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Snow, or top snow in Bedrock Edition, is a ground cover block that is commonly caused by snowfall.

Obtaining

Destroying snow with a shovel yields two snowballs, plus an additional one snowball per extra layer on top (meaning a three tall layer drops four snowballs). If it is destroyed with anything other than a shovel, nothing is dropped.

Block Snow (layer)
Hardness ?
Tool
Breaking time[A]
Default ?
Wooden ?
Stone ?
Iron ?
Diamond ?
Netherite ?
Golden ?
  1. Times are for unenchanted tools as wielded by players with no status effects, measured in seconds. For more information, see Breaking § Speed.

Natural generation

Snow naturally generates in snowy biomes – ice plains, ice spikes, cold taiga, frozen river and cold beach – and in the extreme hills biome above layer 95.

Snow will generate in single layers in the Java Edition, and can generate in multiple layers in Pocket Edition.

Snowfall

In snowy biomes or in cold biomes at varying layers, it will snow instead of rain, and while it is snowing, snow will generate on random non-transparent blocks with a block light level of 10 or less, with the exception of packed ice.

In Pocket Edition, multiple snow layers are built up naturally during snowfall; in the Java Edition, snowfall only creates one layer.

Snow golems

See also: Snow farming

Snow golems generate a trail of snow in snowy, cold, and some medium biomes, or any non-dry biome in Pocket Edition.

Crafting

Ingredients Crafting recipe
Snow

Usage

Redstone Lamp melt pattern

Powered redstone lamps melting nearby snow.

Cover

If the snow is on a grass block, podzol or on mycelium, the ground cover will turn white on the top and around the sides. Snow will not damage tilled and hydrated field areas – it cannot be placed on farmland. Gravity-affected blocks like sand and gravel will not fall if the block below them has snow on it, but they will replace a snow layer if they fall onto it.

In Bedrock Edition, top snow can occupy the same space as one-block flowers, mushrooms, and one-block ferns and tall grass, and can be layered and mined normally.

Melting

Snow will melt if there is a block light level of 12 or more. In Bedrock Edition, it will also melt in dry biomes, regardless of block light or daylight level. If there are multiple layers, all layers melt at once; the snow levels do not gradually reduce in height.

Falling block

In Bedrock Edition, top snow is affected by gravity and will fall if unsupported. On leaves topped with a layer of snow, little particles of snow appear to fall through the leaves from the snow layer.

Data values

A snow layer has the ID name minecraft:snow_layer.

Block state

See also: Block states

Java Edition:

Name Default value Allowed values Description
layers11
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
The number of layers thick.
Each layer adds two pixels to the block height, and each layer after the first adds two pixels to the collision box.

Bedrock Edition:

NameMetadata Bits Default value Allowed valuesValues for
Metadata Bits
Description
height0x1
0x2
0x4
00
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
The number of layers in addition to the bottom layer.
covered_bit0x8falsetrue
false
0
1
True if the snow is covering a plant.

Video

Snow/video

History

alpha
1.0.4Snowfall added to maps only in winter mode. When creating a new save, a map had a 1/4 chance of having worldwide snowfall. When falling on exposed land, a thin snow layer was created.
1.0.5A player could easily harvest snow by placing a block of water. By doing so, the player received a large amount of snowballs with little effort. Fixed in Alpha 1.0.5_01.
1.2.0Due to a missing feature in the Halloween Update, snow did not regenerate.
beta
1.5Snow regeneration returned as part of the new weather features.[1]
Snow can occur in arctic biomes.
1.8Snow biomes were temporarily removed as Notch was trying to improve them.
release
1.0.0Snow biomes were re-added.
1.1Snow occurs in tundra biomes, as well as arctic biomes.
1.3.112w21aSnow was made available in the creative inventory.
1.513w05aSnow can be crafted and is obtainable in Survival mode. It is possible to stack snow to create layers thicker than 1.
1.814w28bNumber of snowballs dropped increased from 1-8 to 2-9, depending on thickness.
Pocket Edition Alpha
0.3.0Added snow to the world generation.
0.8.0Added snow to the Creative mode inventory.
0.12.1build 1Snow can now be built up to multiple layers.
Snow is now affected by gravity, so that unsupported snow layers show falling dust particles.
Snow can now be placed inside flowers, mushrooms and tall grass.
Snow is now obtained by using a shovel on it. Previously, snow was mined like any dirt-type block.
Bedrock Edition
1.2Snow now generate a extreme hills biome.
Legacy Console Edition
TU1CU1 1.0 Patch 1Patch 1Added snow.
TU54CU44 1.52 Patch 24Patch 4Snow can now be placed on top of upside-down stairs.

Issues

Issues relating to "Snow" or "Snow layer" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.

Trivia

  • Snow can be stacked to a full block beside a cactus without destroying the cactus.
  • Attempting to place torches on snow will replace the snow with a torch.
  • Snow on a block of soul sand makes the soul sand act like a normal block.
  • Snow layers of 2 to 7 thickness prevent hostile mobs from spawning.
  • In Spectator mode, If you position the player at the correct height, you can see the snowy texture of the top of grass blocks.

Gallery

References


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