Minecraft Enchantments Guide: The Best Enchantments For Your Gameplay

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Erin Jamieson

Erin Jamieson grew up playing with Minecraft with your cousins at family get-togethers, and her love for the game remains today. For the creative side of constructing new buildings, to searching for the best techniques for Survival Mode, Erin brings passion and first hand experience.

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Maybe it was inevitable; maybe it was a pandemic boost, but online games are getting a spotlight– especially games like Minecraft, with features as varied as enchantments to guide players through an immersive experience.

Most of us appreciate a little magic– whether literally or metaphorically– in our gameplay. It seems Minecraft, enchantments aside, has the ability to not only retain avid players but draw even more month after month.

As of late April 2021, Minecraft was approaching 140 million monthly active users–not users overall, but gamers regularly playing. Billions of downloads from the best mods, tweaks, and the best Minecraft worlds power this game.

While it’s not just Minecraft that’s seemingly cast a spell– other games like Roblox, also with an active online modding community, with multiplayer options, have also benefited– there’s no doubt, nevertheless, that Minecraft continues to capture captivated gamers around the world.

But to capture some that own magic– and open up some new features, you may be missing out if you’re not using enchantments in your Minecraft game. Consider this your guide to enchantments in Minecraft– from how to use the enchantments table, what to use enchantments for, and a candid look at both the most powerful and most useless enchantments in Minecraft.

What are Enchantments?

Enchantments in Minecraft essentially enhance the power and use of Minecraft items, but even game mechanics, like how quickly you can travel, breathe underwater, and many more.

One of the most popular ways to use enchantments is through increasing the use of weapons, your own protection against enemies, and both your accuracy and force.

Think of enchantments this way: by enchanting, you’re increasing all the game’s features, as well as all of the resources and items at your disposal. Enchantments aren’t cheats or mods: there are certain steps you must take in order to reap the benefits of enchantments in Minecraft. It’s a way to upgrade items and, in some cases, may just make the difference between losing all or surviving.

One of my favorite aspects about enchantments? They offer you not only a way to make more of what you have but, in some sense, explore the game in a new way.

How do you use the Anvil to enchant?

Before you get too excited about the different types of enchantments in Minecraft, though, you’ll have to familiarize yourself with the enchanting table in Minecraft or the anvil.

The anvil, available to only the Bedrock version, is a little limited, in fact, far more limited than the more expansive crafting table available to other versions of Minecraft. With the anvil, you can enchant only a handful of items: flint and steel, carrot and a stick, a basic shield, carved pumpkins, shears, and mob heads. It’s important to note that no other items, including weapons, can be enchanted this way.

Gathering Required Materials

First, you’ll need to gather and likely craft your materials. To make an anvil, use a three-by-three crafting grid and place three iron blocks across the top row, one iron nugget in the central row (center slot), and three iron nuggets on the bottom.

If you don’t have an enchanted book in your possession, you’ll need to make one by acquiring a book and using an enchanting table; I’ll discuss how to use an enchanting table in the next section.

Using the Anvil

To enchant in the Bedrock edition using an anvil, start by placing the anvil on any clear block. Face in front of the anvil until the Repair and Name menu opens. From there, place your enchanted book in the second slot and the item which you wish to enchant in the first. Enchantments require experience points, and that varies depending on the item you’re trying to enchant.

How do you make an Enchantment Table?

I greatly prefer using the enchanting table, however, for most enchantments in Minecraft. It offers far more enchantment abilities, plus, to use an anvil in the first place, you’ll need an enchanted book– which, of course, is made using an enchanting table. In other words: enchanting tables, in some ways, make using an anvil to enchant rather useless if you have the ability to make or access such a table.

Gathering Required Materials

To make an enchanting table, you’ll need obsidian, books, and diamonds. As you can imagine, this is in and of itself a bit of a challenge.

Finding Diamonds and Obsidian

While Obsidian is fairly common and can be obtained by pouring water on a lava pool and mining using an ax, diamonds are rarer.

Diamonds can be found by mining with a pickaxe, most commonly in caves, in layers deep as 12 out of 16. There are different strategies for mining for diamonds, which include:

• Branch Mining– making two by two tunnels and digging out one out of every three blocks)
• Strip Mining – creating a cut-out, so you form a box around you and mine to continue to expand the region.

Occasionally, you may also find diamonds in chests, but this is relatively rare and should not be counted on as your sole strategy.

Creating or Finding Books

Books can be either made or found. To find a book in Minecraft, you’d need to find a bookshelf– and then books will be released on impact from an explosion. They may also be found in chests.

But the more practical solution is often simply making books yourself. You’ll need three pieces of paper and one item of leather. Arrange in a three-by-three grid, with paper in the first two slots in the second row and the first slot in the third row. Leather goes in the second slot on the bottom row.

Making an Enchantment Table

Now that you’ve successfully acquired all the materials required to make an enchantment table, place them in the correct formation using a crafting table (3 by 3 grid). To make an enchantment table, place a book in the middle slot in the first row, diamonds in the first and last slot in the second row, and obsidian in the middle slot of the second row, and all of the bottom row.

How do you use the Enchanting Table?

The enchantment table is not unlike the crafting table in how you use it. To enchant something, you place the item of your choice into the slot. However, enchanting requires an experience level of 1, and as that experience increases, you’ll unlock more enchantment options.

Experience Orbs System

This experience stems from the experience orb system. To even have access to this system, you need to start by collecting experience orbs. Luckily, if you’ve played even Minecraft for a little while, you’ll realize these orbs are quite common: with the exception of Silverfish, all mobs will drop these orbs, which are indicated by yellow and green glowing hues as they drop.

Continue to collect these orbs, as the more experience you have, the more options you’ll have (and potentially, your enchantments will be more powerful as well).

What are all the Minecraft Enchantments?

You can unlock many enchantments in Minecraft– from quite powerful to admittedly a bit underwhelming. Enchantments are categorized into general use, tools, and weapons.

General Use Enchantments

General use enchantments can be used for almost any item, including tools, armor, and weapons. These are actually some of my favorite enchantments in Minecraft, however simple, and include:

While not especially powerful or impressive, these general use enchantments, no doubt, come in handy for a variety of reasons.

Tools Enchantments

If I had to select the most practical enchantments, I might have to say they are the tools enchantments. These enchantments save you time by making the tools you already have more efficient.

Protective/ Armour Enchantments

These enchantments mostly serve to protect you under environmental conditions, including water, fire, and magma, among other things. They’re quite useful, but for particular situations.

Weapons Enchantments

Likely among the most popular Minecraft enchantments, of course, are those that can be used to enhance weapons. These enchantments are useful for both melee and weapons with range and improve how much damage they inflict, how much loot you can acquire, and efficiency.

What are the most powerful and most useless enchantments in Minecraft?

The most powerful and useless enchantments in Minecraft, in many respects, are a matter of perspective and how you play. While I find tool enchantments quite useful, others may prioritize weapons enchantments. That said, here are a few enchantments to consider for these categories.

Powerful Enchantments

I want to reframe the idea of power here, especially because power is often associated with weapons or inflicting damage. Here, I’m discussing power more in terms of the ability to expand your game. Some of my favorite enchantments for this category include Mending, Unbreaking, Looting, and Efficiency. These are all likely to be quite useful in a variety of situations you’ll find yourself in.

In terms of fending off mobs, consider investing in Infinity, Multishoot, and Sharpness.

Less Useful Enchantment

To be clear: I actually don’t consider any Minecraft enchantment to be entirely useless, even though some may label ones useless as such. These enchantments are simply ones I personally wouldn’t prioritize– and let’s face it, with countless things to do in Minecraft, from taming a fox to building and fending off mobs– you may not want to focus on every enchantment in Minecraft at once.

If you don’t find yourself exploring underwater for long, you’re obviously going to get less use out of enchantments like Respiration and trident-related enchantments, such as Loyalty, along with Riptide.

Another enchantment that probably won’t come in use as often is the Bane of Arthropods. While it’s by no means utterly useless, this enchantment is pretty limited in its use, plus there are other enchantments that allow you to inflict more damage to all you encounter, not just spiders and related creatures.

Frequently Asked Questions

Question: What is the rarest enchantment in Minecraft?

Answer: One of the rarest enchantments in Minecraft is looting– and it also happens to be quite useful. Looting increases how much loot you’ll get, and the enchantment improves up to three levels. No matter your Minecraft gameplay style, you’ll find that this enchantment, while rare, can be quite helpful.

Question: Can a bow have infinity and mending?

Answer: For certain items in Minecraft, you can combine more than one enchantment at a time. A bow can benefit from both infinity and mending, which extends use and provides you with an even greater incentive to explore.

Question: Is Mending better than Unbreaking?

Answer: Mending helps repair an item to its original state, and in some ways, you may find it a more useful enchantment; while not a better enchantment, mending is a bit more versatile in that it can be used for more items. I’d prioritize Mending over Unbreaking, but you should also take into account your personal preferences.

Question: Does Unbreaking 3 last forever?

Answer: At the highest level possible, the Unbreaking enchantment in Minecraft does not technically last forever. Like all enchantments, it does wear off– but, understandably, Minecraft players may think otherwise.

The average Unbreaking enchantment at this level lasts six thousand to six thousand and a hundred times for a diamond pick. This all has some variations depending on what you’re using this enchantment on, as well as a bit of chance.

Question: What is the most powerful weapon in Minecraft 2020?

Answer: Even with the best enchantments, it’s true that some weapons, at their core, are more powerful than others. The most powerful weapon in Minecraft is the diamond swords– which are quite durable too, but also expensive. Many do settle for a less rare iron sword, which is still quite powerful– no enchantments or even the best Minecraft mods required.

Final Thoughts

Enchantments can make tools, weapons, and other items more useful, expanding your gameplay in Minecraft and allowing you to get the most out of your resources, no matter how you play. But in order to take advantage of enchantments in Minecraft, you’ll need to know where to find resources in the first place– and what to do with them.

To start, I recommend checking out our guide to the best recipes in Minecraft, which covers everything from crafting tables to stairs, mining blocks, glow stones, and more.