Structure Block file format

This article is about the format used by Structure Blocks. For the similar format used by many community programs, see Schematic file format.

Structure files are stored as a gzipped NBT file. This file format is used to store structures such as End city, Igloo and Fossil into the data/minecraft/structures folder, inside the minecraft.jar. Custom structure can also be saved and loaded using the Structure Block. These structures are saved into the structures folder of the minecraft map.

NBT Structure

All the specified positions are relative to the block located toward -X, -Y, -Z

• : The root tag.
  •  DataVersion: Version of the NBT structure.
  •  author: Name of the player who created this structure, only exists for structures saved before 1.13.
  •  size: 3 TAG_Int describing the size of the structure
  •  palette: Set of different block states used in the structure.
    • : Block state
      •  Name: Id of the block
      •  Properties: List of block state properties, with [name] being the name of the block state property
        •  Name: The block state name and it's value.
  •  palettes: Sets of different block states used in the structure, a random palette gets selected based on coordinates and structure integrity. Used in vanilla by shipwrecks.
    • : A set of different block states used in the structure.
      • : Block state
        •  Name: Id of the block
        •  Properties: List of block state properties, with [name] being the name of the block state property
          •  Name: The block state name and it's value.
  •  blocks: List of individual blocks in the structure.
    • Individual block
      •  state: Index of the block state in the palette
      •  pos: 3 TAG_Int describing the position of this block
      •  nbt: nbt of the associated block entity (optional, only present if the block has one). Does not contain x, y, or z fields. See Block entity format.
  •  entities: List of entities in the structure
    • : Entity
      •  pos: 3 TAG_Double describing the exact position of the entity
      •  blockPos: 3 TAG_Int describing the block position of the entity
      •  nbt: nbt of the entity (required). See entity format.