River

Rivers are common technical biomes. They serve as borders between various other biomes, and usually lead to ocean biomes, though they can occasionally form circles.

Description

Rivers are thin, lengthy biomes that frequently generate across the world. They typically serve as a division between two different biomes, but can also split a single biome in two. They are filled with water up to sea level, though rivers may run dry in certain areas due to higher than usual elevation. Exposed grass in river biomes takes on a bluish-green hue. Riverbeds consist of dirt, sand, gravel, and clay, and are the only places where clay generates aside from lakes, swamp marshes and ocean hilltops. Seagrass generates atop the riverbed, and sugar cane occasionally generates on the riverbank. Passive mobs cannot spawn within river biomes themselves, but frequently wander into them from the surrounding biomes if they can spawn there. Hostile mobs can spawn within rivers, however, and drowned can spawn underwater, as can salmon and squid‌^{[JE & LCE only]}.

When generated between two high-elevation biomes, such as mountains and hills, river biomes may pose a fall damage hazard, but are otherwise mostly harmless.

If this biome is used to generate a buffet world, it will look like a shallow ocean, of no more than 10 blocks deep, with mostly sand, dirt, clay and gravel floor and infrequent grassy islands that rarely contain oak trees and, more rarely, pumpkins.

Variants

There are two different river biomes.

River

River

Type	Medium/Lush
Rarity	Very common
Temperature	0.5
Blocks	Water Grass Block Dirt Clay Sand Gravel Sugar cane Seagrass
Data value	dec: 7 hex: 7 bin: 111
Biome ID	river

The standard river variant. Salmon and squid‌^{[JE & LCE only]} may spawn here.

Frozen River

Frozen River

Type	Snowy
Rarity	Uncommon
Temperature	0.0
Blocks	Ice Water Grass Block Dirt Clay Sand Gravel Seagrass
Data value	dec: 11 hex: B bin: 1011
Biome ID	frozen_river

Frozen Rivers replace regular rivers, and only generate within snowy tundra biomes. As the name implies, the top layer of water is entirely frozen, though below the ice is the usual sand, gravel, and clay. While sugar cane can generate alongside a frozen riverbank, it quickly uproots itself after generation due to the water being frozen. Along with salmon and drowned, strays, rabbits, and polar bears can spawn in frozen rivers.

Note that frozen rivers can only cut through snowy tundra, not its variants; if a river generates separating the snowy tundra from one of its variants or any other biome, it will only be partially frozen.

History

Java Edition Beta
August 18, 2011					Notch tweeted a screenshot of a revamped river biome.
1.8		Pre-release			Added rivers. Previously, were generated as part of the terrain generation algorithm.
Java Edition
1.13		18w16a			Renamed FrozenRiver to Frozen River.
Pocket Edition Alpha
0.1.0					Added biomes, including rivers.
0.13.0		build 1			Added rabbits, which can spawn in frozen river.
0.15.0		build 1			Added strays, which spawn in frozen river biomes.
Pocket Edition
1.0.0		alpha 0.17.0.1			Added polar bears which can spawn in frozen river.
Bedrock Edition
1.4.0		beta 1.2.13.8			Added drowned, which spawn in river biomes.
		beta 1.2.14.2			Added salmon, which spawn in rivers.
					Rivers now generate with seagrass.

Trivia

• Lakes can technically still generate in the waters of rivers and frozen rivers, when either are used as buffet worlds. This can be more clearly seen in frozen river worlds, as holes in the ice.
• Regular river can still generate cutting frozen river.

Gallery

• 

  The first image of a river released by Notch.

• 

  A river near two forests.

• 

  A narrow river.

• 

  A frozen river in a cold biome.

• 

  A river separating a desert and a forest.

• 

  Rivers splitting and cutting through forests and wooded hills.

• 

  A river cutting through multiple uncommon biomes.

• 

  A buffet river world.

• 

  A buffet frozen river world. Note the "lake" in the distance.

See also

• Beach
• Ocean