| Health points |
Big: 16 |
|---|---|
| Armor points |
Big: 12 ( |
| Behavior |
Hostile |
| Attack strength |
Big: |
| Hitbox size |
In Java Edition: |
| Spawn |
A magma cube is a hostile mob found in the Nether. A magma cube behaves similarly to a slime, but jumps higher and deals a higher amount of damage with its attacks.
Contents
Spawning[]
They spawn in areas of the Nether at all light levels. The space they spawn in must be clear of solid obstructions and liquids. Due to being inherently fireproof, magma cubes can spawn on magma blocks.
Only sizes 1, 2 and 4 (NBT Size tag values 0, 1 and 3 respectively) spawn naturally. With use of /summon, magma cubes can potentially range from size 1 to 256 (NBT Size tag 0–255).
This large magma cube attempts to spawn on the basalt, but because there is a piece of iron bar intersecting its hitbox, it is unable to spawn. This check is performed before the size of the magma cube is determined, meaning no magma cubes can spawn at that location.
A magma cube needs roughly a 3×2.1x3 free space to spawn. The area in which the magma cube spawns in must be clear of solid or liquid obstructions. When a magma cube attempts to spawn, the game checks for the space requirement of a large magma cube, and the size is determined later. Therefore, since large magma cubes are slightly taller than 2 blocks, no magma cubes, regardless of size, are able to spawn at all in 2-block-high areas. Also, since large magma cubes are slightly wider than 2 blocks, and mobs spawn at the center of a block, having any block within the 3×2.1x3 area, even as thin as a glass pane, can prevent a magma cube of any size from spawning. These conditions are in effect since the Nether Update.
Magma cubes' size is affected by regional difficulty: chances range from 33% for each size at the low difficulty to 16% small, 33% medium, and 50% big with higher difficulty.
Nether Wastes[]
Magma cubes spawn uncommonly in nether wastes in groups of 1 to 4.
Nether Fortresses[]
Magma cubes spawn commonly in fortresses in groups of 4.
Basalt Deltas[]
Magma cubes spawn commonly in basalt deltas, in groups of 2 to 5.
Spawners[]
Magma cube spawners generate in the treasure room of bastions.
Drops[]
- Large magma cube: 0–1 magma cream and 4 experience
- Small magma cube: 0–1 magma cream (0.25 average) and 2 experience
- Tiny magma cube: 1 experience (or 1 froglight if killed by a frog[upcoming: BE 1.19.0]).
The maximum of magma cream can be increased by 1 per level of Looting. Looting 1 averages 0.5 per kill, Looting 2 averages ~0.81 per kill, and Looting 3 averages ~1.21 per kill. Unlike a lot of common loot which picks a random number between 0 and 1 for its drop, the magma cube's drop ranges between -2 and 1 instead. This leads to the 25% drop chance from an unenchanted kill, as well as the relatively low averages with the Looting enchantment since a negative base roll can cancel out the bonus roll made by Looting.
Behavior[]
A magma cube moves by hopping at intervals of 40 to 120 ticks (2 to 6 seconds).
Magma cube jumping.
A magma cube seeks out any player or an iron golem within a spherical distance of 16 blocks. If it finds no enemy, it waits for 40 to 120 ticks (2 to 6 seconds), then changes direction by a random amount up to 57.30° (1 radian) left or right, jumps, and repeats the process. If it finds a target, the delay before jumping is 1⁄3 as long (13 to 40 ticks), and the magma cube changes direction directly toward the target before jumping.
Magma cubes cannot be hurt by fall damage or burning, and are not slowed down by lava. They can swim upward in lava and leap above its surface.
Their jump height depends on their size. Their forward speed is twice that of most other mobs. They always make a distinct sound upon jumping up and landing, but no idle sounds.
When a magma cube is killed, it splits into 2-4 smaller magma cubes. Tiny magma cubes disappear when killed, like other mobs.
They can swim in water and attempt to stay on the surface. Like slimes, magma cubes drown if submerged in water for 15 seconds, splitting into smaller cubes if possible.
Unlike most mobs, magma cubes have no pathfinding ability, meaning that they do not avoid falling off cliffs and cannot go around walls, even when chasing a player.
When they are in lava, they hover and try to move to nearby land.
Combat[]
Magma cubes attack by jumping and attempting to land on the player, and cause damage when touched anywhere. As their jump rate is random, magma cubes can be hard to fight.
The health of a magma cube is its size squared; the attack strength is its size + 2, and the armor points are its size tripled.
A magma cube jumps a distance of approximately its length times 1.5 and a height equivalent to its size in blocks. This means that a large magma cube jumps 4 blocks in height and moves significantly quicker than a small magma cube, which jumps 2 blocks in height; while a tiny magma cube moves slowly and jumps 1 block in height.
Magma cubes have an attack speed twice as fast as most mobs.[1] Mobs like zombies attack once per second, while magma cubes attack twice per second. This means that a large magma cube deals 12
× 6 of damage per second on normal difficulty. Unlike slimes, tiny magma cubes can deal damage to the player.
Sounds[]
Reason: changes in 1.16 (this section is probably up to date, but Slime is not)
| Sound | Subtitles | Source | Description | Resource location | Translation key | Volume | Pitch | Attenuation distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Magma Cube dies | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.death | subtitles.magma_cube.death | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Magma Cube dies | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.death_small | subtitles.magma_cube.death | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Magma Cube hurts | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.hurt | subtitles.magma_cube.hurt | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Magma Cube hurts | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.hurt_small | subtitles.magma_cube.hurt | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Magma Cube squishes | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.jump | subtitles.magma_cube.squish | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Magma Cube squishes | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.squish | subtitles.magma_cube.squish | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Magma Cube squishes | ? | ? | entity.magma_cube.squish_small | subtitles.magma_cube.squish | ? | ? | 16 |
Data values[]
ID[]
| Name | Identifier | Translation key |
|---|---|---|
| Magma Cube | magma_cube | entity.minecraft.magma_cube |
| Name | Identifier | Numeric ID | Translation key |
|---|---|---|---|
| Magma Cube | magma_cube | 42 | entity.magma_cube.name |
Entity data[]
Magma cubes have entity data associated with them that contains various properties.
- Entity data
- Tags common to all entities
- Tags common to all mobs
- Size: The size of the magma cube. Note that this value is zero-based, so 0 is the smallest magma cube, 1 is the next larger, etc. The sizes that spawn naturally are 0, 1, and 3.
- wasOnGround: 1 or 0 (true/false) - true if the magma cube is touching the ground.
Achievements[]
| Icon | Achievement | In-game description | Actual requirements (if different) | Gamerscore earned | Trophy type (PS4) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PS4 | Other platforms | |||||
| Monster Hunter | Attack and kill a monster. | Kill a hostile mob or one of the following neutral mobs: an enderman, a piglin, a zombified piglin, a spider, or a cave spider. | 15G | Bronze | ||
Advancements[]
| Icon | Advancement | In-game description | Parent | Actual requirements (if different) | Resource location |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Adventure | Adventure, exploration, and combat | — | Kill any entity, or be killed by any entity. | adventure/root
|
| Monster Hunter | Kill any hostile monster | Adventure | Kill one of these 34 mobs:
| adventure/kill_a_mob
|
 | Monsters Hunted | Kill one of every hostile monster | Monster Hunter | Kill each of these 34 mobs:
| adventure/kill_all_mobs
|
History[]
| Java Edition | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.0.0 | Beta 1.9 Prerelease |  Added magma cubes.
| |||
| “It started out as a retexturing of the Slime for the Nether - it was just going to be a Lava Slime. But then when I named it that, I felt it was a bit lazy to retexture a mob. I wanted to make it more unique. I can’t really remember how I came up with the idea to have a layered block, but it’s one of my favourite mobs now. It really intrigues me. It doesn’t stand out in any particular way - I just really like it! You can use Magma Cream [an item Magma cubes drop] to brew Fire Resistance potions.” -Jeb[2] | |||||
| Beta 1.9 Prerelease 2 | Magma cubes have been made quite rare. Here are the current spawning rules for magma cubes. Big magma cubes require a 3×2½×3 space to spawn, small magma cubes require a 3×2×3 space, and tiny magma cubes require a 1×2×1 space (or 1×1×1 if the upper block is not opaque).[3] | ||||
| RC1 | Magma cubes have been given sounds. | ||||
| 1.1 | release | Large and small magma cubes now drop magma cream. | |||
| 1.3.1 | 12w18a | Magma cubes no longer show their animation in singleplayer, due to singleplayer being a local server. | |||
| 12w23a | Magma cubes now show their animation in multiplayer. | ||||
| 1.8 | 14w06b | Magma cubes can now swim as a result of the update to the new AI. | |||
| Magma cubes now randomly change direction every so often, reducing the chance of them getting stuck at walls or corners. | |||||
| Magma cubes now randomly despawn over time if no player is within a 32 meter range. | |||||
| The jumping mechanics of magma cubes have been changed. How far they jump now corresponds to the length of their size; they jump approximately 1.5 times their current length. For example, a tiny size 1 magma cube jumps slowly, while a large size 4 magma cube jumps farther. Also, when attacking, magma cubes turn their whole body to face the player. | |||||
| 1.10 | 16w20a | Magma cubes now spawn almost twice as often in the general Nether (rate is now 2⁄153, was 1⁄151). | |||
| 1.11 | 16w32a | The entity ID has been changed from LavaSlime to magma_cube. | |||
| 1.14 | 18w43a | The textures of magma cubes have been changed. | |||
| 18w44a |  The texture of magma cubes have now slightly tweaked. The color channel of transparent pixels are now filled to black. | ||||
| 19w12a | Magma cubes now hop on the surface of the lava instead of swim. | ||||
| 1.14.3 | 1.14.3-pre4 | Magma cubes now hover over the surface of the lava. | |||
| 1.16 | 20w06a | Small cubes now have moving sounds again.[4] | |||
| 20w15a | Magma cubes now spawn in basalt deltas biome. | ||||
| 20w16a | Magma cube spawners now generate in bastion remnants structure. | ||||
| ? | Their spawning rules were changed. | ||||
| 1.17 | 21w13a | Magma Cubes now take extra damage when freezing. | |||
| Pre-release 1 | Magma cubes no longer interacted with the player.[5] | ||||
| Pre-release 2 | Magma cubes will now interact with the player again.[5] | ||||
| Pocket Edition Alpha | |||||
| v0.11.0 | build 1 | Added magma cubes.
| |||
| Magma cubes are currently unobtainable in-game without hacking. | |||||
| build 8 | Magma cubes can now be spawned using spawn eggs. | ||||
| v0.12.1 | build 1 | Magma cubes now spawn naturally. | |||
| Magma cubes now split into smaller cubes when killed. | |||||
| v0.14.0 | build 1 | Magma cube cores now glow from  to  . | |||
| Pocket Edition | |||||
| 1.1.0 | alpha 1.1.0.0 | The entity ID has been changed from lavaslime to magma_cube. | |||
| Bedrock Edition | |||||
| 1.10.0 | beta 1.10.0.3 | The textures of magma cubes have been changed. | |||
| 1.16.0 | beta 1.16.0.57 | Magma cubes now spawn in basalt deltas. | |||
| beta 1.16.0.59 | Magma cube spawners now generate in bastion remnants. | ||||
| 1.17.0 | beta 1.16.230.54 | Magma Cubes now take extra damage when freezing. | |||
| 1.17.30 | beta 1.17.30.20 | Medium magma cubes hitboxes now corrected and matches Slime.[6] | |||
| 1.18.10 | beta 1.18.10.26 |    Magma cubes now drop froglights when killed by a frog behind the "Wild Update" experimental toggle. | |||
| Legacy Console Edition | |||||
| TU7 | CU1 | 1.0 | Patch 1 | Added magma cubes. | |
| New Nintendo 3DS Edition | |||||
| 0.1.0 | Added magma cubes. | ||||
Issues[]
Issues relating to "Magma Cube" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.
Trivia[]
- When a larger magma cube that has a name dies, the smaller magma cubes it spawns also have the same name, just like slimes.
- According the the article "visit the nether" magma cubes are not aggressive but their heat is dangerous when close.
- Magma cube is the only mob native to the Nether that can truly swim in water.
- Zombified piglins, skeletons, and wither skeletons sink in water.
- Piglins, piglin brutes and hoglins sink in water and drown.
- Endermen, blazes, and striders take damage in water immediately.
- Ghasts ignore water while floating around.
Gallery[]
Screenshots[]
Magma cubes.
Size comparison between a large magma cube and a player.
They emit the same flame particles as a mob spawner upon landing.
A group of small magma cubes.
A separated magma cube. Note the lava core.
A magma cube leaping out of lava.
A magma cube spawner inside a Bastion Remnant.
A magma cube spawner completely disabled with 9 solid blocks in Java Edition.
A magma cube spawner in a bastion remnant, being disabled with solid blocks.
In other media[]
The Magma Cube page from the Mobestiary.
Lego Minecraft Magma Cube.
