Obsidian

Obsidian

Transparent	No
Luminance	0
Blast resistance	6,000
Tool
Renewable	Yes
Stackable	Yes (64)
Flammable	No
Catches fire from lava	No
Drops	Itself
Data value	dec: 49 hex: 31 bin: 110001
Namespaced ID	obsidian

	“	Strong almost beyond compare and able to stand huge blasts, glossy, black obsidian is forged in the very fires of the earth. What a block!	„
		— Alex Wiltshire

	“	Obsidian is tough to design in Minecraft because: This is obsidian. Very specular, brittle, see-through on thin edges, very dark, very smooth. texture is largely defined by specular and shape. In MC, it's a purple colored 'rock' with a few spots!	„
		— Jasper "JAPPA" Boerstra

Obsidian is a dark block known for its high blast resistance and strength.

Occurence

Natural generation

Solid pillars of obsidian can also be found on the surface of the End.

Obsidian also generates as a part of end ship in end cities.

Obsidian also generates in woodland mansions in a tree shape with a diamond block in the middle of it in the "obsidian room" and the "lava room".

Obsidian also generates in sufficiently low underwater ravines and underwater caves.

Post-generation

Obsidian also occurs naturally where underwater springs flow onto lava, often at layer 10 or lower.

Obsidian can be created when a Nether portal is generated in the Nether or the Overworld. This portal can then be mined, providing a way of obtaining obsidian renewably.

When a player enters the End, a platform of 25 obsidian blocks is generated for the player to spawn on. This platform can then be mined, and gets regenerated when the player reenters the End. Obsidian pillars also regenerate when the ender dragon respawns.

Using a water spring to mine obsidian.

Obsidian is formed when flowing water hits a lava source block, and can be found naturally where water from a spring or lake has flowed over a nearby lava pool.

Obtaining

See also: Tutorials/Obsidian farming

Naturally occurring obsidian.

Water pouring onto lava springs, forming obsidian.

Obsidian drops 1 obsidian when mined with a diamond pickaxe. Otherwise, it drops nothing.

Block	Obsidian
Hardness	50
Tool
Breaking time
Hand	250
Wooden	125
Stone	62.5
Iron	41.7
Diamond	9.4
Golden	20.85

Enchanting a pickaxe with "Efficiency" and using a beacon with Haste both drastically decrease the mining time. See the obsidian farming tutorial for more information.

Chests

Obsidian can be found in 8.0% of fortress chests in stacks of 2–4, and in 25.6% of village weaponsmith chests in stacks of 3–7.

Ender chests

When an ender chest is mined with a pickaxe without the Silk Touch enchantment, it drops 8 obsidian.

Usage

Obsidian is useful for building explosion resistant structures, as along with anvils, it has a blast resistance of 6,000; the highest of all blocks obtainable in survival mode. Obsidian also cannot be pushed by pistons, and also cannot be destroyed by the ender dragon.

These qualities make obsidian an extremely effective defensive block, and it is commonly used in many bases in multiplayer servers as protection from griefers.

End crystals can be placed on top of obsidian, which can be useful in PvP combat, or just as decoration.

Nether portals

Obsidian can be used to create a nether portal frame, which can then be ignited using fire. The frame must be a vertical rectangle any size from 4×5 to 23×23. Note that the corners of the frame are not required.

Sounds

Java Edition:

Sound	Subtitle	Namespaced ID	Subtitle ID	Source	Pitch	Volume	Attenuation distance
	Block breaking	block.stone.hit	subtitles.block.generic.hit	Blocks	0.5	0.25	16
	Block broken	block.stone.break	subtitles.block.generic.break	Blocks	0.8	1.0	16
	Block placed	block.stone.place	subtitles.block.generic.place	Blocks	0.8	1.0	16
	Footsteps	block.stone.step	subtitles.block.generic.footsteps	Blocks	1.0	0.15	16
	No subtitle	block.stone.fall	(Plays when fallen on from a height)	Blocks	0.75	0.5	16

Achievements

Main article: Achievements

Icon	Achievement	In-game description	Actual requirements (if different)	Availability				Xbox points earned	Trophy type (PS)
				Xbox	PS	Bedrock	Nintendo
	Enchanter	Use a book, obsidian and diamonds to construct an enchantment table	Pick up an enchantment table from a crafting table output.	Yes	PS3	Yes	Yes	20G	Silver
					PS4, PSVita				Bronze

Advancements

Main article: Advancements

Icon	Advancement	In-game description	Parent	Actual requirements (if different)	Namespaced ID
	Ice Bucket Challenge	Form and mine a block of Obsidian	Hot Stuff	Have a block of obsidian in your inventory.	story/form_obsidian
	Enchanter	Enchant an item at an Enchanting Table	Diamonds!	—	story/enchant_item

History

Java Edition Classic
October 24, 2009					Notch showed obsidian.
0.28					Added obsidian.
					Obsidian is extremely tough to break and drops one cobblestone block when broken.
Java Edition Infdev
Infdev		2010-02-27			Obsidian can now be used to mark the positions of the cardinal directions. This creates two intersecting planes extending just above the surface of the solid material that surrounds them.
		2010-03-13			The two obsidian intersecting planes have now been removed.
Java Edition Alpha
v1.2.0		preview			The nether portal has now been introduced, which is made using obsidian.
Java Edition Beta
1.8		Pre-release			Obsidian can now be mined with an iron pickaxe (has since been removed) or moved by endermen.
Java Edition
1.0.0		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 3			The enchantment table has now been introduced, which is crafted using obsidian.
		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 6			Obsidian mining time has now been decreased from 15 to 2.5 seconds.
		?			Obsidian mining time has now been increased from 2.5 to 9.4 seconds.
1.1		12w01a			Obsidian can now be found in village chests.
1.3.1		12w21a			The ender chest has now been introduced, which is crafted using obsidian.
		12w22a			Inventory sprites for blocks have now been flipped from left to right, changing to .
1.4.2		12w36a			The beacon block has now received a crafting recipe, which uses obsidian.
		12w38a			The wither's “blue wither skull” projectile has now been introduced, which produces a special explosion that can destroy obsidian.
1.7.2		13w36a			Obsidian can now be destroyed with explosives by summoning a fireball with custom data.
1.8		14w25a			“Infiniobsidian” glitch (allowing conversion of redstone into obsidian) has been fixed during the implementation of the new block metadata format.
		14w30a			Obsidian can now be found inside chests in nether fortresses.
1.9		15w31a			Obsidian now generates as part of the end cities.
		15w43a			The obsidian yield from nether fortress chests has now been slightly decreased.
1.11		16w39a			Obsidian now generates in woodland mansions.
July 18, 2017					Jeb tweets an image of an updated obsidian texture.
July 19, 2017					Jeb tweets an image of an updated obsidian texture.
July 11, 2018					Jasper Boerstra tweets an image of an updated obsidian texture.
?					This texture of obsidian was used at some point (not in game).
1.13		17w47a			Prior to The Flattening, this block's numeral ID was 49.
		18w09a			Obsidian now generates in some underwater ruins.
1.14		18w43a			The texture of obsidian has now been changed.
		18w44a			The texture of obisidan has now been changed, once again.
Pocket Edition Alpha
0.1.0					Added obsidian.
0.5.0					Glowing obsidian has been added, which drops a block of regular obsidian when mined.
					The newly added nether reactor structure generates a "spire" of obsidian when activated.
0.6.0					The “spires” generated by nether reactors are now made of netherrack, instead of obsidian.
0.9.0		build 1			Obsidian can now be found in villages within blacksmith chests.
0.12.1		build 1			Obsidian can now be used to form nether portals.
					Obsidian is now used to craft enchantment tables.
0.13.0		build 2			Obsidian now requires 6.5 seconds to mine, rather than 3.
0.16.0		build 4			Obsidian is now used to craft beacons.
					The wither's “blue wither skull” projectile has now been introduced, which produces a special explosion that can destroy obsidian.
Pocket Edition
1.0.0		alpha 0.17.0.1			Obsidian is now used to craft ender chests and end crystals.
					Obsidian now generates naturally in the End as obsidian platforms, obsidian pillars and some parts of end ships in end cities.
1.1.0		alpha 1.1.0.0			Obsidian now generates in woodland mansions.
Bedrock Edition
1.4.0		beta 1.2.20.1			Obsidian now generates in some underwater ruins.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			The texture of obsidian has now been changed.
					Obsidian can now be found in village weaponsmith chests.
Legacy Console Edition
TU1	CU1	1.0	Patch 1		Added obsidian.
		1.90			The texture of obsidian has now been changed.
New Nintendo 3DS Edition
0.1.0					Added obsidian.

Issues

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

Trivia

• Obsidian is one of the hardest blocks to destroy in Minecraft. In reality, obsidian is glass-like in texture and quite fragile.
• In real life, obsidian is an extrusive igneous rock like andesite, meaning that they are both formed from lava that has cooled down.
• Destroying an obsidian block with a diamond pickaxe, while underwater, without standing on solid ground would take 3 minutes and 54 seconds (without the pickaxe, it takes 4 minutes and 10 seconds). Either way, the player runs out of air long before the block is mined (unless a potion of water breathing is used).
• Destroying an obsidian block without a pickaxe, while underwater, without standing on solid ground, while under Mining Fatigue 3 from an Elder Guardian takes 50*5*5*5*370, or 2312500 seconds, or 26 days, 18 hours, 21 minutes, and 40 seconds. The derivation is from hardness times 5 (from not using a tool that can harvest the obsidian block) times 5 (from being underwater) times 5 (from not standing on solid ground) times 370 (from mining fatigue).
• It is a common misconception that enough TNT can destroy obsidian. Even though its explosion resistance rating is finite, additional TNT or other explosives has no more effect on an individual block than only one (it would take 71.25 times the explosive power of TNT to destroy a block of obsidian). It is possible to hack or /summon an explosion strong enough to destroy obsidian, but no such explosion appears naturally.
  • The Blue Wither Skull's ability to destroy obsidian is a special feature; its explosion is otherwise no stronger than a ghast's fireball.

Gallery

• 

  Naturally found obsidian in a snowy biome.

• 

  Old obsidian wall from Infdev.

• 

  Obsidian can be used to shield from explosions.

See also

• Obsidian wall
• Crying Obsidian
• Glowing Obsidian

References

Blocks

View at: Template:Blocks/content [edit]