Minecraft: Java Edition

Although this product has been released, it remains under active development - information may change frequently and could be outdated or irrelevant.

This page is for the Java Edition. For the Windows 10 version, see Minecraft: Bedrock Edition.

Minecraft: Java Edition

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Developers
	Mojang
Engines
	LWJGL
	Java
Release dates
Windows	November 18, 2011
macOS (OS X)	November 18, 2011
Linux	November 18, 2011
Reception
Metacritic	93
IGDB	84
Taxonomy
Microtransactions	None
Modes	Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Perspectives	First-person
Genres	Survival, Open world
Art styles	Voxel art
Series	Minecraft

Minecraft
Minecraft: Java Edition	2011
Minecraft: Pi Edition	2013
Minecraft: Story Mode (series)
Minecraft: Education Edition	2016
Minecraft: Bedrock Edition	2016
Minecraft Dungeons	2020
Minecraft Legends	2023

Minecraft, later known as Minecraft Java Edition, is a first-person survival sandbox game developed by Mojang and published by Microsoft and released on November 18, 2011 for Windows, OS X and Linux.

Key points

Active and dedicated modding scene, responsible for many fixes, tools and additional content.

Without mods, likely to perform worse than the Windows 10 Edition on low-end hardware.

General information

Official Bug Tracker

Minecraft Help Center

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Official website
Amazon.co.uk
Microsoft Store		Included in Xbox Game Pass for PC
Amazon.com (unavailable)

All versions require a Microsoft account.

Purchase includes access to Minecraft: Bedrock Edition.

Free trial

A free trial is available.

Essential improvements

Utilities

• MultiMC - a custom open source launcher. It allows to have multiple, separate instances of Minecraft, each with their own mods, texture packs, saves, etc.
• Prism Launcher - a fork of MultiMC with a built-in mod downloader and installer for Modrinth and CurseForge mods, Quilt support, better linux packaging, proper Microsoft Account support on linux, and more community-centric.

Mods

Mod Loaders

• Forge is required by most mods, and is the standard for a modded setup. Can be automatically installed with the 'Install Forge' option in MultiMC or Prism Launcher. Incompatible with Fabric.
• Fabric is required for many mods for Minecraft 1.14 and above. Can be automatically installed with the 'Install Fabric' option in MultiMC or Prism Launcher. Incompatible with Forge.
• Quilt is a hard-fork of Fabric, focusing on a faster development pace and being more community-centric. Can be automatically installed with the 'Install Quilt' option in Prism Launcher. Incompatible with Forge.

Mods

• OptiFine is a proprietary optimization mod, which also adds support for HD textures, shader packs, and graphical improvements. Compatible with Forge natively and Fabric through OptiFabric. Incompatible with Sodium.
• Performant is a proprietary general-purpose optimization mod for Forge that focuses on optimizing entities and block updates along with adding mechanisms to handle and reduce lag. Requires Forge on 1.14.4+. Incompatible with Lithium or Lithium ports, such as Roadrunner.
• The Sodium Collection is a collection of open source optimization mods that improve performance even more so than OptiFine and Performant, but only work with 1.16+. Out of the box they do not have as much functionality as OptiFine, but LambdAurora's list of OptiFine alternatives or the Fabulously Optimized modpack (inspired by that list) can be used to match or exceed OptiFine's feature-set. Requires Fabric or Quilt, incompatible with OptiFine. The main mods are:
  • Sodium, for rendering engine and client-side optimizations
  • Lithium, for game logic/server optimizations
  • Phosphor, for lighting engine optimizations
  • Hydrogen, discontinued. See FerriteCore
• FerriteCore is an open source memory usage optimization mod. The Sodium team used to make a competing mod called Hydrogen, but they now recommend this mod instead. Requires Fabric or Quilt on 1.16.5+.
• Starlight is an open source lighting engine optimization mod that claims to have much better performance than Phosphor. Incompatible with Phosphor. Requires Fabric or Quilt on 1.15.2+.
• Fabulously Optimized is a modpack that includes many of the above listed mods, such as Sodium, Lithium, FerriteCore, Starlight, and Iris (for Shader Pack support), as well as dozens of other optimization and graphics mods. It is inspired by LambdAurora's list of OptiFine alternatives, and which mods to include are now usually decided by community votes on their github page. Requires Fabric or Quilt on 1.16.5+.

Java version

The Windows version of Minecraft includes Java (used for Minecraft only). Installing Java manually is not necessary.

Minecraft benefits from using the latest version of Java. Using 64-bit Java on 64-bit operating systems is strongly recommended.

RAM allocation

The official launcher allows to easily allocate RAM and set other Java arguments. The manual methods are detailed below.

OS X memory allocation[citation needed]
Right-click on Minecraft.app in Finder and choose Show Package Contents. Go to Contents and open info.plist using TextEdit. Modify -Xms ### MB - replace ### with the minimum amount of memory Minecraft can use (in megabytes). Modify -Xmx $$$ MB - replace $$$ with the maximum amount of memory Minecraft can use (in megabytes).

Linux memory allocation[citation needed]
Go to the location of Minecraft.jar. Run the command java -jar Xms###MB -Xmx$$$MB Minecraft.jar Replace ### with the minimum amount of memory Minecraft can use (in megabytes). Replace $$$ with the maximum amount of memory Minecraft can use (in megabytes).

Game data

In-game general settings.

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Windows	%APPDATA%\.minecraft\options.txt
macOS (OS X)	~/Library/Application Support/minecraft/options.txt
Linux	~/.minecraft/options.txt

launcher_profiles.json contains stored user profiles.

This game does not follow the XDG Base Directory Specification on Linux.

Save game data location

System	Location
Windows	%APPDATA%\.minecraft\saves
macOS (OS X)	~/Library/Application Support/minecraft/saves
Linux	~/.minecraft/saves

The server save is stored in world in the root directory of the server.

Saves are not compatible with Minecraft: Bedrock Edition.

Save game cloud syncing

System	Native	Notes
Xbox Cloud

Video

In-game video settings.

Graphics feature	State	WSGF	Notes
Widescreen resolution
Multi-monitor			Can be stretched to any window size.
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)		Limited to 30-110°. Can be set to any value by editing the configuration files. See Field of view (FOV).
Windowed		Set in options or toggle with F11.
Borderless fullscreen windowed		Use Borderless Gaming with regex: Minecraft (\d+\.\d+\.\d+|\d+w\d+\w). 1.13+ has native support.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
Anti-aliasing (AA)		Custom resource packs can be used when Fabulous graphics is enabled. Alternatively, use a shader pack with Fabulously Optimized (specifically, Iris), or see OptiFine.
Vertical sync (Vsync)
60 FPS and 120+ FPS		Frame rate cap is fully configurable.
High dynamic range display (HDR)		See the glossary page for potential alternatives.
Ray tracing (RT)		Requires shader mods.
Color blind mode		Custom resource packs can be used.

Field of view (FOV)

Dynamic FOV can be disabled in Minecraft 1.16+ in Accessibility Settings.

Set custom FOV[citation needed]
Go to the configuration file(s) location. Edit options.txt. Find fov and modify its value. Notes 1.0 = 110° FOV, 1.25 = 120°, 1.5 = 130°, 1.75 = 140°, 2.0 = 150°.

Input

In-game controls settings.

In-game mouse settings.

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping
Mouse acceleration		Support for Raw Input was added in 1.14. Also see Mouse acceleration.
Mouse sensitivity
Mouse input in menus
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Touchscreen optimised		Only usable in the inventory screen. Minecraft: Bedrock Edition has full support.
Controller
Controller support		Use Controllable (requires Forge) or Use Midnight Controls (requires Fabric).
Full controller support
Controller remapping
Controller sensitivity
Controller Y-axis inversion

Controller types

XInput-compatible controllers

Tracked motion controllers		Use Vivecraft or Minecrift Vive.
Button/gesture prompts

Generic/other controllers

Additional information
Controller hotplugging
Haptic feedback
Digital movement supported
Simultaneous controller+KB/M

Mouse acceleration

Disable Windows mouse acceleration

Minecraft uses a Windows function to control mouse movement, which can be modified. Modifying the function affects any software that relies on it (not just Minecraft). Download the MarkC Mouse Acceleration Fix. Extract its contents to a new folder. Open the Start menu and open the Control panel. Select Display from the list. Check the PC's text size (100%, 125%, 150%) in the display settings. Open the folder created in step 1. Open the sub-folder that fits the operating system. Double-click the .reg file that corresponds with the text display percentage. Confirm the changes to registry. Reboot the PC.

Audio

In-game audio settings.

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls		Detailed separate volume sliders
Surround sound		Up to 7.0 output.
Subtitles		No spoken dialog. Subtitles option actually refers to Closed Captions.
Closed captions		Most sounds have their own individual captions, which are displayed as text along with the directions they come from.
Mute on focus lost		Automatically pauses on focus lost, except in multiplayer.
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Localization is done by the community via Crowdin. An up-to-date page of all supported languages can be found here

A few joke "languages" are available as well, such as Pirate Speak, Shakespearean English, Klingon etc.

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English				Includes localizations for Australia, Canada, UK, USA and New Zealand
Afrikaans
Albanian
Arabic
Armenian
Asturian
Azerbaijani
Bashkir
Basque
Belarusian
Bosnian
Breton
Bulgarian
Catalan				Available in variants: Catalan and Valencian
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
Cornish
Croatian
Czech
Danish
Dutch				Includes localizations for Netherlands, Belgium, and Brabant, as well as Limburgish
Esperanto
Estonian
Faroese
Filipino
Finnish
French				Regular French and Occitan
Canadian French
Frisian
Galician
Georgian
German				Includes localizations for Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Bavaria, Upper Saxon, Franconia, and northern Germany (Low German)
Greek
Hawaiian
Hebrew
Hindi
Hungarian
Icelandic
Ido
Igbo
Indonesian
Interslavic				In the Latin alphabet
Irish
Italian				Available in variants: Italian, Lombardian, Friulian, and Venetian
Japanese
Kannada
Kazakh
Korean
Kurdish
Latin
Latvian
Lithuanian
Luxembourgish
Macedonian
Malay
Maltese
Mongolian
Nahuatl
Nepali
Northern Sami
Norwegian				Available in variants: Non-descript (i.e. Bokmål) and Nynorsk
Persian
Polish
Portuguese
Brazilian Portuguese
Ripuarian
Romanian
Russian				Available in modern and pre-revolutionary orthography
Scottish Gaelic
Serbian				Cyrillic orthography
Slovak
Slovenian
Somali
Spanish				Regular Spanish and Andalusian
Latin American Spanish				Includes localizations for Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Ecuador
Polish				Regular Polish and Silesian
Swedish				Regular Swedish and Elfdalian
Tagalog
Tamil
Tatar
Thai
Turkish
Ukrainian				Regular Ukrainian and Rusyn
Valencian
Vietnamese
Welsh
Yiddish
Yoruba

Network

In-game chat settings.

Requires a Microsoft account.

Multiplayer is not compatible with Minecraft: Bedrock Edition unless Geyser is used.

Multiplayer types

Type	Native	Players	Notes
Local play		2147483647	Usable with the Joypad mod. Max players is capped to the max integer size in Java.
LAN play		8	Maximum 8 players
Online play		2147483647	Max players is capped to the max integer size in Java.

Connection types

Type	Native	Notes
Matchmaking
Peer-to-peer
Dedicated
Self-hosting
Direct IP

Ports

Protocol	Port(s) and/or port range(s)
TCP	25565

Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) support status is unknown.

VR support

3D modes	State	Notes
Native 3D		3D Anaglyph support removed in 1.13 and above.
Nvidia 3D Vision		See Helix Mod: Minecraft 1.7.10 in 3D Vision.

Headsets
SteamVR		Use Vivecraft or Minecrift Vive.
Oculus VR (LibOVR)		Can also use Vivecraft or Minecrift.
Windows Mixed Reality		Use Vivecraft or Minecrift Vive.
OSVR

Devices
Tracked motion controllers		Use Vivecraft or Minecrift Vive. See Input for details.
Traditional controller		See Input for details.
Keyboard/Mouse

Play area
Seated
Standing
Room-scale		Use Vivecraft or Minecrift Vive.

Steam Deck

Minecraft is not available through SteamOS, but can be installed manually. Minecraft can be played through a launcher such as Prism Launcher (a fork of MultiMC).

Install Minecraft using Prism Launcher
Press Power then select Switch to Desktop Open Discover Search for and install Prism Launcher Log into Minecraft account (Mojang or Microsoft) Within Prism Launcher, open Settings → Minecraft, enable Close Prism Launcher after game window opens Within Steam, click Games → Add a Non-Steam Game to My Library, add Prism Launcher Return to Gaming Mode → Library → Non-Steam and launch Prism Launcher

Issues fixed

Mojang has created an Official Bug Tracker that can be used to find or report bugs.

Graphical issues

Black borders on Blocks[1]
Disable forced anisotropic filtering in the graphics card options menu, and only use the in-game Mip Maps settings.

Other information

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
OpenGL	3.2, 4.4, 4.5
Vulkan		Undocumented officially. Use VulkanMod with the Fabric or Quilt mod loaders to enable it. Incompatible with Sodium or any other mod that relies on OpenGL rendering.

Executable	PPC	32-bit	64-bit	ARM	Notes
Windows
macOS (OS X)					PowerPC is only known to support up to 1.5.2, due to Java ≥6 not having PowerPC versions. ARM requires m1-multimc-hack and the MultiMC or Prism Launcher launchers.
Linux					PowerPC support for recent Minecraft versions require the MultiMC or Prism Launcher launchers. ARM requires Optifine.

System requirements

Windows

macOS (OS X)

Linux

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	7	10, 11
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i3-3210 3.2 GHz AMD A8-7600 3.1 GHz	Intel Core i5-4690 3.5 GHz AMD A10-7800 3.5 GHz
System memory (RAM)	2 GB	4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	1 GB	4 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce 400 series AMD Radeon HD 7000 series Intel HD Graphics 4000 AMD Radeon R5 series OpenGL 4.4 compatible Shader model 5.0 support	Nvidia GeForce 700 series AMD Radeon Rx 200 series OpenGL 4.5 compatible

macOS (OS X)
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	10.14.5 (Mojave)
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i3-3210 3.2 GHz AMD A8-7600 3.1 GHz	Intel Core i5-4690 3.5 GHz AMD A10-7800 3.5 GHz
System memory (RAM)	2 GB	4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	1 GB	4 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce 400 series AMD Radeon HD 7000 series Intel HD Graphics 4000 AMD Radeon R5 series OpenGL 4.4 compatible Shader model 5.0 support	Nvidia GeForce 700 series AMD Radeon Rx 200 series OpenGL 4.5 compatible

PowerPC support was retired with version 1.6.

Linux
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	3.0	5.0+
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i3-3210 3.2 GHz AMD A8-7600 3.1 GHz	Intel Core i5-4690 3.5 GHz AMD A10-7800 3.5 GHz
System memory (RAM)	2 GB	4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	1 GB	4 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce 400 series AMD Radeon HD 7000 series Intel HD Graphics 4000 AMD Radeon R5 series OpenGL 4.4 compatible Shader model 5.0 support	Nvidia GeForce 700 series AMD Radeon Rx 200 series OpenGL 4.5 compatible
Other	Any modern distro	Up to date version of OpenJDK or Oracle Java