| Rarity color |
Common |
|---|---|
| Renewable |
Yes |
| Stackable |
Yes (16) |
| Size |
Height: 0.25 Blocks |
Snowballs are throwable combat items.
Contents
Obtaining[]
Mining[]
A shovel without the Silk Touch enchantment can get 4 snowballs by breaking a snow block, and 1–8 snowballs by breaking or blasting snow layers – one per layer. The Fortune enchantment does not affect these amounts.
Creepers / TNT[]
Creeper and TNT explosions leave snowballs in the resulting debris field if near snow.
Ravagers[]
On Bedrock Edition, Ravagers destroy snow layers, dropping snowballs.
Pistons[]
On Bedrock Edition, a block or piston head pushed into the position of snow layers destroys the snow layers, dropping snowballs. 1-3 layers drops 1 snowball, 4-5 layers drops 2 snowballs, 6-7 layers drops 3 snowballs and 8 layers drops 4 snowballs.
Water[]
On Bedrock Edition water flowing onto snow layers destroys the snow layers, dropping snowballs, in the same quantity as for pistons. Attempting to waterlog a snow layer destroys the snow layer, dropping nothing.
Mob loot[]
Snow golems drop 0–15 snowballs upon death.
Chest loot[]
| Item | Structure | Container | Quantity | Chance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Java Edition | ||||
| Snowball | Village | Snowy house chest | 1–7 | 66.3% |
| Bedrock Edition | ||||
| Snowball | Village | Snowy house chest | 1–7 | 66.3% |
Usage[]
Crafting ingredient[]
| Name | Ingredients | Crafting recipe |
|---|---|---|
| Snow Block | Snowball |
Combat[]
Throwing a snowball on a pig animation.
Snowballs can be thrown by using them, similar to an egg. They are affected by gravity.
They deal 3
to blazes but they deal no damage to other mobs. Mobs still have knockback and give the same effect as if they were being damaged (for example, zombified piglins who are hit by snowballs become aggressive toward the attacker), but players are unaffected.[1][until JE Combat Tests]
When fighting the ender dragon, end crystals are able to be destroyed by snowballs being thrown at them.
Dispenser[]
Snowballs can be fired from dispensers.
Sounds[]
| Sound | Subtitles | Source | Description | Namespaced ID | Translation key | Volume | Pitch | Attenuation distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Snowball flies | ? | ? | entity.snowball.throw | subtitles.entity.snowball.throw | ? | (<1.0) | 16 | |
| Snowball flies | ? | ? | entity.snow_golem.shoot | subtitles.entity.snowball.throw | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Dispensed item | Blocks | Dispenser shoots | block.dispenser.launch | subtitles.block.dispenser.dispense | 1.0 | 1.2 | 16 |
Advancements[]
| Icon | Advancement | In-game description | Parent | Actual requirements (if different) | Namespaced ID |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Bullseye | Hit the bullseye of a Target block from at least 30 meters away | Take Aim | Be at least 30 blocks away when the center of a target is shot with a projectile horizontally by the player. | adventure/bullseye
|
Data values[]
ID[]
| Item | Namespaced ID | Form | Translation key |
|---|---|---|---|
| Snowball | snowball | Item | item.minecraft.snowball |
| Entity | Namespaced ID | Entity tags (JE) | Translation key |
|---|---|---|---|
| Snowball | snowball | impact_projectiles | entity.minecraft.snowball |
| Item | Namespaced ID | Numeric ID | Form | Translation key |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Snowball | snowball | 332 | Item | item.snowball.name |
| Entity | Namespaced ID | Numeric ID | Translation key |
|---|---|---|---|
| Snowball | snowball | 81 | entity.snowball.name |
Entity Data[]
Snowballs have entity data that define various properties of the entity.
- Entity data
- Tags common to all entities
- Tags common to all projectiles
- Item: The item to render as, may be absent.
- Tags common to all items
Video[]
History[]
| Java Edition Alpha | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| v1.0.5 |  Added snowballs.
| ||||
| Snowballs are used to craft snow blocks. | |||||
| Snowballs could stack up to 64. | |||||
| v1.0.5_01 | Snowballs now stack to 8. | ||||
| Added a new snowball sound effect. | |||||
| Harvesting snowballs now requires a shovel. | |||||
| v1.0.6 | Snowballs now stack up to 16. | ||||
| Thrown snowballs no longer disappear. | |||||
| v1.1.1 | It is no longer possible to obtain more than four snowballs from a solid snow block (the player was previously able to obtain 4-6 snowballs per snow block allowing an infinite number of snowballs to be made). | ||||
| Java Edition Beta | |||||
| Sound Update | The throw sound of snowballs has now been changed. | ||||
| Java Edition | |||||
| 1.0.0 | Beta 1.9 Prerelease | Ghasts no longer shoot flaming snowballs. | |||
| RC1 | Snowball throwing sound was changed. | ||||
| 1.9 | 15w32a | Snowballs no longer damage the ender dragon. | |||
| 15w36b | Snowballs now produce particles when thrown at an entity. | ||||
| 15w49a | Snowballs, as well as all projectiles, now take the thrower's motion into account when fired. | ||||
| 1.11 | 16w32a | The entity ID has now been changed from Snowball to snowball. | |||
| 1.13 | 17w47a | Prior to The Flattening, this item's numeral ID was 332. | |||
| 1.14 | 18w43a |  The texture of snowballs has now been changed. | |||
| 18w49a | Snowballs can now be found in chests in snowy tundra village houses. | ||||
| 19w08a | The texture of snowballs has now been changed, once again. | ||||
| 1.16.2 | Pre-Release 1 | Snowballs are now affected by bubble columns. | |||
| Upcoming Java Edition | |||||
| Combat Tests | Combat Test 4 | Snowballs now stack to 64, once again. | |||
| Snowballs now have 4-tick cooldown and are not rendered for the first 2 ticks to prevent screen flickering. | |||||
| Pocket Edition Alpha | |||||
| v0.2.0 | Added snowballs. They are currently unobtainable and serve no purpose. | ||||
| v0.3.0 | Snowballs now drop as an item when mining snow blocks and snow layers. | ||||
| Snowballs can be used to craft snow blocks. | |||||
| v0.4.0 | Snowballs can now be thrown. | ||||
| v0.11.0 | build 14 | Snowballs are now available in the creative inventory. | |||
| v0.12.0 | Snowballs now deal damage to blazes. | ||||
| v0.12.1 | build 1 | Added snow golems, which drop snowballs. | |||
| Bedrock Edition | |||||
| 1.10.0 | beta 1.10.0.3 | The texture of snowballs has now been changed. | |||
| 1.11.0 | beta 1.11.0.1 | Snowballs can now be found in some snowy tundra village house chests. | |||
| beta 1.11.0.5 | The texture of snowballs has now been changed, once again. | ||||
| Legacy Console Edition | |||||
| TU1 | CU1 | 1.0 | Patch 1 | 1.0.1 | Added snowballs. |
| 1.90 | The texture of snowballs has now been changed. | ||||
| New Nintendo 3DS Edition | |||||
| 0.1.0 | Added snowballs. | ||||
Issues[]
Issues relating to "Snowball" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.
Trivia[]
- A thrown snowball faces the player in the first-person view and appears horizontally rotated in third-person view. This is the case for all throwable items (ender pearls, eggs, snowballs, and all throwable potions).
