectator mode, while all other players remain in Survival mode. When looking at a Hardcore singleplayer world, the gamemode is "Hardcore Mode!" and the color is red.

Demo Mode

Main article: Demo Mode

Demo Mode functionally serves to allow the players to try out the game before deciding to buy Minecraft. It allows players to play on a single world for a 100-minute (5 in-game days) period before the map is locked and required to be reset. The game is locked to Survival mode and cheats are off by default. While the demo version does not expire, it comes with certain restrictions, by others, as its sole purpose is to allow new players to try out Minecraft.

Demo Mode is not technically a game mode as it cannot be enabled with the /gamemode command.

Summary

Below is a brief summary of the different available features in each game mode.

Feature	Survival	Creative	Adventure	Hardcore	Spectator
Premium account	Required for multiplayer	Required	Required	Required	Required
Multiplayer	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Crafting	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Smelting	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Brewing	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Enchanting	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Inventory	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Partial
Health	Yes	Hidden	Yes	Yes	Hidden
Respawn after death	Yes	Yes	Yes	After death you can only enter Spectator Mode or return to the title screen	Yes
Block placing/breaking	Yes	Yes	No, unless the player has a CanPlaceOn data tag	Yes	No
Mobs	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Maximum amount of blocks (so far)	Partial	Yes	No	Partial	No
Daylight cycle	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Cheats	Preset to no, but changeable	Yes	Preset to no, but changeable	No	Yes
Preset difficulty	No	No	No	Yes	No
Hunger	Partial	No	Partial	Yes	No
Available in Bedrock Edition	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Can phase through blocks	No	No	No	No	Yes

Changing game mode

The command /gamemode can be used to switch between true game modes. For example, /gamemode creative puts the player into Creative mode. As hardcore is handled differently, it cannot be set via commands.

In Java Edition, a player with operator permissions on a server or cheats enabled is able to open a GUI by pressing F3 and F4, which then allows the player to cycle through the four available gamemodes available with /gamemode by pressing F4.

In Bedrock Edition, the gamemode can also be changed by quitting the world, going to Edit World, tapping either Creative or Survival, and then returning to the game if cheats are enabled.

Data values

In the level.dat file, Survival mode is gametype=0, Creative is gametype=1, Adventure is gametype=2, and Spectator is gametype=3. Hardcore is Survival with the addition of hardcore=1 (a normal world uses hardcore=0 instead). This knowledge allows hacking to change game modes by editing the world's level.dat.

See also

• Gameplay

References

Game modes 

View at: Template:Game modes/content [edit]