Shears
Shears are a tool used primarily to shear sheep to get wool and mine a few types of blocks.
Contents
Obtaining[edit]
Crafting[edit]
| Name | Ingredients | Crafting recipe | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shears | Iron Ingot | ||
| Shears | Damaged Shears | The durability of the two shears is added together, plus an extra 5% durability. |
Trading[edit]
Novice-level Shepherd villagers have a 40% chance to sell shears for 2 emeralds in Java Edition, and the trade is always offered in Bedrock Edition.
Natural generation[edit]
| Item | Structure | Container | Quantity | Chance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Java Edition | ||||
| Shears | Village | Shepherd's chest | 1 | 12.3% |
| Bedrock Edition | ||||
| Shears | Village | Shepherd's chest | 1 | 12.3% |
Usage[edit]
Despite using iron in its crafting recipe, it cannot be smelted into iron nuggets.[1]
Shearing[edit]
Shears are the most efficient way to get wool from a sheep, producing 1–3 wool blocks. The same sheep can be sheared again after it eats from a grass block to regenerate its wool. In contrast, killing the sheep yields only 1 non-renewable wool block.
Shearing a mooshroom drops 5 mushrooms of the same color and turns it into a normal cow.
Shearing a pumpkin turns it into a carved pumpkin after dropping 4 pumpkin seeds in Java Edition or 1-3 pumpkin seeds in Bedrock Edition.
Shearing a snow golem removes its pumpkin, dropping it.
Shearing either a beehive or bee nest at honey level 5 drops 3 honeycombs. This does not break the hive or nest.
In Minecraft Earth, shears can be used to get Buttercups from Mooblooms and Wool from Wooly Cows and variant Sheep.
Breaking Blocks[edit]
Shears can also be used to harvest cobweb, leaves, tall grass, seagrass, ferns (both normal and 2-high), dead bushes, nether sprouts and vines. They can also be used to break Tripwire connected to a Tripwire Hook without activating it.
The following table shows information about blocks that can be broken with shears. Colors indicate what gets dropped when the block is broken:
- White: The original block.
- Blue: The Block's normal drop (i.e. string, sticks, seeds, sapling, apple).
- Red: Nothing.
| No shears breaking time | Shears breaking time | |
|---|---|---|
| Cobweb | 20 s [note 1] | 0.4 s |
| Dead Bush | 0 s | 0 s |
| Fern | 0 s | 0 s |
| Grass | 0 s | 0 s |
| Nether Sprouts | 0 s [note 2] | 0 s |
| Leaves | 0.35 s | 0.05 s |
| Tripwire | 0 s | 0 s [note 3] |
| Vines | 0.35 s | 0.35 s |
| Wool | 1.25 s | 0.25 s |
| Seagrass | 0 s | 0 s |
- ↑ Breaking cobwebs with a sword is as fast as breaking with shears, and yields string. This costs double durability.
- ↑ In Bedrock Edition, the item drops when breaking it with fists.
- ↑ Using shears does not trigger a redstone pulse.
Enchantments[edit]
Shears can receive the following enchantments via an anvil.
| Name | Max Level | Method |
|---|---|---|
| Efficiency | V | |
| Unbreaking | III | |
| Mending | I | |
| Curse of Vanishing | I | |
| Silk Touch[BE only] | I |
Sounds[edit]
| Sound | Subtitle | Source | Description | Namespaced ID | Translation key | Volume | Pitch | Attenuation distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shears click | Players | Plays when shearing mooshrooms | entity.mooshroom.shear | subtitles.item.shears.shear | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Shears click | Players | Plays when shearing sheep | entity.sheep.shear | subtitles.item.shears.shear | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Shears click | Players | Plays when shearing snow golems | entity.snow_golem.shear | subtitles.item.shears.shear | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Shears scrape | Blocks | Plays when harvesting honeycombs | block.beehive.shear | subtitles.block.beehive.shear | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Shears carve | Blocks | Plays when carving pumpkin | block.pumpkin.carve | ? | ? | ? | 16 | |
| Item breaks | Players | When durability is exhausted | entity.item.break | subtitles.entity.item.break | 1.0 | 0.9 | 16 |
Data values[edit]
ID[edit]
| Name | Namespaced ID | Translation key |
|---|---|---|
| Shears | shears | item.minecraft.shears |
| Name | Namespaced ID | Numeric ID | Translation key |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shears | shears | 359 | item.shears.name |
Achievements[edit]
| Icon | Achievement | In-game description | Actual requirements (if different) | Gamerscore earned | Trophy type (PS) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Have a Shearful Day | Use Shears to obtain wool from a sheep. | — | 15G | Bronze | |
Video[edit]
This video is outdated, since snow golems drop carved pumpkins when sheared, and cobwebs drop itself when broken with shears
History[edit]
| June 3, 2011 | Shears were first mentioned by Jeb on Twitter. The tweet revealing Jeb's work on shears was written in Swedish (Jag jobbar på shears nu), which translates to "I'm working on shears now". | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 7, 2011 | Jeb tweets about how shears were originally planned as a way to defuse TNT, but he dropped this shortly after deciding TNT would detonate only with redstone or fire. | ||||
| Java Edition Beta | |||||
| 1.7 |  Shears have been introduced into the game.
| ||||
| Before Beta 1.7, sheep would drop 1-3 wool blocks at most when hit, but shears can harvest up to 4 wool blocks per sheep. | |||||
| 1.8 | Pre-release | Shears can now be used to harvest a fern, vines and grass. | |||
| Java Edition | |||||
| 1.0.0 | Beta 1.9 Prerelease | Shears now harvest red mushrooms from a mooshroom and turn it back into a normal cow. | |||
| 1.1 | 11w49a | Sheep now drop only 1-3 wool blocks when sheared, but they can also regrow their wool by eating grass, which is part of a plan to have animals stay in the game longer.[2] | |||
| 1.2.1 | 12w06a | Shears can now be used to harvest dead bushes. | |||
| 1.3.1 | 12w21a | Shears can now be bought from farmer villagers for 3 emeralds each. | |||
| 12w22a | Shears can now be used to break tripwire string and not set it off. | ||||
| 1.4.2 | 12w38a | Added a sound when using shears on sheep. | |||
| 1.4.6 | 12w50a | Shears can now be enchanted. | |||
| 1.8 | 14w02a | Trading has been changed: Shepherd villagers now sell shears for 3–4 emeralds each. | |||
| Farmers no longer trade shears. | |||||
| pre1 | Shears now lose durability when breaking wool blocks. In previous versions, shears would take durability damage only when destroyed or when breaking tall grass or leaves, the damage remaining the same for all other blocks.[3] | ||||
| 1.9 | 15w34a | Shears may now be used in a crafting grid to zoom in maps. | |||
| 15w45a | Shears no longer zoom in maps. | ||||
| 15w47b | Shears can no longer be enchanted with Silk Touch. | ||||
| Shears now lose durability when used to break any block (formerly lost durability only from leaves, web, grass, vines, tripwire and wool). | |||||
| 15w47c | Shears now harvest cobweb without requiring Silk Touch. | ||||
| 15w49a | Snow golems' pumpkin can now be removed with shears. | ||||
| 1.13 | 17w47a | When shears are used on an un-carved pumpkin, it now turns into a carved pumpkin and drops 4 pumpkin seeds. | |||
| Prior to The Flattening, this item's numeral ID was 359. | |||||
| 1.14 | 18w43a | Shears placed in a dispenser can now shear sheep. | |||
 The texture of shears has been changed. | |||||
| 1.15 | 19w34a | Shears can now be used on bee nests and beehives to harvest honeycomb. | |||
| 1.16 | 20w15a | Shears placed in a dispenser can now shear mooshrooms and snow golems. | |||
| 1.16.2 | pre1 | Shears are now required in order to pick up roots. | |||
| Pocket Edition Alpha | |||||
| 0.2.0 | Added shears to survival mode. | ||||
| 0.3.2 | Survival players no longer start out with infinite durability shears in the inventory. | ||||
| 0.8.0 | build 3 | Added shears to creative mode. | |||
| 0.9.0 | build 1 | Shears can now be used to transform mooshrooms into cows. | |||
| 0.12.1 | build 3 | Shearing a snow golem now removes its pumpkin. | |||
| Shears can now be enchanted in an anvil. | |||||
| 0.13.0 | build 1 | Shears can now be used to break tripwire string without triggering it. | |||
| 0.15.0 | build 1 | Shears now lose durability when used to break any block. | |||
| Pocket Edition | |||||
| 1.0.4 | alpha 1.0.4.0 | Shears can now be bought from shepherd villagers. | |||
| 1.1.0 | alpha 1.1.0.0 | Breaking a melon block with shears now always drop 9 melons. | |||
| Bedrock Edition | |||||
| 1.4.0 | beta 1.2.13.8 | Shears can now be used to turn un-carved pumpkins into carved pumpkin and spit out 4 pumpkin seeds. | |||
| ? | Shears now harvest cobweb without requiring Silk Touch. | ||||
| 1.10.0 | beta 1.10.0.3 | Shears placed in a dispenser can now shear sheep. | |||
| The texture of shears has been changed. | |||||
| 1.11.0 | beta 1.11.0.1 | Shears can now be found in village shepherd houses. | |||
| beta 1.11.0.4 | Shears sold by shepherd villagers now cost only 2 emeralds. | ||||
| 1.14.0 | beta 1.14.0.1 | Shears can now be used on bee nests and beehives to harvest honeycomb. | |||
| Legacy Console Edition | |||||
| TU3 | CU1 | 1.0 | Patch 1 | 1.0.1 | Added shears. |
| TU69 | 1.76 | Patch 38 | Shears can now be used to turn regular pumpkins into carved pumpkins. | ||
| 1.90 | The texture of shears has been changed.
| ||||
| Shears placed in a dispenser can now shear sheep. | |||||
| New Nintendo 3DS Edition | |||||
| 0.1.0 | Added shears. | ||||
Issues[edit]
Issues relating to "Shears" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.
Gallery[edit]
An enchanted pair of shears.
References[edit]
