Drops

Typical drops from a Skeleton: Experience Orbs, an Arrow, and Bones.

Drops are items which appear when mobs and some other entities die. There are three basic types of drops: normal drops, rare drops, and Experience Orbs. Only normal drops appear when a mob is killed other than by the player.

Common drops

Common drops may occur whenever a mob dies, and appear at the location of the mob at the moment it receives the killing damage. Most mobs have particular items which it may drop when killed. Some common drops only appear when mobs are killed by the player, but they are still much more common than rare drops.

For each of these items, there is a random (uniform) distribution of numbers of that item it will drop; for example, a Cow will drop 0-2 Leather items and 1-3 Raw Beef items. Since the range includes 0, it is possible for no leather to be dropped. If the mob is killed with a weapon with the Looting enchantment, then the upper limit of the range is increased by the level number of the enchantment.

If a mob is a baby animal or a villager, it will not drop anything when killed.

Note: The term "common drops" was chosen by the authors of this article. It is not known to be an official term.

Rare drops

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A bow received from a rare drop with Power I

Rare drops occur in addition to the common drops. Unlike most common drops, they only occur if the monster is killed by a player. All rare drops can also be obtained by other means; there are no items which are exclusively available through rare drops. Rare drops are always a single item, not multiples.

Rare drops have a 2.5% chance of occurring when a monster dies, and, when possible, a 20% chance of being enchanted rare drops. Using a weapon with the Looting enchantment increases the chance of a rare drop by 0.5% per level, and also increases the chance of enchanted weapons (up to 50% with Looting III).

Each monster has a separate list of possibilities for enchanted rare drops and non-enchanted rare drops. Within each list, all items are equally likely.

When items are enchanted, the enchantment is chosen in the same way as using an Enchantment Table with a cost of 5 levels. It is possible to get multiple enchantments. This means that the following enchantments may occur on golden swords:

• Sharpness I–III
• Smite I–IV
• Bane of Arthropods I–IV
• Knockback I–II
• Fire Aspect I–II
• Looting I–II

and the following enchantments may occur on Bows:

• Power I

Experience Orbs

Main article: Experience Orb

Experience Orbs only drop if a mob dies less than five seconds after being attacked (melee, bow, snowballs, eggs) by a player or by a player's pet wolf or cat. Their total value will always be the specific amount of experience granted by killing that mob. Experience gathered from kills can be used for enchanting.

Experience Orbs are similar to items but not the same. Unlike other drops, Experience Orbs appear at the location of the mob's corpse at the moment it disappears in a puff of smoke. Experience Orbs will move towards nearby players.

Table of drops

Mob	Exp	Common drops	Rare drops	Notes
Animals
Chicken	1–3	0–2 Feather 1 Raw Chicken or 1 Cooked Chicken	None	Cooked if on fire. Meat unaffected by looting. Also drops Chicken Egg every 5-10 minutes.
Cow	1–3	0–2 Leather 1–3 Raw Beef or 1–3 Steak	None	Cooked if on fire. Gives Milk when right-clicked with an empty bucket.
Mooshroom	1–3	0–2 Leather 1–3 Raw Beef or 1–3 Steak	None	Cooked if on fire. Shearing drops 5 Red Mushroom, converting it to a normal cow which cannot re-become a Mooshroom. Gives Milk when right-clicked with an empty bucket. Gives Mushroom Stew when right-clicked with an empty bowl.
Ocelot	1–3	None	None
Pig	1–3	0–2 Raw Porkchop or 0–2 Cooked Porkchop	None	Cooked if on fire.
Sheep	1–3	1 Wool if not sheared	None	Not affected by Looting. Shearing drops 1-3 Wool. Wool is colored if the sheep was spawned colored or dyed.
Squid	1–3	1–3 Ink Sac	None
Wolf	1–3	None	None
Villager	0	None	None
Golems
Iron Golem	0	0–2 Rose 3–5 Iron Ingot	None	Not affected by Looting.
Snow Golem	0	0–15 Snowball	None	Not affected by Looting.
Monsters
Blaze	10	0–1 Blaze Rod if killed by player	None
Cave Spider	5	0–2 String 0–1 Spider Eye if killed by player	None	Eye is an uncommon drop (33% chance) Looting doesn't affect number of eyes dropped, but increases probability of a drop.
Creeper	5	0–2 Gunpowder 1 Music Disc if killed by skeleton	None
Ender Dragon	20,000	None	None	Creates a portal including removable blocks: 4 Torch 1 Dragon Egg
Enderman	5	0–1 Ender Pearl	None
Ghast	5	0–1 Ghast Tear 0–2 Gunpowder	None
Magma Cube	1, 2, or 4	0–1 Magma Cream if size > 1	None	Uncommon drop (25% chance).
Silverfish	5	None	None
Skeleton	5	0–2 Arrow 0–2 Bone	Bow	Bow may be enchanted with Power I.
Slime	1, 2, or 4	0–2 Slimeball if size = 1	None
Spider	5	0–2 String 0–1 Spider Eye if killed by player	None	Eye is an uncommon drop (33% chance) Looting doesn't affect number of eyes dropped, but increases probability of a drop.
Zombie	5	0–2 Rotten Flesh	Iron Ingot Iron Helmet Iron Shovel Iron Sword
Zombie Pigman	5	0–1 Rotten Flesh 0–1 Gold Nugget	Gold Ingot Golden Helmet Golden Sword	Golden Sword may be enchanted with a random enchantment.
Non-Mob Entities
Boat	0	3 Wooden Planks 2 Stick	None
Minecart	0	1 Minecart	None
Minecart with Chest	0	1 Minecart 1 Chest	None	Also drops all of its contents.
Minecart with Furnace	0	1 Minecart 1 Furnace	None
Painting	0	1 Painting	None

History

Experience Orbs were added in Minecraft Beta 1.8 (the Adventure Update) but it had no use until the next update.They also had the normal pick up sound but now they have a ding sound. This was also the first version in which more mobs dropped more than one kind of item. Before Beta 1.8, skeletons were the only mobs that dropped two different items.

Before Beta 1.8, Zombies dropped feathers and Zombie Pigmen dropped cooked porkchops. This changed and they dropped rotten flesh, and eventually zombie pigmen dropped golden nuggets.

During the expanse of the Adventure Updates (Beta 1.8 to 1.0), many drops were added. Rotten flesh, Ender Pearls, Gold Nuggets, Ghast Tears, Spider Eyes, Blaze Rods, Snowballs, and many more meats, along with Experience Orbs.

During the Snapshot Releases (1.1 - 1.2), Magma Cubes dropped magma cream. Iron Golems were added, which dropped iron ingots and roses. New discs were dropped by creepers, except for "11". Sheep were able to regrow wool. Rare drops were added in Minecraft 1.2.

See also

• Item (entity)