How to Make Potions in Minecraft

Written by Jack Lloyd

Last Updated: May 25, 2022 Tested

This wikiHow teaches you how to brew potions in Minecraft. Potions can increase your strength, restore health, or even harm enemies depending on their ingredients.

Part 1

Part 1 of 6:

Gathering Your Supplies

1
Travel to the Nether. There are several ingredients that you can only gather while in the Nether, so you'll need to go to the Nether in order to kick off the potion-brewing process.
- The Nether is incredibly dangerous, especially for new players. Consider setting the game difficulty to "Peaceful" while in the Nether to avoid dying until you want Ghast tears, Magma cream, Blaze rods and Blaze Powder.
2
Gather Nether ingredients. You'll need to gather two things while in the Nether:
- Nether Wart: A mushroom-like item found on the ground in Nether fortresses. It grows on soul sand. (Can be found in Nether Fortress or Bastion Remnant as of 1.16)
- Blaze Rods: Blazes drop blaze rods when killed. You will need to bump the difficulty up to 'Easy' for Blazes to spawn.(Save some for crafting some Eyes of Ender later on)
- Soul Sand: If you wish to grow more Nether Wart in the Overworld, you can grab some of these brown blocks that look like they have faces trapped inside. (Not to be confused with Soul soil.)
Advertisement
3
Return to the overworld. Exit the Nether by going back to your Nether portal and hopping through it. Just make sure a Ghast doesn't put it out. You can also use a respawn anchor, which is made with crying obsidian and glowstone.
4
Craft your brewing stand and place it on the ground. Open your crafting table, place three cobblestone blocks in the bottom row of the crafting grid, place a blaze rod in the middle square, and move the brewing stand to your inventory. Select it in your inventory, then select the ground to place the brewing stand.
- In Minecraft PE (Pocket Edition), just tap the brewing stand icon and then tap 1 x to create the brewing stand.
- On the console version of Minecraft, select the brewing stand and press A on the Xbox or X on the PlayStation).
5
Craft glass bottles. Open the crafting table, place a glass block in the middle-left, bottom-middle, and middle-right squares, and move the stack of three glass bottles into your inventory.
- In Minecraft PE, just tap the glass bottle icon and tap 3 x.
- On the console version of Minecraft, select the glass bottle icon and press A on the Xbox or X on the PlayStation. (To get glass bottles; you can craft it from 3 glass (smelt 3 sands in a furnace), you can get it from fishing or even from killing a witch or looting)
6
Create blaze powder. Open the crafting table, place a blaze rod in any of the squares, and move the resulting powder into your inventory (probably best not to use it all up. You'll need some later).
- In Minecraft PE, tap the blaze powder icon, then tap 2 x.
- On the console version, select the blaze powder icon and press A on the Xbox or X on the PlayStation.
7
Find secondary ingredients. Base potions don't have any effects, and need to have another ingredient added to make them do something. The ingredients you choose will dictate what kind of potion you create.
- Spider Eye - Dropped by Spiders, Cave Spiders, and Witches. Used for poison potions.
- Glistering Melon - You can craft a glistening melon by surrounding a Melon with eight Gold Nuggets in the Crafting Grid. Used for instant health potions.
- Golden Carrot - Can be crafted by surrounding a single Carrot with eight Gold Nuggets in the Crafting Grid. Used for night-vision potions.
- Blaze Powder - Can be crafted by crafting a single Blaze Rod, dropped by Blaze enemies. This will produce two Blaze Powders. Used for strength potions.
- Fermented Spider Eye - Can be crafted from a Spider Eye, Mushroom, and Sugar. Used for weakness potions.
- Pufferfish - Can be caught by fishing or (As of Update Aquatic) in a Water Bucket. Used for water-breathing potions.
- Magma Cream - Dropped by defeated Magma Cubes, or can be crafted by combining Blaze Powder (Crafted from Blaze rods) and a Slimeball (Dropped by Slime). Used for fire resistance potions.
- Sugar - This can be crafted from single pieces of Sugar Cane. Used for speed potions.
- Ghast Tear - Dropped by Ghasts. (Can be difficult to obtain since Ghasts tend to hover over lava). Used for health regeneration potions.
- Rabbit's Foot - Dropped by defeating Rabbits (2.5% drop rate). Used for leaping potions.
- Phantom Membrane - Dropped by phantoms. Used in potions of slow falling.
- Turtle Shell - Crafted by placing 5 turtle scutes in a helmet formation in a crafting table. Scutes are obtained by first breeding turtles, waiting for the eggs to hatch and the babies to grow into adults, then killing the resulting adult turtles. Used in potions of the turtle master.
8
Collect potion modifiers. You can further modify a potion by adding another ingredient after it is created. This will usually increase the amount of time the potion is active. You can also make potions throwable so that they splash on impact.
- Redstone - You can find Redstone by mining Redstone Ore. This will typically yield 4-5 Redstone. This can make potions last longer.
- Glowstone Dust - Can be obtained by breaking a block of Glowstone. You can receive up to four Glowstone Dusts per block of Glowstone. This can make potions stronger, but shorter.
- Gunpowder - This can be found by defeating Creepers, Ghasts, and Witches. This makes potions throwable.
- Fermented Spider Eye - This secondary ingredient can also be used to further modify potions. It typically reverses or corrupts the effects of the potion. (Crafted from a Spider eye and brown mushroom)
- Dragon's Breath - Can be obtained by using an empty glass bottle on the Ender Dragon's purple breath attack. This makes potions linger on the ground.
9
Fill your glass bottles. Find a water source (Like a Cauldron full of water or body of water), equip the glass bottles, and select the water to fill your glass bottles with it. Once you have a stack of three glass bottles, you're ready to begin making potions.

Part 2

Part 2 of 6:

Brewing Potions

1
Open your brewing stand (Crafted from a blaze rod and 3 cobblestone). Select the brewing stand while facing it to open the brewing stand.
2
Place your water bottles in the stand. Click and drag your bottles into the three squares at the bottom of the page.
- In Minecraft PE, tap a square, then tap the water bottle icon on the left side of the page.
- On the console version, press Y or triangle with the water bottle selected.
3
Add a Nether wart. Place the Nether wart in the top square of the crafting page.
4
Add blaze powder. Click and drag blaze powder onto the top-left square in the brewing stand window. Doing so will prompt the base potion—known as an "Awkward Potion"—to begin brewing.
- Skip this step in Minecraft PE.
- On the console version, just press Y or triangle with the blaze powder selected.
5
Place the Awkward Potion(s) back in the brewing stand. Now that you have the Awkward Potion as a base, you can add a secondary ingredient to modify the potion.
6
Add a secondary ingredient. Place your secondary ingredient (e.g., a rabbit foot) in the square at the top of the brewing stand. The potion will begin brewing again.
- Your blaze powder from the first round should be good for 20 brew cycles.
7
Place the potion in your inventory. Your potion is now ready to be consumed.

Part 3

Part 3 of 6:

Making Potions with Positive Effects

1

Add your secondary ingredient to create your desired potions. With the three Awkward Potions in the bottom part of the Brewing Grid, place an ingredient from the chart below in the top square of the Brewing Grid to achieve your desired potion:

*Positive Potions*
Potion	Base	Ingredient	Effect	Duration
Healing	Awkward Potion	Glistering Melon	Restores ♥♥	Instant
Night Vision	Awkward Potion	Golden Carrot	See in the dark	3 min
Strength	Awkward Potion	Blaze Powder	30% damage boost	3 min
Water Breathing	Awkward Potion	Pufferfish	Breathe underwater	3 min
Fire Resist	Awkward Potion	Magma Cream	Immune to fire and lava	3 min
Swiftness	Awkward Potion	Sugar	20% speed boost	3 min
Regeneration	Awkward Potion	Ghast Tear	Heal one ♥ every two seconds	45 sec
Leaping	Awkward Potion	Rabbit's Foot	Jump 1/2 block higher	3 min
Slow Falling	Awkward Potion	Phantom Membrane	Falls slower and immune to fall damage	1.5 min
Turtle Master	Awkward Potion	Turtle Shell	Slows the player by 60% and reduces incoming damage by 60%	20 sec

Part 4

Part 4 of 6:

Creating Potions with Negative Effects

1

Add your secondary ingredient to create your desired potions. With the three Awkward Potions in the bottom part of the Brewing Grid, place an ingredient from the chart below in the top square of the Brewing Grid to achieve your desired potion:

*Negative Potions*
Potion	Base	Ingredient	Effect	Duration
Poison	Awkward Potion	Spider Eye	Takes away one ♥ every three seconds	45 sec
Weakness	Mundane Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	50% reduction in damage	1.5 min

Part 5

Part 5 of 6:

Further Modifying Your Potions

1

Add the modifier ingredient to the potion you want to change. You can change the potions you create using additional ingredients to affect them in a variety of different ways, including creating all-new potions. See the chart below to see how to modify the potions you just created:

*Modified Positive Potions*
Potion	Base	Ingredient	Effect	Duration
Healing II	Healing Potion	Glowstone Dust	Restores ♥♥♥♥	Instant
Night Vision+	Night Vision Potion	Redstone	See in the dark	8 min
Invisibility	Night Vision Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	Makes invisible	3 min
Invisibility+	Invisibility	Redstone	Makes invisible	8 min
Strength II	Strength Potion	Glowstone Dust	160% damage boost	1.5 min
Strength+	Strength Potion	Redstone	30% damage boost	8 min
Water Breathing+	Water Breathing Potion	Redstone	Breathe underwater	8 min
Fire Resist+	Fire Resist Potion	Redstone	Immune to fire and lava	8 min
Speed II	Speed Potion	Glowstone Dust	40% speed boost	1.5 min
Speed+	Speed Potion	Redstone	20% speed boost	8 min
Regeneration II	Regeneration Potion	Glowstone Dust	Heal one ♥ every second	16 sec
Regeneration+	Regeneration Potion	Redstone	Heal one ♥ every two seconds	2 min
Leaping II	Leaping Potion	Glowstone Dust	Jump 1 and 1/2 blocks higher	1.5 min
Leaping+	Leaping Potion	Redstone	Jump 1/2 a block higher	8 min
Slow Falling+	Slow Falling Potion	Redstone	Falls slower and immune to fall damage	4 min
Turtle Master II	Turtle Master Potion	Glowstone Dust	Slows the player by 90% and reduces incoming damage by 80%	20 sec
Turtle Master+	Turtle Master Potion	Redstone	Slows the player by 60% and reduces incoming damage by 60%	40 sec

*Modified Negative Potions*
Potion	Base	Ingredient	Effect	Duration
Poison II	Poison Potion	Glowstone Dust	Takes away one ♥ every second	22 sec
Poison+	Poison Potion	Redstone	Takes away one ♥ every three seconds	2 min
Weakness+	Strength Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	50% reduction in damage	4 min
Harming	Poison/Healing Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	Deals ♥♥♥ damage	Instant
Harming II	Poison II/Healing II Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	Deals ♥♥♥♥♥♥ damage	Instant
Harming II	Harming Potion	Glowstone Dust	Deals ♥♥♥♥♥♥ damage	Instant
Slowness	Resist Fire/Speed Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	Slows movement speed	1.5 min
Slowness+	Resist Fire+/Speed+ Potion	Fermented Spider Eye	Slows movement speed	3 min
Slowness+	Slowness Potion	Glowstone Dust	Slows movement speed	3 min

Part 6

Part 6 of 6:

Making a Throwable Potion

1
Making a splash Potion. A splash potion is a potion that can be thrown. When thrown, a particle cloud with the effect of the potion (eg. slowness, speed, etc.) will appear for around a second. You can make this by the combining any potion from the tables above with a piece of gunpowder. ^{[1]
X
Research source}
- It is possible to turn Awkward and Mundane potions into splash potions.^{[2]
  X
  Research source}
2
On top of that, you can make a lingering potion. A lingering potion is kind of like a splash potion, but the effect cloud lasts longer and "lingers" in place. To make a lingering potion, put Dragon's Breath (Received by using a glass bottle when the Ender Dragon breathes fire.) in the top slot of a brewing stand and put one splash potion in one of the top slots. ^{[3]
X
Research source}

Community Q&A

Question

How do I make a poison arrow in Minecraft?

Abigail Baskin

Community Answer

To make a poison arrow, put a lingering potion of poison in the middle of eight arrows.
Question

How do I find or make a dragon breath potion?

Community Answer

When the dragon spits out his breath, take a glass bottle and try right-clicking on the breath and you will obtain a dragon breath potion.
Question

How do I make a harming potion in Minecraft?

Community Answer

Make a poison potion, then add a fermented spider eye (mushroom, spider eye and sugar).

Warnings

If you accidentally do drink negative potions, drink a bucket of milk to get rid of the effects. You can get milk from a cow (Not the Mushroom cow, Regular cow). Keep in mind that it'll also make you lose positive effects too.

⧼thumbs_response⧽
Helpful 13 Not Helpful 2
Throwing too many lingering potions at once (especially in Creative Mode) will cause lag.

⧼thumbs_response⧽
Helpful 11 Not Helpful 3
Make sure not to accidentally drink negative potions, you'll probably die and possibly even lose all your stuff.

⧼thumbs_response⧽
Helpful 10 Not Helpful 5