Difficulty

This article is about the gameplay mechanic. For the command, see Commands/difficulty. For the feature in Minecraft Dungeons, see MCD:Difficulty.

Difficulty is an option in Minecraft that has a direct impact on the ease of gameplay, allowing the game's challenges to be tailored to the player's skill level.

World settings

There are four difficulty levels in the game: Easy, Normal, Hard and Peaceful. These can be changed when creating a world, in the world options, as well as with the /difficulty command.

While the difficulty settings modify the challenge in Survival mode, they also affect hostile mobs in Creative mode the same as in Survival; for example:

• Most hostile mobs cannot spawn naturally in Creative Peaceful.
• Zombies have the same difficulty-dependent chances as in Survival to convert villagers into zombie villagers (0% in Creative Easy, 50% in Creative Normal, 100% in Creative Hard).
• Hostile mobs killed by mob grinders in farms drop higher-value items in Creative Hard.

Survival mode is affected by difficulty as described in the sections below.

Peaceful

No hostile mobs can spawn naturally, except for shulkers and the ender dragon, all of whom no longer deal any damage. No spiders, cave spiders, zombified piglins, endermen, drowned, skeleton horses, zombie horses,‌^{[BE only]}, or camel husks– neutral/passive rather than hostile mobs – can spawn naturally. In Java Edition, zombie nautiluses can only naturally spawn inside of ocean ruins, and their other spawning conditions are disabled.

When any of these mobs attempt to spawn (whether naturally, through monster spawners, spawn eggs, or commands), they despawn instantaneously, with no visible spawning.

All mobs that can spawn (such as shulkers, piglins, zombie nautiluses, polar bears, or wolves) are completely peaceful and unable to harm the player, with the exception of the ender dragon, which still targets players and deals knockback. Additionally, sculk shriekers do not give the Darkness effect because they can't spawn the warden, and most neutral mobs are passive.

When the difficulty is switched from any other setting to Peaceful, all mobs that are not allowed to spawn on Peaceful despawn. Players regain health rapidly over time. Despite this, it is still possible to die if damage is received quickly enough. TNT deals no direct damage to the player, but it does give knockback still, meaning a player can be indirectly killed by it via fall damage if it launches them too far upward.

The hunger bar never depletes; in Java Edition, players therefore cannot eat anything except golden apples, chorus fruits, milk buckets, honey bottles, and suspicious stew, unless the player switched to Peaceful when their hunger bar was below the maximum. Players can eat normally in Bedrock Edition. Additionally, if the hunger bar is below the maximum, it regenerates quickly.

Mob	Despawns in Peaceful difficulty?	Spawns naturally in Peaceful difficulty?
Blaze Breeze Bogged Cave Spider Creeper Creaking Drowned Elder Guardian Elder Guardian Ghost‌[BE only] Enderman Endermite Evoker Ghast Giant‌[JE only] Guardian Husk Illusioner‌[JE only] Magma Cube Parched Piglin Brute Pillager Ravager Silverfish Skeleton Slime Spider Stray Vex Vindicator Warden Witch Wither Wither Skeleton Zoglin Zombie Zombie Villager Zombified Piglin	Yes	No
Phantom	Yes‌[JE only] Partially‌[BE only][1]	No
Hoglin	Yes‌[JE only] No‌[BE only]	No‌[JE only] Yes‌[BE only]
Camel Husk Killer Bunny‌[JE only] Skeleton Horse	No	No
Zombie Horse	No	Yes‌[JE only] No‌[BE only]
Zombie Nautilus	No	As part of structures only[2]
Ender Dragon Piglin Shulker	No[table 1]	Yes

The monsters that spawn naturally, which are ender dragons, piglins, shulkers, zombie nautiluses, hoglins,‌^{[BE only]} and killer bunnies,‌^{[JE only]} all become passive, with the exception of the ender dragon, which still attacks the player but deals no damage or knockback. Zombie horses also spawn naturally in Java Edition, due to a bug.

If a player is in a village with Raid Omen and the effect ends, the raid is not triggered as raiders cannot spawn in peaceful difficulty.

Because of the gameplay changes and the absence of many mob types, many blocks and items are unavailable to the player. A list can be found at Non-renewable resource#Peaceful difficulty. In addition, the player is unable to get many advancements and achievements.

Dispensers are unable to place wither skeleton skulls even if the required blocks for summoning a wither are available.

One major effect of the lack of certain resources is that it is impossible to acquire the resources required to craft eyes of ender, which are necessary to activate End portals.^{[note 1]} However, it is possible to switch to a non-Peaceful difficulty, let blazes and endermen spawn, kill enough for crafting eyes of ender, and switch back to Peaceful. It is also possible for an end portal to be activated by naturally generating with an eye of ender already embedded within all 12 end portal frames. For any given end portal, there is a 1 in a trillion chance of this happening.^{[note 2]} However, because of the huge number of possible seeds, over 8 million seeds are known to generate such end portals.^[3]

Easy

Hostile mobs spawn, but they deal ¹⁄₂ of the damage they would on Normal difficulty plus 1HP or the same damage they would on Normal difficulty, whichever is lower. The hunger bar can deplete, damaging the player until 10HP remain if it drains completely. Cave spiders and bees cannot poison players on Easy difficulty, and the wither does not cause the Wither effect, although wither skeletons do. Lightning sets only the struck block on fire, not surrounding blocks. Zombies do not break down doors, and do not turn villagers into zombie villagers. Zombies and skeletons do not spawn wearing full sets of armor. Hostile mobs like zombies, skeletons, spiders, husks, and strays deal about 1HP or 2HP damage.

If a player is in a village with Raid Omen and the effect ends, it triggers a raid that consists of 3 waves (4 waves if a player with a Raid Omen effect that is higher than one level enters a village).

Normal

Hostile mobs spawn and deal standard damage. The hunger bar can deplete, damaging the player until 1HP health remains if it drains completely. Zombies do not break down doors, but villagers killed by zombies have a 50% chance of turning into zombie villagers. Zombies and skeletons rarely wear sets of enchanted armor. Vindicators can break doors.

If a player is in a village with Raid Omen and the effect ends, it triggers a raid that consists of 5 waves (6 waves if a player with a Raid Omen effect that is higher than one level enters a village).

Hard

"Hard" redirects here. For the property of blocks, see Hardness.

Hostile mobs deal approximately 1¹⁄₂ times the damage they would deal on Normal difficulty, and in some cases drop higher-value items when killed. The hunger bar can deplete, not only damaging but also killing the player if it drains completely. Zombies and zombified piglins‌^{[JE only]} can break through wooden and copper doors and can spawn reinforcements when attacked. In Java Edition, spiders can spawn with a beneficial status effect (Speed, Strength, Regeneration, or Invisibility), with these effects having an infinite duration. Villagers killed by zombies always turn into zombie villagers. In Bedrock Edition, if the world type isn't infinite, pillagers deal 4HP damage, instead of 5HP.

If a player is in a village with Raid Omen and the effect ends, it triggers a raid that consists of 7 waves (8 waves if a player with a Raid Omen effect that is higher than one level enters a village).

Hardcore mode

• 
  Icon for Hardcore mode

While in the world creation screen, selecting Hardcore from among the game mode options causes the player to spawn in Hard difficulty, does not allow it to be changed, and allows the player only one life. In a single player world, a player who dies can choose to respawn in Spectator mode or return to the title screen. In multiplayer, upon death, the player's game mode is automatically set to Spectator mode.

The only way to change the difficulty of Hardcore is to use an .NBT editor on the world's level.dat file.

Moon phase

The phase of the moon affects the spawning of slimes in swamp biomes, and also contributes to the calculation of regional difficulty. Fuller moon phases have a larger effect.

The moon does not actually have to be visible in the sky for this effect to apply, since the moon phase exists during daytime and across dimensions.

	Moon phase	Value	Percentage
	Full	1.0	100%
	Gibbous	0.75	75%
	Quarter	0.5	50%
	Crescent	0.25	25%
	New	0.0	0%

For regional difficulty, the moon phase contribution is capped by the daytime contribution. In other words, the moon contributes min(MoonPhase × 0.25, DaytimeFactor),^[4] so before 63 in-game days (1512000 game ticks) even a full moon does not yet give its full bonus.

Regional difficulty

Regional difficulty or local difficulty is a value between 0.00 and 6.75 that the game calculates by considering the world difficulty setting, the inhabited time of a chunk, the total daytime in the world, and the phase of the moon. This value is shown on the debug screen as the first value listed after the heading "Local Difficulty". This value determines several aspects of the difficulty of gameplay (see below).

The inhabited time of a chunk increases for each tick a player spends with the chunk loaded. This is a cumulative measure of time—if 50 players spend a single hour in a chunk, it counts the same as if one player spent 50 hours there. The effect of inhabited time on regional difficulty is capped at 50 hours.

The total daytime in the world is the value from /time query daytime added to the "Day" on the F3 debug screen converted to ticks, i.e. daytime + (dayNumber * 24,000). This is not the same as the actual playtime in the world (the value from /time query gametime). It affects the regional difficulty after the first 3 in-game days, and has no additional effect after 63 in-game days.

In pseudocode, the calculation of regional difficulty is:

# DaytimeFactor, ChunkFactor, MoonFactor, and RegionalDifficulty are floating-point variables
# MoonPhase is as in the table above.

if (difficulty is Peaceful) return 0

if (TotalDaytime > 63 in-game days) DaytimeFactor = 0.25
else if (TotalDaytime < 3 in-game days) DaytimeFactor = 0 
else DaytimeFactor = (TotalDaytimeInTicks − 72,000) / 5,760,000

if (ChunkInhabitedTime > 50 hours) ChunkFactor = 1
else ChunkFactor = ChunkInhabitedTimeInTicks / 3,600,000

if (difficulty is Normal or Easy) multiply ChunkFactor by 0.75

MoonFactor = min(MoonPhase × 0.25, DaytimeFactor)
ChunkFactor += MoonFactor

if (difficulty is Easy) multiply ChunkFactor by 0.5

RegionalDifficulty = 0.75 + DaytimeFactor + ChunkFactor

if (difficulty is Normal) multiply RegionalDifficulty by 2
if (difficulty is Hard) multiply RegionalDifficulty by 3

return RegionalDifficulty

The raw regional difficulty therefore is always 0.0 on Peaceful and ranges from 0.75 to 1.5 on Easy, 1.5 to 4.0 on Normal, and 2.25 to 6.75 on Hard.

Clamped regional difficulty

The clamped regional difficulty (also known as special multiplier) is a value between 0.00 and 1.00 based on regional difficulty. This value is shown on the debug screen as the second value listed after the heading "Local Difficulty". This is yet another value that affects the difficulty of gameplay (see below).

The regional difficulty value is clamped as follows:

if (RegionalDifficulty < 2.0) value = 0.0;
else if (RegionalDifficulty > 4.0) value = 1.0;
else value = (RegionalDifficulty − 2.0) / 2.0;

Thus, on Easy, where regional difficulty is never higher than 1.5, the clamped value is always zero. On Normal, where regional difficulty is between 1.5 and 4.0, the clamped value can be anywhere from 0.0 to 1.0. On Hard, where the regional difficulty is never lower than 2.25, the clamped value is always at least 0.125.

On Normal, the clamped regional difficulty reaches its maximum value of 1.0 only after 63 in-game days (1512000 game ticks), in a fully inhabited chunk, during a full moon. On Hard, after 63 in-game days, the clamped regional difficulty reaches 1.0 in chunks inhabited for 4 ¹⁄₆ hours during a full moon; on lower moon phases it reaches 1.0 later, and once a chunk has been inhabited for more than 16 ²⁄₃ hours it remains at 1.0 regardless of moon phase.

Effects

Mob damage

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Please update this article to reflect recent updates or newly available information. The talk page may contain suggestions.
Reason: some mobs damage value in bedrock edition.

The damage mobs deal to players is affected by the difficulty setting of the world they are in. The values below represent the amount of damage taken per hit.

• For most attacks, the damage is scaled as follows: if a mob deals D damage on Normal difficulty, then it deals 1.5D on Hard difficulty and min(D, 0.5D+1) on Easy difficulty.
• A mob attacking another mob always deals its Normal difficulty damage regardless of the current difficulty setting.
• The values for a creeper, ghast, sulfur cube with TNT, and wither assume the player is directly adjacent to the respective explosion.
• The damage of slimes and magma cubes depends on their size. Tiny slimes, while hostile, are unable to inflict damage directly.
• Mobs deal no damage to players on Peaceful difficulty.
• The warden gives Darkness to nearby players, and elder guardians give Mining Fatigue, but these are not attacks. Players simply receive these effects when in range of the mobs.

Mob	Difficulty			Status effects and special effects
	Easy	Normal	Hard
Agent‌[BE only]	5HP			None
Axolotl	2HP			None
Bee	2HP	2HP	3HP	Poison for 10 seconds on Normal difficulty and for 18 seconds on Hard difficulty
Blaze (melee)	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Blaze fireball	5HP			Fire for 5 seconds
Bogged arrow‌[JE only]	2HP to 4HP	3HP to 5HP	4HP to 8HP	Normally: Poison for 4 seconds If holding a tipped arrow or a spectral arrow in its off-hand: The effect of the arrow
Bogged arrow‌[BE only]	1HP to 4HP		1HP to 5HP	Poison for 4 seconds
Bogged (melee)	2HP		3HP	None
Breeze wind charge	1HP		1.5HP × 0.75	None
Cat	3HP			None
Cave Spider	2HP	2HP	3HP	Poison for 7 seconds on Normal difficulty and for 15 seconds on Hard difficulty
Creaking	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Creeper explosion (normal) ‌[JE only]	22.5HP × 11.25	43HP × 21.5	64.5HP × 32.25	When exploding: None If having a potion effect when exploding, it leaves an effect cloud with the effect, like a lingering potion.
Creeper explosion (charged) ‌[JE only]	43.5HP × 21.75	85HP × 42.5	127.5HP × 63.75
Creeper explosion (normal) ‌[BE only]	14.75HP × 7.375	27.5HP × 13.75	41.25HP × 20.625	None
Creeper explosion (charged) ‌[BE only]	35.25HP × 17.625	68.5HP × 34.25	102.75HP × 51.375
Dolphin	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Drowned				None
Drowned trident (ranged)‌[JE only]	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	None
Drowned trident (ranged)‌[BE only]	8HP			None
Drowned trident (melee)‌[BE only]	6.5HP × 3.25	11HP × 5.5	16.5HP × 8.25	None
Elder Guardian (laser)	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	Mining Fatigue III for 5 minutes on nearby players
Elder Guardian (spikes)	2HP		3HP
Elder Guardian Ghost (spikes)	2HP
Ender Dragon (melee)	6HP	10HP	15HP × 7.5	None
Ender Dragon (wings)	3.5HP × 1.75	5HP	7.5HP × 3.75	None
Ender Dragon (breath)	3HP per second			Area effect cloud of Instant Damage
Ender Dragon Dragon Fireball	6HP per second
Enderman	4.5HP × 2.25	7HP	10.5HP × 5.25	None
Endermite	2HP		3HP	None
Evoker fangs‌[JE only]	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Evoker fangs‌[BE only]	6HP			None
Fox	2HP		3HP	None
Frog	Target despawns after being pulled			None
Frostbite	2HP	2HP	3HP	Freezing
Ghast fireball (impact)	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Ghast fireball (explosion)	9.5HP × 4.75	17HP × 8.5	25.5HP × 12.75	None
Giant‌[JE only]	26HP × 13	50HP × 25	75HP × 37.5	None
Goat	2HP		3HP	None
Baby Goat	1HP		1.5HP × 0.75	None
Guardian (laser)	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Guardian (spikes)	2HP		3HP	None
Hoglin‌[JE only]	2.5HP × 1.25 to 5HP	3HP to 8HP	4.5HP × 2.25 to 12HP × 6	None
Hoglin‌[BE only]	2.5HP × 1.25 to 5.5HP × 2.75	3HP to 9HP	4.5HP × 2.25 to 13.5HP × 6.75	None
Baby Hoglin‌[JE only]	0.5HP × 0.25		0.75HP × 0.375	None
Baby Hoglin‌[BE only]	1HP			None
Husk	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	Hunger when attacking any mob for 7 × floor of RD seconds
Illusioner arrow‌[JE only]	2HP to 5HP		3HP to 5HP	Casts Blindness spells on the player, if regional difficulty is 2 or greater
Iron Golem	4.75HP × 2.375 to 11.75HP × 5.875	7.5HP × 3.75 to 21.5HP × 10.75	11.25HP × 5.625 to 32.25HP × 16.125	None
The Killer Bunny‌[JE only]	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	None
Llama spit	1HP		1.5HP × 0.75	None
Magma Cube (big)	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Magma Cube (medium)	3HP	4HP	6HP	None
Magma Cube (small)	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Nautilus				None
Ocelot	3HP			None
Old Zombie Villager	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Panda	2HP		3HP	None
Panda (aggressive)	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Parched arrow‌[JE only]	2HP to 4HP			Normally: Weakness for 30 seconds when their tipped arrow hits any mob (including another parched) If holding a tipped arrow or a spectral arrow in its off-hand: The effect of the arrow
Parched arrow‌[BE only]	1HP to 4HP, varies with proximity		1HP to 5HP, varies with proximity	Weakness for 30 seconds when their tipped arrow hits any mob (including another parched)
Parched (melee)	2HP		3HP	None
Phantom‌[JE only]				None
Phantom‌[BE only]	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Piglin arrow‌[JE only]	2HP to 5HP		3HP to 5HP	None
Piglin arrow‌[BE only]	1HP to 4HP		1HP to 5HP	None
Piglin (melee with sword)‌[JE only]	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	None
Piglin (melee with sword)‌[BE only]	5.5HP × 2.75	9HP	13.5HP × 6.75	None
Piglin (melee without sword)‌[JE only]	3.5HP × 1.75	5HP	7.5HP × 3.75	None
Piglin Brute‌[JE only]	7.5HP × 3.75	13HP × 6.5	19.5HP × 9.75	None
Piglin Brute‌[BE only]	6HP	10HP	15HP × 7.5	None
Piglin Brute (unarmed)	4.5HP × 2.25	7HP	10.5HP × 5.25	None
Pillager arrow ‌[JE only]	2HP to 3HP	3HP to 5HP	5HP to 7HP	Normally: None If holding a tipped arrow or a spectral arrow in its off-hand: The effect of the arrow
Pillager arrow ‌[BE only]				None
Pillager (melee)‌[BE only]	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Polar Bear	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Pufferfish (semi-puffed)	2HP		3HP	Poison for 3 seconds
Pufferfish (fully puffed)‌[JE only]	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	Poison for 6 seconds
Pufferfish (fully puffed)‌[BE only]	2HP		3HP	Poison for 10 seconds
Ravager (melee)	7HP	12HP × 6	18HP × 9	None
Ravager (roar)	4HP	6HP	9HP	None
Shulker bullet	3HP	4HP	6HP	Levitation for 10 seconds
Silverfish	1HP		1.5HP × 0.75	None
Skeleton arrow‌[JE only]	2HP to 4HP	3HP to 5HP	4HP to 8HP	Normally: None If holding a tipped arrow or a spectral arrow in its off-hand: The effect of the arrow
Skeleton arrow‌[BE only]	1HP to 4HP, varies with proximity		1HP to 5HP, varies with proximity	None
Skeleton (melee)	2HP		3HP	None
Slime (big)	3HP	4HP	6HP	None
Slime (medium)	2HP		3HP	None
Slime (small)	0HP			None
Snow Golem snowball	3HP to blazes			None
Spider	2HP		3HP	None
Stray arrow‌[JE only]	3HP to 5HP			Normally: Slowness for 30 seconds when their tipped arrow hits any mob (including another stray) If holding a tipped arrow or a spectral arrow in its off-hand: The effect of the arrow
Stray arrow‌[BE only]	1HP to 4HP, varies with proximity		1HP to 5HP, varies with proximity	Slowness for 30 seconds when their tipped arrow hits any mob (including another stray)
Stray (melee)‌[JE only]	2HP	2HP	3HP	None
Stray (melee)‌[BE only]				Slowness for 9 seconds
Sulfur Cube (Magma Block)	1HP			None
Sulfur Cube explosion (TNT)	29HP × 14.5	56HP × 28	84.5HP × 42.25	None
Trader Llama spit	1HP		1.5HP × 0.75	None
Vex	5.5HP × 2.75	9HP	13.5HP × 6.75	None
Vex (unarmed) ‌[JE only]	3HP	4HP	6HP	None
Vex (unarmed) ‌[BE only]	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Villager's firework rocket	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	None
Vindicator	7.5HP × 3.75	13HP × 6.5	19.5HP × 9.75	None
Vindicator (unarmed)‌[JE only]	3.5HP × 1.75	5HP	7.5HP × 3.75	None
Vindicator (unarmed)‌[BE only]	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	None
Warden (melee)	16HP × 8	30HP × 15	45HP × 22.5	None
Warden (ranged)	6HP	10HP	15HP × 7.5	None
Witch	Deals damage by throwing potions			Throws splash potions of Poison, Instant Damage, Slowness, and Weakness
Wither Skeleton‌[JE only]	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	Wither for 10 seconds
Wither Skeleton‌[BE only]	5.5HP × 2.75	9HP	13.5HP × 6.75	Wither for 10 seconds
Wither Skeleton (unarmed)	3HP	4HP	6HP	Wither for 10 seconds
Wither Skeleton arrow‌[JE only]	2HP to 4HP + Fire for 5 seconds	3HP to 5HP + Fire for 5 seconds	4HP to 8HP + Fire for 5 seconds	Normally: None If holding a tipped arrow or a spectral arrow in its off-hand: The effect of the arrow
Wither (birth explosion) ‌[JE only]	35.5HP × 17.75	69HP × 34.5	103.5HP × 51.75	None
Wither (birth explosion) ‌[BE only]	37HP × 18.5	72HP × 36	108HP × 54	None
Wither Skull	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	Wither II for 10 seconds on Normal difficulty and 40 seconds on Hard difficulty
Wither Skull (explosion)	5HP			None
Wither (dash attack)‌[BE only]	8.5HP × 4.25	15HP × 7.5	22.5HP × 11.25	None
Wolf	3HP	4HP	6HP	None
Zoglin	2.5HP × 1.25 to 5HP	3HP to 8HP	4.5HP × 2.25 to 12HP × 6	None
Baby Zoglin	0.5HP × 0.25		0.75HP × 0.375	None
Zombie	2.5HP × 1.25	3HP	4.5HP × 2.25	None
Zombie Nautilus				None
Zombie Villager				None
Zombified Piglin‌[JE only]	5HP	8HP	12HP × 6	None
Zombified Piglin‌[BE only]	5.5HP × 2.75	9HP	13.5HP × 6.75	None
Zombified Piglin (unarmed)	3.5HP × 1.75	5HP	7.5HP × 3.75	None

Other effects

Attribute	Notes	Condition
		World difficulty	Regional difficulty (RD)	Clamped regional difficulty (CRD)	Moon phase only
HP Mobs and explosions do higher damage to players.	Peaceful: No damage Easy: 1⁄2 of Normal damage + 1 (never higher than Normal damage) Hard: 1 1⁄2 times Normal damage	Yes	No	No	No
Guardians (both types) have higher laser magic damage.	Hard: + 2HP, added before calculating the difficulty-scaled mob damage	Yes	No	No	No
Starvation more harshly affects health.	Easy/Normal/Hard: starvation brings health down to 10/1/0 HP	Yes	No	No	No
Mobs that spawn with armor are more likely to have more armor.	Easy & Normal: 75%/56%/42% of having 2/3/4 pieces; Hard: 90%/81%/73% of having 2/3/4 pieces	Yes	No	No	No
Zombies are more likely to spawn with weapons.	1% on Easy and Normal, 5% on Hard	Yes	No	No	No
Zombies are able to spawn reinforcements.	Hard only	Yes	No	No	No
Zombies are more likely to be able to break wooden doors.	A zombie having the ability to break a door: (10×CRD)% The door actually breaking: Hard only	Yes	No	Yes	No
Villagers killed by zombies have a greater chance of becoming zombie villagers.	0% on Easy, 50% on Normal, 100% on Hard	Yes	No	No	No
Zombified piglins spawn from nether portals in the Overworld more often.	1⁄2000 per block tick on Easy, 1⁄1000 on Normal, 3⁄2000 on Hard	Yes	No	No	No
A skeleton or stray's cooldown between attacks is shortened	Easy/Normal: 3s cooldown Hard: 2s	Yes	No	No	No
A bogged or parched's cooldown between attacks is shortened	Easy/Normal: 4.5‌[JE only]/3.5‌[BE only]s cooldown Hard: 3.5‌[JE only]/2.5‌[BE only]s	Yes	No	No	No
A skeleton or stray is more accurate in ranged attacks with its bow.	Easy/Normal/Hard "inaccuracy" value is 10/6/2	Yes	No	No	No
Damage from arrows slightly increases.	Easy/Normal/Hard damage bonus = +0.11 / +0.22 / +0.33	Yes	No	No	No
Phantoms spawn more frequently.	A spawn attempt succeeds if the local difficulty is greater than a random value between 0.0 and 3.0.	No	Yes	No	No
Phantoms spawn in larger groups.	Easy: 1-2 Normal: 1-3 Hard: 1-4	Yes	No	No	No
Spiders can naturally spawn with status effects.	Hard (10×CRD)%	Yes	No	Yes	No
The Poison effect given by a cave spider lasts longer.	Normal/Hard: 7s/15s	Yes	No	No	No
The Poison effect given by a bee lasts longer.	Normal/Hard: 10s/18s	Yes	No	No	No
The Wither effect given by a wither skull lasts longer.	Normal/Hard: 10s/40s	Yes	No	No	No
A wither shoots wither skulls when idle.	Normal/Hard only	Yes	No	No	No
A wither spawns 3 wither skeletons when brought below half health.‌[Bedrock Edition only]	Normal/Hard only	Yes	No	No	No
Lightning can cause fires in the surrounding blocks, not just the block struck.	Normal/Hard only	Yes	No	No	No
Fire lingers for a bit longer.	The raw encouragement value of blocks surrounding fire gets a bonus of (Easy/Normal/Hard) +47 / +54 / +61, before being adjusted for fire age, humidity and rain.	Yes	No	No	No
Mobs are more willing to take fall damage when pursuing a target.[note 3]	Easy: 33% + 8HP Normal: 33% + 4HP Hard: 33%	Yes	No	No	No
Lightning strikes are more likely to spawn a skeleton trap horse.	Chance = (RD)% (0.75–1.5% on Easy, 1.5–4% on Normal, 2.25–6.75% on Hard)	No	Yes	No	No
Burning zombies are more likely to set their target on fire, and the burn duration is longer.	Chance = (30×RD)% Burn time = 2 × RD seconds	No	Yes	No	No
The Hunger effect caught from being attacked by a husk lasts longer.	Effect time = 7 × RD seconds	No	Yes	No	No
Illusioners can cast blindness.	If RD > 2.	No	Yes	No	No
Skeletons and zombies are more likely to have the ability to pick up dropped items.	Having the ability: (55×CRD)%	No	No	Yes	No
Zombies are more likely to have a greater follow distance.	If (random # in range 0–1.5) × CRD is greater than 1, that becomes a bonus multiplier on the follow distance. Therefore, this is impossible when the CRD is less than 0.67[note 4]; when the CRD is 1.0, there is only a 1⁄3 chance of it happening.	No	No	Yes	No
Zombies are more likely to be "leader zombies" (gaining a bonus to max HP, a bonus to the chance to spawn reinforcements, and the ability to break doors).	Any given zombie being a "leader": (5×CRD)%	No	No	Yes	No
Mobs are more likely to spawn with armor.	Chance of getting any armor at all: (15×CRD)%	No	No	Yes	No
Mobs that spawn with weapons are more likely to have enchantments.	Chance for the main hand item = (25×CRD)%	No	No	Yes	No
Mobs that spawn with armor are more likely to have enchantments.	Chance per armor item = (50×CRD)%	No	No	Yes	No
Mobs that spawn with enchanted equipment have higher levels of enchantments.	Level = 5 + randInt(0,18)×CRD where randInt(0,18) is a random integer between 0 and 17. So, the level is 5 when CRD is 0.0, and it can be as high as 22 when CRD is 1.0.	No	No	Yes	No
Slimes are more likely to be bigger.	Small: ((33×(1-CRD)/2)+16.5)% Medium: 34% Big: ((33×(1+CRD)/2)+16.5)% in other words: Small/Medium/Big: 16.5%–33% / 34% / 33%–49.5%	No	No	Yes	No
Slimes are more likely to spawn in swamp biomes.	See above	No	No	No	Yes
Raid has more waves	Easy: 3 waves Normal: 5 waves Hard: 7 waves	Yes	No	No	No
Illager patrol size	RD + 1 illagers (rounded up)	No	Yes	No	No
Illager patrol can spawn on any light level‌[Bedrock Edition only]	Easy: Light level 0-7 Normal and Hard: Any light level	Yes	No	No	No
Vindicator and Pillager spawn from raids having higher chance to drop special loot.‌[Bedrock Edition only]	Normal: 65% chance Hard: 80% chance	Yes	No	No	No
Vindicator are able to break down Wooden Door	Peaceful and Easy: unable to break door Normal and Hard: can break door	Yes	No	No	No

Videos

History

Development

Java Edition

Bedrock Edition

Legacy Console Edition

• 
  First image of the difficulty lock.

Issues

Issues relating to "Difficulty" are maintained on the bug tracker. Issues should be reported and viewed there.

Gallery

• 
  Peaceful difficulty icon from Bedrock Edition.
• 
  Easy difficulty icon from Bedrock Edition.
• 
  Normal difficulty icon from Bedrock Edition.
• 
  Hard difficulty icon from Bedrock Edition.

Notes

References

See also

• Health
• Hunger
• Gameplay
• Tutorial:Gathering resources on Peaceful difficulty