Gravel

Renewable	Yes
Stackable	Yes (64)
Tool
Blast resistance	0.6
Hardness	0.6
Luminant	No
Transparent	No
Flammable	No
Catches fire from lava	No

Gravel is a block that is affected by gravity.

Obtaining[edit]

Natural generation[edit]

In the Nether, gravel generates naturally in large veins between Y=63 and Y=65 in one-block-deep layers. It often generates without blocks below it, in which case it falls when updated.

Gravel is also found as disks on beaches, near small pools of water, river, in gravelly mountains biomes covering most of the surface and underwater covering the bottom of normal, cold, frozen ocean biomes, and deep variants.

Gravel also generate as part of cold underwater ruins.

Gravel can generate in the Overworld in the form of mineral veins. Gravel attempts to generate 8 times per chunk in veins of size 1–33, at all levels and in all biomes.

Veins of gravel attempt to replace netherrack 2 times per chunk in veins of size 1–33, from levels 5 to 41, in all Nether biomes except basalt deltas.

Breaking[edit]

Gravel can be broken using any tool, but a shovel is the quickest. When broken, it has a 10% chance of dropping flint instead of the gravel itself. The flint received can be controlled with enchantments. Silk Touch removes the chance of dropping flint. Fortune increases the chance to 14% at the level I, 25% at level II, and 100% at level III.

Block	Gravel
Hardness	0.6
Tool
Breaking time^{[note 1]}
Default	0.9
Wooden	0.45
Stone	0.25
Iron	0.15
Diamond	0.15
Netherite	0.1
Golden	0.1

↑ Times are for unenchanted tools as wielded by players with no status effects, measured in seconds. For more information, see Breaking § Speed.

If gravel falls onto a non-full block, it drops as an item and does not drop flint.

Bartering[edit]

Piglins may barter 8-16 gravel when given a gold ingot.

This may be automated with a bartering farm.

Usage[edit]

A gravel block falls until it lands on the next available block below it. It exhibits a smooth falling animation.

When gravel falls on a player or mob, it can engulf the head, resulting in suffocation inside gravel until destroying the block, moving out of it, or dying. If falling gravel lands in the space occupied by a non-solid block, (such as torches, slabs, rails, or redstone dust) or soul sand, it breaks and turn into a gravel item. If it falls onto a cobweb, falls slowly until it passes completely through, or until it touches the ground, at which point it drops and becomes a gravel item.

Gravel can be placed on a non-solid block without falling.

Bamboo can be placed and grown on gravel.

Crafting ingredient[edit]

Name	Ingredients	Crafting recipe	Description
Coarse Dirt	Dirt + Gravel	4
Concrete Powder	Sand + Matching Dye + Gravel	8888888888888888
White Concrete Powder or Blue Concrete Powder or Brown Concrete Powder or Black Concrete Powder	Bone Meal or Lapis Lazuli or Cocoa Beans or Ink Sac + Sand + Gravel	8888	‌^{[Bedrock and Education editions only]}

Trading[edit]

Novice-level fletcher villagers have a 50%‌^{[Bedrock Edition only]} or ²⁄₃‌^{[Java Edition only]} chance to buy 10 gravel and one emerald for 10 flint as part of their trade.

Sounds[edit]

Java Edition:

Subtitle	Source	Description	Namespaced ID	Translation key	Volume	Pitch	Attenuation distance
Block broken	Blocks	Breaking the block	`block.gravel.break`	`subtitles.block.generic.break`	1.0	0.8	16
None^{[sound 1]}	Blocks	Falling on the block with fall damage	`block.gravel.fall`	None^{[sound 1]}	0.5	0.75	16
Block breaking	Blocks	Mining the block	`block.gravel.hit`	`subtitles.block.generic.hit`	0.25	0.5	16
Block placed	Blocks	Placing the block	`block.gravel.place`	`subtitles.block.generic.place`	1.0	0.8	16
Footsteps	Blocks	Walking on the block	`block.gravel.step`	`subtitles.block.generic.footsteps`	0.15	1.0	16

↑ ^a ^b MC-177082

Bedrock Edition: ^{[needs in-game testing]}

Sound	Source‌^{[upcoming: BE 1.16.200]}	Description	Namespaced ID	Volume	Pitch
?	?	Breaking the block	`dig.gravel`	?	0.8
?	?	Falling on the block with fall damage	`fall.gravel`	?	?
?	?	Mining the block	`hit.gravel`	?	0.5
?	?	Jumping from the block	`jump.gravel`	?	?
?	?	Falling on the block without fall damage	`land.gravel`	?	?
?	?	Walking on the block	`step.gravel`	?	?
?	?	Placing the block	`use.gravel`	?	0.8

Data values[edit]

ID[edit]

Java Edition:

Name	Namespaced ID	Block tags (JE)	Translation key
Gravel	`gravel`	`bamboo_plantable_on` `enderman_holdable`	`block.minecraft.gravel`

Bedrock Edition:

Name	Namespaced ID	Numeric ID	Translation key
Gravel	`gravel`	`13`	`tile.gravel.name`

Falling block entity[edit]

Falling Block

Hitbox size	Height: 0.98 Blocks Width: 0.98 Blocks

Dynamic block entity data
- Tags common to all entities see Template:Nbt inherit/entity/template
- TileEntityData: Optional. The tags of the block entity for this block.
- BlockState: The falling block represented by this entity.
  - Name: The namespaced ID of the block.
  - Properties: Optional. The block states of the block.
    - Name: The block state name and its value.
- Time: The number of ticks the entity has existed. If set to 0, the moment it ticks to 1, it vanishes if the block at its location has a different ID than the entity's TileID. If the block at its location has the same ID as its TileID when Time ticks from 0 to 1, the block is deleted, and the entity continues to fall, having overwritten it. When Time goes above 600, or above 100 while the block is below Y=0, the entity is deleted.
- DropItem: 1 or 0 (true/false) – true if the block should drop as an item when it breaks. Any block that does not have an item form with the same ID as the block does not drop even if this is set.
- HurtEntities: 1 or 0 (true/false) – true if the block should hurt entities it falls on.
- FallHurtMax: The maximum hit points of damage to inflict on entities that intersect this falling_block . For vanilla falling_block, always 40 × 20.
- FallHurtAmount: Multiplied by the FallDistance to calculate the amount of damage to inflict. By default this value is always 2.

History[edit]

Java Edition Classic
May 21, 2009				Notch shows interest in adding gravel.
May 23, 2009				Notch says he accomplished adding sand. This claim may also extend to gravel.
0.0.14a				Added gravel.
				Gravel behaves similarly to sand, which was also added during this update.
				Rather than falling by turning into a falling block entity, gravel instantly appears at the lowest point it can go when placed above an air block, without any sort of falling animation. This behavior that lasted until the Seecret Friday 1 update, in Infdev.
				Map editors can now be used to create floating gravel, although the server crashes if the gravel is affected from its state.
0.0.15a (Multiplayer Test 1)				The texture of gravel has been changed.
0.0.23a				A glitch occurring at this time allows players to raise the height of a fluid block by placing gravel over it. The gravel stays suspended in mid-air until it is broken. When broken, a fluid block corresponding to the type below the gravel appears where the block was. The suspended fluid block remains immobile until a block was placed next to it, causing a flood.
Java Edition Indev
20100219				Gravel now has a 10% chance of dropping flint.
Java Edition Infdev
20100227				Gravel has been removed during map tests.^[1]
20100413				Gravel has been re-added.
20100617-2				Gravel now generates underground, along with dirt, for more varied caves.
20100618				FallingSand entities now falls more realistically.
Java Edition Alpha
v1.2.0_01				Replaced soul sand with gravel in the Nether.
Java Edition Beta
1.2				FallingSand entities now behave better in multiplayer.
1.8		Pre-release		Terrain generation has been changed, removing gravel beaches.
Java Edition
1.0.0		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 5		The texture of gravel has been changed.
1.3.1		12w21a		The texture of gravel has been changed.
1.3.1		12w22a		Gravel is now able to be used in the trading system: buying flint costs 1 emerald and 10 gravel.
1.4.2		12w38a		Gravel now has new sounds when being walked on.
1.8		14w25a		Gravel can now be used to craft coarse dirt.
1.10		16w20a		Falling dust particles for unsupported gravel have been added.
1.12		17w06a		Gravel is now used to craft concrete powder.
1.13		17w47a		Prior to The Flattening, this block's numeral ID was 13.
1.13		18w09a		Gravel now generates in underwater ruins.
1.14		18w43a		The texture of gravel has been changed.
1.16		20w07a		Gravel now has a ⁵⁄₁₀₉ (~4.59%) chance of being given by the new piglins when bartering, in a stack size of 4–12, making it renewable.
1.16		20w09a		Gravel now has a ²⁰⁄₂₂₆ (~8.82%) chance of being given by piglins when bartering, in a stack size of 1–5.
Pocket Edition Alpha
Pre-release				Added gravel.
0.1.0				The texture of gravel icon in the inventory has been added.
0.2.0				The textures of gravel and icon in the inventory have been changed.
0.4.0				The texture of gravel icon in the inventory has been changed.
0.5.0				The texture of gravel icon in the inventory has been changed, once again.
0.6.0				The texture of gravel icon in the inventory has been changed, once again.
0.6.0				Gravel is now affected by gravity.
0.8.0		build 2		The texture of gravel has been changed.
0.8.0		build 2		The inventory icon of gravel is now rendered block instead of texture.
0.9.0		build 1		Gravel no longer falls when generated.
				Gravel now appears in villages.
				Falling gravel now drops a resource when landing on a non-solid block.
0.10.0		build 1		Falling dust particles for unsupported gravel have been added.
0.11.0		build 1		Gravel no longer generates as a village path.
0.12.1		build 1		Gravel now generates in the Nether.
Pocket Edition
1.0.4		alpha 1.0.4.0		10 gravel can now be used to trade with fletcher villagers for 6-10 flint.
1.1.0		alpha 1.1.0.0		Gravel is now used to craft concrete powder.
Bedrock Edition
1.2.0		beta 1.2.0.2		Gravel can now be used to craft coarse dirt.
1.4.0		beta 1.2.20.1		Gravel now generates in underwater ruins.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3		The texture of gravel has been changed.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.4		Trading has been changed, fletcher villagers now have a 50% chance to buy 10 gravel and one emerald for 10 flint as part of their first tier trade.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.57		Gravel now has a ¹⁰⁄₁₀₆ (9.43%) chance of being given by piglins when bartering, in a stack size of 8–16, making it renewable.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.57		gravel now generate below lava sea layer in the Nether.
Legacy Console Edition
TU1	CU1	1.0	Patch 1	Added gravel.
TU9	CU1	1.0	Patch 1	The texture of gravel has been changed.
		1.90		The texture of gravel has been changed.
New Nintendo 3DS Edition
0.1.0				Added gravel.

Issues[edit]

Issues relating to "Gravel" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.

Trivia[edit]

Explosions launch falling gravel.
If a player stands on a stack of sand or gravel, and the stack falls onto a non-solid block, the player falls fast enough to take damage or even die.
Gravel often falls into caves, making a mock dead end. If a player encounters a gravel dead-end while mining, removing the gravel may reveal additional passageways.

Gallery[edit]

A naturally generated gravel patch as seen in a cave.
A naturally generated gravel floor as seen in an ocean.
A gravel patch as seen in the Nether.
Gravel shown to be not affected by gravity if there is a non-solid block (except fire) underneath it.