Ore

All of the current ores as of 1.16.5.

Ores isolated down to bedrock

This graph shows the actual amount of ores found in a relatively small but untapped world as of Java Edition 1.12.2

This graph shows the actual amount of ancient debris found in a relatively small but untapped world as of Java Edition 20w06a

All of the present and upcoming ores as of 21w10a and beta 1.16.230.52 (Deepslate versions of copper, coal and emerald don't generate naturally in worlds, as they are intended for mapmaking or datapacks.)

An ore is any uncommon rock-type block used to obtain specific resources.

Usage[edit]

Ore blocks are primarily collected for crafting purposes, such as for tools and armor. Redstone dust is obtained from redstone ore or deepslate redstone ore‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}, which can be used to create redstone circuits. Refined ore can also be combined to create a block of the material's type.

There are two ways to obtain a resource from an ore block, depending on the type of ore:

Mining: The indicated yield can be increased by mining the ore with a pickaxe enchanted with Fortune. Ores that drop their resource when mined require a Silk Touch pickaxe to drop themselves.
- Coal, copper‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}, iron‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}, gold‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}, diamond, emerald, their respective deepslate variants‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}, and nether quartz ores drop 1 unit of their corresponding raw material.
- Redstone and deepslate redstone‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]} ores drop 4–5 redstone dust.
- Lapis lazuli and deepslate lapis lazuli‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]} ores drop 4–9 lapis lazuli.
- Nether gold ore drops 2–6 gold nuggets.
Smelting: Iron ore and gold ore‌^{[until JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}, and ancient debris all drop themselves when mined. They must be smelted to obtain the corresponding resource (iron ingot, gold ingot, and netherite scrap, respectively).

Smelting ingredient[edit]

Ingredients	Smelting recipe
Any ore + Any fuel	0.10.10.70.70.70.70.20.2110.70.711110.212
Raw Iron or Raw Copper or Raw Gold + Any fuel	0.70.71

Ores can be smelted faster using a blast furnace.

It is not efficient to mine with Silk Touch and then smelt an ore block that normally drops multiple pieces of its resource, because smelting these ores yields less experience and only 1 piece of the resource.

Further uses[edit]

Refined ore resources can be crafted into blocks for bulk storage, for crafting recipes or for decoration. Coal blocks and most mineral blocks are crafted by putting 9 of the refined material items in a square. Mineral blocks that only need 4 items are nether quartz and copper‌^{[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17]}.

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Any processed ore
Any raw ore

All of the above block recipes are reversible, excluding quartz and oxidized copper.

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Most mineral blocks	994999999
Any raw ore blocks	999

Iron and Gold ingots can be converted into nuggets and vice-versa.

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Metal Ingots	99

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Metal Nuggets

Lapis Lazuli can be crafted into a dye, or even used as one.

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Lapis Lazuli

Netherite scraps, obtained by smelting ancient debris, are used alongside gold ingots to create netherite ingots. This is the only mineral used alongside another mineral to create an alloy.

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Gold Ingot, Netherite Scrap

Netherite ingots can be used on a smithing table to upgrade diamond items to netherite items. Data such as durability, enchantments, and custom names are preserved.

Ingredients	Smithing recipe
Diamond items + Netherite Ingot	Upgrade Gear

Availability[edit]

The following is the distribution of ores according to the altitude (layers are number of blocks above the lowest layer of bedrock) in the Overworld and the Nether. The highest layers that gold, redstone, diamond, and lapis lazuli ore can be found on are two layers lower.^[1]

Overworld[edit]

‌^{[until 1.17]}:

	Coal^[a]	Iron	Lapis Lazuli	Gold		Redstone^[b]	Diamond	Emerald^[c]
Ore block
Refined resource
Manufactured
Mineral block
Minimal pickaxe for drop	Wooden	Stone		Iron
Found in biome...	Any				Badlands	Any		Mountains
Abundance	Very Common	Common	Rare	Uncommon	Common	Uncommon	Rare	Very Rare
Most found in layers...	5-52	5-54	13-17^[d]	5-29		5-12		5-29
Commonly up to layers...	128	61	23	29	76	12		29
Rare on layers...	129-131	62-63	31-33	31-33	77-79	13-15		30-32
None at or above...	132	64	34	34	80	16		33
Can Replace	Stone Andesite Diorite Granite							Stone

‌^{[upcoming: 1.17]}:

	Coal^[e]	Copper	Lapis Lazuli	Iron	Gold		Redstone	Diamond	Emerald^[f]
Ore block
Deepslate variant ^[g]
Raw resource
Refined resource
Manufactured	-	-					-	-	-
Mineral block
Minimal pickaxe for drop	Wooden	Stone			Iron
Found in biome...	Any					Badlands	Any		Mountains
Abundance	Very Common	Common	Rare	Common	Uncommon	Common	Uncommon	Rare	Very Rare
Most found in layers...	5-52	5-192	13-17^[h]	5-54	5-29		5-12		5-29
Commonly up to layers...	128	96	23	61	29	76	12		29
Rare on layers...	129-131	^{[more information needed]}	31-33	62-63	31-33	77-79	13-15		30-32
None at or above...	132	193	34	34	34	80	16		33
Deepslate variant generates naturally?	No		Yes						No
Can Replace ^[i]	Stone Andesite Diorite Granite Tuff Deepslate								Stone Tuff Deepslate

‌^{[upcoming: 1.18]}:

	Coal^[j]	Copper	Lapis Lazuli	Iron	Gold		Redstone	Diamond	Emerald^[k]
Ore block
Deepslate variant ^[l]
Raw resource
Refined resource
Manufactured	-	-					-	-	-
Mineral block
Minimal pickaxe for drop	Wooden	Stone			Iron
Ore veins distinguishable block ^[m]	-	Granite	-	Tuff	-
Found in biome...	Any					Badlands	Any		Mountains
Abundance	Very Common	Common	Uncommon	Very Common	Uncommon	Common	Uncommon	Rare	Rare
Total range...	0 to 256	0 to 96	-64 to 64	-64 to 256	-64 to 79		-64 to 16		29 to 256
Most found in layers...	^{[more information needed]}
Commonly up to layers...	96	48	0	256	-16	76	-48		256
Rare on layers...	^{[more information needed]}			-64 to -32	^{[more information needed]}
None at or above...	-64 to -1		63	56 to 127 -33 to -28	33	80	17		-64 to 28
Deepslate variant generates naturally?	No		Yes						No
Can replace ^[n]^[o]	Stone Andesite Diorite Granite Tuff Deepslate		Stone Andesite Diorite Granite Tuff Deepslate						Stone Tuff Deepslate

The generation of ores in 1.18.

The Nether[edit]

	Nether Quartz^[p]	Nether Gold		Ancient Debris
Ore block
Refined resource			(with Silk Touch)
Manufactured			(with Silk Touch)
Mineral block
Minimal pickaxe for drop	Wooden			Diamond
Abundance	Very Common	Common		Very Rare
Found in biome...	Any Nether
Most found in layers...	10 to 114	15		13 to 17^[q]
Commonly up to layers...	120	95		23
Rare on layers...	123 to 125	96 to 116		22 to 119
None at or above...	128	117		120
Can Replace	Netherrack			Netherrack Basalt Blackstone

↑ This refers to coal ore blocks spawned in ore veins and not as parts of fossils or mansion forges.
↑ Redstone has the same layer and line-size statistics as Diamond, but is generated eight times per chunk as opposed to once.
↑ Instead of multi-block veins, emerald ore is placed in scattered blocks.
↑ Unlike most other ores, lapis lazuli's frequency peaks around layer 15, and slowly tapers off above and below.
↑ This refers to coal ore blocks spawned in ore veins and not as parts of fossils or mansion forges.
↑ Instead of multi-block veins, emerald ore is placed in scattered blocks.
↑ Deepslate variants only generate in deepslate blobs. Coal, Copper and Emerald Deepslate Ores aren't naturally generated.
↑ Unlike most other ores, lapis lazuli's frequency peaks around layer 15, and slowly tapers off above and below.
↑ Deepslate variants replace only Deepslate.
↑ This refers to coal ore blocks spawned in ore veins and not as parts of fossils or mansion forges.
↑ Instead of multi-block veins, emerald ore is placed in scattered blocks.
↑ Deepslate variants only generate under layer 0. Coal, Copper and Emerald Deepslate Ores aren't naturally generated.
↑ The block which allows to distinguish its large ore veins.
↑ Deepslate variants replace only Deepslate and Tuff. However, Coal and Copper don't become their deepslate variants when replacing Tuff.
↑ While Coal, Copper and Emerald technically can replace Deepslate and Tuff, as they do not generate on layers under 0, they can't replace them naturally.
↑ Nether quartz spawns equally in all parts of the Nether.
↑ Unlike most other ores, ancient debris' frequency peaks at layer 15, and quickly tapers off above and below.

History[edit]

Java Edition Classic
May 21, 2009					Notch shows interest in adding ores.
0.0.14a					Added coal, iron, and gold ores.
0.0.14a					These ores could be found exposed only in amounts ranging from roughly 10 to 30 in a vein.
October 24, 2009					A texture change for gold ore has been teased by Notch.
0.27 SURVIVAL TEST					The texture of gold ore has been changed.
0.27 SURVIVAL TEST					Mining an ore now gives the corresponding block of it.
Java Edition Indev
0.31		20100129			Added diamond ore.
0.31		20100201-2			Ores can no longer be mined without a pickaxe.
Java Edition Infdev
Minecraft Infdev		20100320			Random ore is now placed randomly around the terrain.
		20100327			Ores now replace stone upon a world reload.
		20100330			The ore change of replacing stone upon a world reload has been reverted.
Java Edition Alpha
v1.0.1					Added redstone ore.
Java Edition Beta
1.2					Added lapis lazuli ore.
Java Edition
1.0.0		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 4			Coal, lapis lazuli, redstone, and diamond ore now also drop as ore blocks with Silk Touch.
May 21, 2012					The week before the release of 12w21a, Jeb released a screenshot of himself testing the trading system.^[2] At this time, what would become emerald ore was ruby ore.^[3]
1.3.1		12w21a			For the release of 12w21a, the block was changed to an emerald ore. The texture for emerald ore remained unchanged, as Jeb forgot to commit the new texture in the snapshot.^[4]
		12w21b			The texture of emerald ore has been changed.
		12w22a			All ores except iron and gold (which give experience when smelted) now drop experience points when mined.
1.5		13w01a			Added nether quartz ore.
Texture Update		?			New textures for coal ore, gold ore and diamond ore have been proposed.
1.14		18w43a			The textures of all ores have been changed.
		18w50a			The texture of nether quartz ore has been changed.
		19w08a			The texture of diamond ore has been changed.
1.14.1		Pre-Release 1			The texture of iron ore has been changed.
1.16		20w06a			Added ancient debris.
		20w11a			Added nether gold ore.
		20w12a			Nether gold ore now drops gold nuggets instead of itself.
		20w13a			The texture of nether gold ore has been changed.
October 3, 2020					Copper ore is revealed at Minecraft Live 2020.
Upcoming Java Edition
1.17		20w45a			Added copper ore.
		21w07a			The textures of coal, iron, gold, diamond and redstone ore have been changed.
		21w07a			Changed ore distribution. See Ore/Pre-1.17 distribution for the old distribution.
		February 17, 2021			Henrik Kniberg shows grimstone variants of overworld ore with textures made by JAPPA.
		February 18, 2021			JAPPA shows new textures of iron, gold, lapis lazuli, and emerald ore and updated grimstone variants of overworld ore.
		February 18, 2021			JAPPA shows a new texture for the grimstone variant of diamond ore.
		February 22, 2021			JAPPA shows updated iron, gold, copper, redstone ore and updated grimstone variant of overworld ore.
		21w08a			Added deepslate ores.
					The textures of Coal, copper, iron, gold, redstone, lapis lazuli, and emerald ore have been changed.
					The new ore distribution has been tweaked.
		March 2, 2021			JAPPA shows updated iron ore and diamond ore textures.
		March 4, 2021			JAPPA Shows updated deepslate variants of iron, gold and diamond ore textures.
		21w10a			Deepslate variants of Coal Ore, Copper Ore, and Emerald Ore have been added, but they are not obtainable in Survival mode as they are intended for map and datapack creators use.
					The textures of Coal Ore, Iron Ore, Gold Ore, Diamond Ore, and the other Deepslate ores have been changed.
					Fossils that generate below Y=0 now generate with deepslate diamond ore instead of coal ore.
					Tweaked again the ore distribution.
		21w13a			Iron ore and diamond ore distribution has been slightly tweaked.
		21w13a			Copper ore now generates uniformly between levels 0 and 63 instead of generating with a normal curve from 0 to 96.
		21w14a			If Iron Ore, Gold Ore and Copper Ore are broke without silk-touch, they will drop Raw Metal instead.
		April 13, 2021			JAPPA shows a new gold ore texture.
		21w15a			The textures for gold, deepslate copper, lapis lazuli and deepslate lapis lazuli ore have been changed.
		21w15a			All of the changes to Ore distribution made in the latest snapshots have been reverted.
Pocket Edition Alpha
v0.1.0					Added coal, iron, gold, diamond, redstone, lapis lazuli ores.
v0.3.0					Coal ore now drops coal.
v0.3.2					Diamond ore now drops a diamond.
v0.3.2					Iron and gold ores are now smeltable into ingots.
v0.4.0					Lapis lazuli ore now drops lapis lazuli .
v0.8.0		build 2			Redstone ore now drops redstone dust.
v0.9.0		build 1			Added emerald ore.
v0.12.1		build 1			Added nether quartz ore.
v0.12.1		build 1			Mining ores now gives experience.
Bedrock Edition
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			The textures of all ores have been changed.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.5			The texture of diamond ore has been changed.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.51			Added ancient debris.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.57			Added nether gold ore.
1.16.210		beta 1.16.210.57			Added copper ore.
1.16.210		release			Copper Ore has been made inaccessible in the full release.
1.16.220		beta 1.16.220.50			Updated textures of all overworld ores.
1.16.220		beta 1.16.220.52			Copper ore can no longer be randomly rotated.
Upcoming Bedrock Edition
1.16.230		beta 1.16.230.52			Added deepslate ores.
		beta 1.16.230.52			Ore is generated as normal, when the ore is generated where Deepslate has been generated, deepslate ore is generated instead.
		beta 1.16.230.54			Updated iron, gold, diamond and coal textures.
1.17.0		beta 1.17.0.50			Changed deepslate coal, copper and lapis lazuli ore textures.
Legacy Console Edition
TU1	CU1	1.00	Patch 1	1.0.1	Added coal, iron, gold, diamond, redstone, lapis lazuli ores.
TU7		1.00			All ores except iron and gold (which give experience when smelted) now drops experience points when mined.
TU14		1.04			Added emerald and nether quartz ores.
		1.90			The textures of all ores have been changed.
New Nintendo 3DS Edition
0.1.0					Added coal, iron, gold, diamond, redstone, lapis lazuli, emerald and nether quartz ores.

Gallery[edit]

All of the current overworld ores including emerald ore and diamond ore.
Naturally generated Diamond Ore, Redstone Ore and Lapis Lazuli Ore found in a canyon. Check the image for seed and cords.
Multiple ores found in one cave.

Caves and Cliffs development[edit]

21w07a texture comparison.
The now and soon texture comparison of the ores and their deepslate variants (Before 21w08a).
An image showing another texture for deepslate diamond ore which improves on blending the ore texture with the base deepslate.
An image showing new iron and diamond texture.
An image showing another texture for deepslate Diamond Ore which improves on blending the ore texture with the base deepslate.
21w08a texture comparison.
21w10a texture comparison.
Ore distribution in 21w07a.
Ore distribution in 21w08a/21w08b.
Ore distribution in 21w10a.

Trivia[edit]

Ancient debris has two ways to generate, similar to gold ore.
Since it is exclusive to only one Overworld biome, Emerald ore is actually rarer than ancient debris per chunk.

References[edit]

↑ http://i.imgur.com/djSvZ.png
↑ https://twitter.com/jeb_/status/204619936616808451
↑ snapshot 12w21a/b lang/en_US.lang: tile.oreRuby.name=Ruby Ore
↑ https://twitter.com/jeb_/status/205641953742819328

Blocks

[2] This refers to coal ore blocks spawned in ore veins and not as parts of fossils or mansion forges.

[3] Redstone has the same layer and line-size statistics as Diamond, but is generated eight times per chunk as opposed to once.

[4] Instead of multi-block veins, emerald ore is placed in scattered blocks.

[5] Unlike most other ores, lapis lazuli's frequency peaks around layer 15, and slowly tapers off above and below.

[6] This refers to coal ore blocks spawned in ore veins and not as parts of fossils or mansion forges.

[7] Instead of multi-block veins, emerald ore is placed in scattered blocks.

[8] Deepslate variants only generate in deepslate blobs. Coal, Copper and Emerald Deepslate Ores aren't naturally generated.

[9] Unlike most other ores, lapis lazuli's frequency peaks around layer 15, and slowly tapers off above and below.

[10] Deepslate variants replace only Deepslate.

[11] This refers to coal ore blocks spawned in ore veins and not as parts of fossils or mansion forges.

[12] Instead of multi-block veins, emerald ore is placed in scattered blocks.

[13] Deepslate variants only generate under layer 0. Coal, Copper and Emerald Deepslate Ores aren't naturally generated.

[14] The block which allows to distinguish its large ore veins.

[15] Deepslate variants replace only Deepslate and Tuff. However, Coal and Copper don't become their deepslate variants when replacing Tuff.

[16] While Coal, Copper and Emerald technically can replace Deepslate and Tuff, as they do not generate on layers under 0, they can't replace them naturally.

[17] Nether quartz spawns equally in all parts of the Nether.

[18] Unlike most other ores, ancient debris' frequency peaks at layer 15, and quickly tapers off above and below.

[1] ttp://i.imgur.com/djSvZ.png

[19] ttps://twitter.com/jeb_/status/204619936616808451

[en_US_12w21-20] snapshot 12w21a/b lang/en_US.lang: tile.oreRuby.name=Ruby Ore

[21] ttps://twitter.com/jeb_/status/205641953742819328

[1]

[a]

[b]

[c]

[d]

[e]

[f]

[g]

[h]

[i]

[j]

[k]

[l]

[m]

[n]

[o]

[p]

[q]

[2]

[3]

[4]

Ore

Contents

Usage[edit]

Smelting ingredient[edit]

Further uses[edit]

Availability[edit]

Overworld[edit]

The Nether[edit]

History[edit]

Gallery[edit]

Caves and Cliffs development[edit]

Trivia[edit]

References[edit]

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