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The horse is a calm and confident compatriot out in the Minecraft wilds. Found in herds of two-to-six, they roam the plains and savanna biomes chomping on grass and swishing their swishy tails. But this life is an ambling, unfocused one, and the proud horse is a creature worthy of far greater adventure.

Emily Richardson[1]

Horses are tamable mobs that have five in-game variants: horses, donkeys, mules, zombie horses, and skeleton horses. The variants can appear in one of several different coat colors that exhibit different markings.

Spawning

Horses and donkeys only spawn in plains and savannas in herds of 2–6. 10% of herds will be donkeys. For horses, all combinations of color and markings are equally likely. All members of the herd will have the same color, but markings may vary. 20% of the individual horses or donkeys will spawn as babies.

Mules do not spawn naturally, and can only be spawned in survival mode by cross-breeding a horse with a donkey. Skeletal horses can spawn as skeleton traps from natural lightning strikes, but do not otherwise spawn naturally. Zombie horses do not spawn naturally, but may be created by the /summon command or with their spawn egg.

Each of the 5 types of horses – horses, donkeys, mules, skeleton horses and zombie horses – has its respective spawn egg.

Appearance

HorseBreeds

All 35 colorations of horses.

Each horse variant has unique features and markings, and a foal (baby) version. Adult horses are 1.4 blocks wide and long, and 1.6 blocks high. Foals start at half the size of adults and get progressively bigger as they age. Unlike wolves and ocelots, the appearances of horses do not change once they have been tamed, though tame horses may be differentiated by giving them equipment.

  • Horses feature a stocky build. They can have 1 of 7 base colors: white, buckskin, dark bay, bay, black, dapple gray, and flaxen chestnut; and 1 of 5 marking patterns: no markings, stockings and blaze, snowflake appaloosa, paint and sooty. In total, there are 35 possible horse coat combinations.
  • Donkeys are smaller all around than the normal horses and sport long, erect ears. Their manes do not protrude, but rather are drawn directly on the back of their heads and necks. All donkeys have gray-brown coats with darker ankles, ears, manes, and tails. Donkeys cannot be equipped with horse armor, but can be equipped with chests to store up to 15 stacks of items.
  • Mules are the offspring of horses and donkeys, and are closer to (but not quite) the size of a normal Horse. Their ears, coats, and manes are like those of a donkey, though mules’ coats are darker and reddish-brown. Like donkeys, mules cannot be equipped with armor, but can be equipped with chests. Mules cannot have foals, much like the mule in real life.
  • Zombie Horses appear to be the horse counterpart of zombies. Like zombies, zombie horses are green-skinned, and their eyes are completely black.
  • Skeleton Horses appear to be the horse counterpart of skeletons. Like skeletons, their bodies are only bones. They are also the slowest naturally spawning horse.

Drops

Horses, donkeys, and mules drop:

The skeleton horse drop:

The zombie horse drop:

All horses also drop 1–3 experience when killed by a player or tamed wolf. If armored, chested, or saddled, they will drop anything equipped.

Using a weapon enchanted with Looting increases the maximum amount of drops by 1 per level of Looting, up to a maximum of 5 at Looting III.

Usage

Tamed and saddled horses can be used as one of the fastest means of transportation in the game, though they are unable to fit through single block-wide openings. They can also be used to climb hills, as some horses can jump high enough to clear up to five block heights, versus the player's maximum of about one (without a potion). Donkeys and mules can be equipped with chests and used as pack animals.

Equipment

Donkey UI

Donkey UI, when equipped with a chest.

13w21a-new-HorseUI-inventory

Horse UI

Tamed horses can be equipped with saddles (all species) , horse armor (normal horses only), or chests (donkeys or mules only). Foals cannot be equipped with anything.

Equipment can be placed on a horse by holding it and then right clicking on the horse, or by accessing its inventory. A horse’s inventory can be accessed by mounting the horse and opening the player inventory or by sneaking and then right-clicking on the horse. A normal horse’s inventory will only have 2 slots, 1 for a saddle and 1 for horse armor. A donkey or mule will only have a saddle slot originally, but if it is given a chest, it will acquire 15 more inventory slots that can hold anything the player wishes.

Chests can only be given to a donkey or a mule by right-clicking on the donkey or mule with the chest in hand, and afterwards the chest cannot be removed, except by killing the donkey or mule. Upon death, the donkey or mule will drop the attached chest and its contents.

Riding

See also: Transportation

Once a horse is tamed and saddled, the player can control it with standard directional controls, jump, and the mouse. The player dismounts using the dismount control.

When riding a horse, the hunger bar is replaced by the horse's health in survival or adventure mode. In the Legacy Console Edition, the horse health bar will still be visible on creative. It uses a slightly different heart texture than the player's health bar. The experience bar is replaced by the horse jump bar.

A player can use any item while riding a horse, including drinking or throwing potions; activating doors or redstone devices; using chests, crafting tables, and furnaces; breaking and placing blocks; and attacking with melee weapons or bows.

A ridden horse will automatically run up any one block high slope. The horse and rider can safely fit through a space as low as 2.75 blocks high. Lower clearance risks suffocating the rider if the rider's head enters a non-transparent block. The horse itself can enter gaps as low as 1.625 blocks high, but may itself take suffocation damage when clearance is less than 1.75 blocks. Horses cannot fit through a 1-block-wide gap.

The maximum speed of horses varies between 4.8375 blocks/second and 14.5125 blocks/second (compared to the player's walking speed, which is about 4.3 blocks/second). About 68% of horses are able to go faster than a minecart. A fast horse can be combined with speed potions and the Nether to make the horse easily the fastest practical way to travel in Minecraft (around 130 m/s Overworld-equivalent in the Nether). The speed of a horse has no relation to its outward appearance. Horses are very slow moving backwards, and about as fast as the player when moving sideways.

A ridden horse can be made to jump, and holding the control charges for a higher leap. Horses are not affected by jump boost beacons or potions. The standard dismount control dismounts from the horse, as does going in water deeper than two blocks. Like the player, horses take fall damage when falling from heights.

It is impossible for a player to use a Nether portal while on a horse. It is possible however, to enter the portal on the horse and then dismount, sending the horse through the portal on its own.

Behavior

HorseHerd

Horses in herds spawned by the game will usually all be the same color.

All horses will roam idly, occasionally stopping to rear, swish their tails, or lower their heads as though eating the grass. Unlike sheep, the eating animation does not actually cause any grass to be consumed. If a player comes near, the horses may turn to look at them. Any (non-undead) horse, even a wild one, will allow itself to be attached to a lead without protest. However, if the player attempts to saddle an untamed horse, it will rear and flail its front hooves. Horses remain passive, even when hit.

Horses will also open their mouths and make noises that depend on the particular horse’s variation.‌[Java Edition only] Normal horses make neighs and whinnies, while donkeys and mules, which use the same audio, emit brays.

Horses, like most mobs, can ride in a minecart. Unlike other passive mobs, horses will slowly regenerate health.

Skeleton trap

SkeletonRiderGroup

A group of skeleton horsemen spawned by a "skeleton trap" horse.

"Skeleton trap" horses spawn from a fraction of lightning strikes during thunderstorms (0.75–1.5% chance on Easy, 1.5–4% on Normal, and 2.8125–6.75% on Hard, depending on regional difficulty). They despawn after 15 minutes if not triggered.

When a player comes within 10 blocks, lightning will strike the horse. This lightning cannot start fires or damage nearby entities. When struck, the skeleton trap horse transforms into a skeleton horseman, a skeleton riding a skeleton horse. It will also spawn three additional skeleton horsemen in the vicinity. Each skeleton is equipped with an enchanted iron helmet and an enchanted bow, and have damage immunity for 3 seconds after spawning. Skeleton horsemen move extremely fast and maneuver exactly like skeletons, strafing when attacking and backing up when the player moves towards them.

Other notes:

  • The skeleton will be wearing an iron helmet, unless it randomly spawned with some other headgear.
  • The skeleton's bow and helmet will be enchanted as if on an enchantment table at level 5–22. The level is higher depending on regional difficulty; on Easy it will always be a level-5 enchantment.
  • The skeleton trap horse will become fully grown if it was a baby, and the breeding cooldown will be reset.
  • The original horse will be tamed when struck, and the additional three horses are spawned tamed.
  • The skeletons will not despawn (PersistenceRequired is set).
  • A trap horse may spawn in areas that a regular horse may not, such as in the middle of an ocean.
  • A trap horse will still trigger if the weather is clear; lightning will strike the trap horse and the four skeleton horsemen will spawn.

Taming

Adult horses, donkeys, and mules can be tamed, but not zombie horses or skeleton horses. With an empty hand mount the horse repeatedly; when it no longer bucks the player and shows hearts, it is tamed. It is necessary to tame a horse in order to breed it, give it equipment, or ride it for any length of time.

Taming depends on the horse's "temper". Horses begin with a temper of 0 out of 100. When a player is riding the horse, a random number 0–99 is chosen. The horse becomes tame if this number is less than the temper, otherwise the temper is increased by 5 and the player is bucked off. Temper can also be increased by feeding the horse.

While riding an untamed horse, you will hear (given a little time) a gallop sound, more or less rapid. This gives you a good general idea of the horse's speed. It is unknown whether there is any indication of jump height before taming.

Breeding

Feeding tamed horses golden apples or golden carrots will activate love mode.

The offspring will be more spindly than their adult versions and will grow progressively larger with time until they reach their full size. The offspring will not automatically belong to the player who owns its parents. Rather, it will be born as an untamed horse and will need to be tamed after it grows into an adult. The foal can be fed to make it mature faster.

Depending on the variations of the parent horses, the offspring can be one of several types.

  • Horse: Breeding two horses produces a horse foal. Usually the new foal has the color of either of its parents. One out of nine times it will take on an random color (this color could still be the same as the parents', slightly reducing the probability of the new color being different). Markings work likewise.
  • Donkey: Breeding two donkeys creates a donkey foal. Since all donkeys have the same texture, the offspring will look exactly like its parents when it is fully grown.
  • Mules: Cannot be found in the wild, and cannot breed. Mules can only be spawned by breeding a horse with a donkey.
  • Zombie and skeletal horses: Cannot be bred or produced from breeding.

Food

Feeding a horse food can alter its behavior, cause it to grow (if it is not yet an adult; foals normally take 20 minutes to fully mature if not fed), and/or restore its health. The table below lists the effects of the various foods horses will take. Zombie and skeletal horses cannot be fed, even if tame.

To feed a horse, hold a valid food item and right click on the horse. If the food is invalid, the player will simply mount the horse. Horses can only be fed when feeding would have an effect, similar to other animals.

Food Heals Speeds growth by Increases temper Notes
Sugar 1♥ 30 sec +3
Wheat 2♥ 20 sec +3
Apple 3♥♥ 1 min +3
Golden Carrot 4♥♥ 1 min +5 Activates love mode in tamed horses.
Golden Apple 10♥♥♥♥♥ 4 min +10 Activates love mode in tamed horses. Enchanted golden apples also work.
Hay Bale 20♥ × 10 3 min N/A Hay bales cannot be fed to untamed adult horses.

Statistics

See also: Horses tutorial

All horses have three "equine stats" which vary from horse to horse: health, (maximum) movement speed, and jump strength. These stats are created once the horse is born or spawned, and are not affected by food.

Spawned values

When spawned in any way except breeding – for instance, using commands, spawning naturally, spawning as part of a skeleton trap, or using spawn eggs – horses are assigned their stats within certain ranges, specific according to their horse type.

Health

For horses, donkeys and mules, their health ranges from 15–30, but tends towards the average 22–23. For skeletal and zombie horses, their health is always 15. Displayed hearts are health, divided by two, rounded down. A horse with an non-even number of health points (15, 17, 19, etc.) will not show the last half-heart. You may strike a horse with your bare hand to test this.

Movement speed

For horses, their speed ranges from 0.1125–0.3375 in internal units, tending toward the average of 0.225. For donkeys and mules, their speed is always 0.175, and for skeletal and zombie horses it is always 0.2.

The player's normal walking speed is 0.1. See also transportation to compare the speeds of various transportation methods.

Jump strength

For horses, skeletal horses and zombie horses, their jump strength ranges from 0.4–1.0, tending towards the average 0.7. For donkeys and mules, their jump strength is always 0.5.

A jump strength of 0.5 is enough to clear 1 916 blocks, while 1.0 is enough to clear 5 14 blocks.

The following derived equation can be use to calculate a horse jump height from its jump strength attribute (with an rss of 5.510e-19). This function was fit to the data found in the table below and is therefore most accurate around these values.
JumpHeight = -0.1817584952 * x^3 + 3.689713992 * x^2 + 2.128599134 * x - 0.343930367
Where x is JumpStrength

The exact jump strengths, to 15 digits, required to clear several block heights are listed below.

Jump Strength Blocks
0.966967527085333 5.000
0.847552919762898 4.000
0.715301016726230 3.000
0.564380127487889 2.000
0.432084373616155 1.250 (player's jump height)

Bred values

When breeding two horses, the foal's stats are determined by averaging both parent's stats with a third set, randomly determined as above (i.e. add both parents' stats with the random value and divide by 3). Random values are used for the third set even when the value is not normally randomized for the type of horse being bred.

Data values

See also: Chunk format

Horses have entity data associated with them that contain various properties of the mob. Their entity IDs are: horse, donkey, mule, zombie_horse and skeleton_horse.

Horse

  • Entity data
    • Additional fields for mobs that can breed
    • Tags common to all entities
    • Tags common to all mobs
    • Tags common to all horses
    •  ArmorItem: The armor of this horse. Ignored if the item is not one of the horse armors.
      • Tags common to all items
    •  Variant: The variant of the horse. Determines colors. Stored as baseColor | (markings << 8). Unused values lead to white horses.

Variant

Main article: Horse/DV
[edit]

Horse/ID

Donkey

Horse/ED1

Mule

Horse/ED2

Zombie Horse

Horse/ED3

Skeleton Horse

Horse/ED4

Achievements

Icon Achievement In-game description Actual requirements (if different) Gamerscore earned Trophy type (PS4)
PS4 Other
Saddle UpTame a horse.20GBronze
Artificial SelectionBreed a mule from a horse and a donkey.30GBronze

Advancements

Icon Advancement In-game description Parent Actual requirements (if different) Resource location
Advancement-plain-rawThe Parrots and the Bats
Breed two animals together HusbandryBreed a pair of any of these 25 mobs: A mule must be the result of breeding a horse and a donkey for this advancement as they are not breedable together. Other breedable mobs are ignored for this advancement.husbandry/breed_an_animal
Advancement-plain-rawBest Friends Forever
Tame an animal HusbandryTame one of these 8 tameable mobs: husbandry/tame_an_animal
Advancement-fancy-rawTwo by Two
Breed all the animals! The Parrots and the BatsBreed a pair of each of these 24 mobs: A trader llama does not count as a llama, and a mule must be the result of breeding a horse and a donkey for this advancement as they are not breedable together. Other breedable mobs can be bred, but are ignored for this advancement.husbandry/bred_all_animals

Video

Note: Since 1.8, bread cannot be used for breeding or feeding. Since 1.9, skeleton horses can spawn naturally.

Horse/video

History

release
4 April 2013Jeb hinted at adding horses when Minecraft hit 10,000,000 sales.
1.6.113w16aAdded horses, assisted by DrZhark (John Olarte), creator of the Mo' Creatures mod, whose horses were a baseline for Minecraft's Horse models.[2]
13w16bMade horses slower and reduced horses from gliding so much.
13w18aRemoved horse saddles. Horses are now ridden using the saddle
13w19aEnabled access to the donkey and mule inventories by sneaking and interacting.
13w21aAdded new GUI for horses, to control saddle/armor/inventory.
13w22aAdded new sound effects for horses, donkeys, mules, skeleton horses, and zombie horses.
1.7.213w36aHorses spawn in savannas.
Skeleton and zombie horses are now available without third-party tools, with the introduction of the /summon command.
1.814w26cHorses can no longer be fed bread for taming, healing, or growing.
Wheat's acceleration of baby horse growth was reduced.
1.915w38aAdded "skeleton trap" horses.
There is a chance (depending on regional difficulty) that a lightning strike will spawn a "skeleton trap" skeletal horse.
15w43a44bDrops changed several times. The end result is that undead horses now always drop 1 of their item (bone or rotten flesh), not affected by Looting.
15w47bAdded sounds for horses eating food given by a player.
1.1016w20aAdded Spawn eggs for Zombie Horses, Skeleton horses, Donkeys and Mules.
1.10-pre2Removed spawn eggs for Zombie Horses, Skeleton Horses, Donkeys and Mules.
1.1116w32aHorses now have different IDs: horse, donkey, mule, zombie_horse and skeleton_horse
Re-added spawn eggs for Zombie Horses, Skeleton Horses, Donkeys and Mules.
Skeleton trap horses' chance to spawn during lightning strikes is reduced to 15 of what it was.
16w38aUndead horses now drop 0–2 of their item (bone or rotten flesh), affected by Looting.
upcoming
1.1317w45aFile:Horse 17w45a.png Added a new model for Horses, Zombie Horses, Skeleton horses, Donkeys and Mules.
17w46aFile:Horse 17w46a.png The new model was slightly tweaked.
18w03aUpdated the horse model again.
Pocket Edition Alpha
0.15.0build 1Added horses, mules, donkeys, skeleton trap horses and zombie horses.
Pocket Edition
1.1build 1The entity ID for skeleton horse and zombie horse is changed from skeletonhorse to skeleton_horse, zombiehorse to zombie_horse.
Bedrock Edition
1.2.6build 1Added the new (1.13) model for Horses, Mules, and Donkeys.
Legacy Console Edition
TU19CU7 1.12 Patch 1Added horses.
TU22CU10 1.15 Added quick move to the horse inventory.
TU31CU19 1.22 Patch 3Baby horse growth can be accelerated using wheat.
TU43CU33 1.36 Patch 13Added sounds for horses.
TU46CU36 1.38 Patch 15Added "skeleton trap" horses.
TU60CU51 1.64 Patch 30Added the new horse model.

Issues

Issues relating to "Horse", "Foal", "Donkey", "Mule", "Skeleton horse", "Undead horse", or "Zombie horse" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.

Trivia

  • Dr. Zhark appears in the credits after the End Poem as the creator of the horses.
  • If a player picks up leather dropped by an adult horse, they will receive the “Cow Tipper" achievement. This is due to the achievement being given when a player picks up any piece of leather instead of being given when one kills a cow.
  • If a player pulling a horse with a lead enters a boat, the horse will swim after them at the same speed as the boat.
  • A player riding a horse will be dragged along if their horse is being pulled by a lead, and can even be lifted up in the air in the same way.
  • On multiplayer, it is possible to easily figure out which of two horses (owned and ridden by different players) is faster. Each rider needs to apply a lead to the other horse, then play 'tug of war'. The stronger horse will be faster.
  • While it's raining, skeleton traps can spawn even if /gamerule doMobSpawning is false. [verify]
  • It is possible to summon a rideable zombie horse or skeleton horse using the command /summon skeleton_horse ~ ~ ~ {Tame:1, SaddleItem: {id: saddle, Count:1}} or /summon zombie_horse ~ ~ ~ {Tame:1, SaddleItem: {id: saddle, Count:1}} which will spawn the respective horse wearing a saddle, which the player can then mount. Like a donkey there is no armor slot, but also no way to equip a chest.

Gallery

See also

References


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