Turtle Egg

Not to be confused with Turtle Spawn Egg.

Turtle Egg

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Renewable	Yes
Stackable	Yes (64)
Tool	Any tool
Blast resistance	0.5
Hardness	0.5
Luminous	No
Transparent	Yes
Waterloggable	JE: No BE: Yes
Flammable	No
Catches fire from lava	No
Map color	2 SAND
Note block instrument	Default (Harp)

A turtle egg is a block that can be placed up to four times within one block space that hatches turtles.

Obtaining

Breaking

A turtle egg drops as an item when mined using any tool^[1] with the Silk Touch enchantment. If broken without the enchantment, pushed by a piston, or broken by a player or mob falling onto it, the egg breaks without dropping anything.

When mining a cluster of more than one turtle egg, the eggs break one at a time, instead of all at once. This is different from other clustered blocks, such as sea pickles or candles.

Breaking a cracked turtle egg with a Silk Touch tool resets the growth stage when the egg is placed on a different block.

Block	Turtle Egg
Hardness	0.5
Breaking time (secs)
Default	10.75 (JE) 0.75 (BE)
Options
Efficiency	000
Haste	001 1JEBE

Legend

• incorrect tool, drops nothing
• correct tool, drops nothing or something other than the block itself
• correct tool, drops the block itself
• italicized can be instant mined

Post-generation

When two turtles are bred with seagrass, one of them returns to its home beach, and after several seconds it lays a cluster of 1–4 eggs on the sand.

Trampling

Turtle eggs can be trampled by living entities (players, mobs, livestock, etc.), except bats, that fall onto or stand on top of them. Eggs in a cluster of eggs are trampled one at a time until no eggs remain.

Under no circumstance can turtles break turtle eggs. Crouch-walking (or "sneaking") on turtle eggs prevents them from breaking. Jumping of any kind still breaks the eggs.

Though eggs cannot be trampled by non-living entities like arrows, items or falling blocks, they can be trampled by armor stands.^[2] When a falling block such as an anvil or sand block is dropped onto an egg, the falling block is dropped and turned into an item, leaving the egg unharmed.

Zombies and their variants (husks, drowned, frostbites​^{[upcoming: Fourth Drop 2026]}, zombie villagers, and zombified piglins) seek out and trample turtle eggs that have 2 blocks of air above them unless /gamerule mobGriefing is false. The range of detection is a 47×7×47‌^{[JE only]} or 11×5×11‌^{[BE only]} box, centered on the block the mob is standing on. When a player in Survival or Adventure mode is nearby (also includes iron golems and villagers), the zombie (other than zombified piglins) prefers to attack the player rather than trampling the turtle egg.

Unlike zombies and their variants, other mobs do not seek out turtle eggs to trample them. However, they can still break turtle eggs by accident. Almost all entities, except for those mentioned above, when falling onto an egg, have a ¹⁄₃ chance of trampling it. Standing on top of an egg has a ¹⁄₁₀₀ chance each game tick of trampling the egg.

Usage

Placement

Up to 4 turtle eggs can be placed in a cluster on one block. Even though turtle eggs can be placed on any block, they only hatch on sand blocks. When adding more eggs to an existing cluster, they retain their hatching progress.

Turtle eggs do not require a supporting block below and unlike dragon eggs are not affected by gravity. Eggs are also capable of supporting lanterns hanging under them.^[3]

Hatching

Turtle eggs hatch on sand, red sand, or suspicious sand in any dimension. Eggs crack over time and hatch after cracking three times. Eggs hatch significantly faster at the end of the night.

Turtle eggs have a 1/500 chance of cracking if they are randomly ticked during the day. However, if the in-game time is between 21062 and 21904 ticks (3:03 am and 3:54 am), then turtle eggs always crack when random ticked. This is a roughly 48-second window for the player. About 95% of eggs crack or hatch during this night-time window. On average, an egg hatches in 4 to 5 nights. 90% of eggs hatch in 7 nights or less.^[4]

Eggs do not progress toward hatching if the player is not within 128 blocks of horizontal distance of the egg.

When a cluster of eggs hatches, all eggs hatch simultaneously.

Baby turtles always hatch facing south.

Bait

As stated above, all Zombie variants seek out turtle eggs to trample them. This mechanic, combined with a barrier around the egg can be used to bait Zombies and their variants in farms (this mechanic is primarly used in Gold farming with Zombified Piglins).

Sounds

Generic

Java Edition:

metal sound type
Sound	Closed captions	Source	Description	Identifier	Translation key	Volume	Pitch	Attenuation distance
	​Block broken	Blocks	Once the block has broken	block.metal.break	subtitles.block.generic.break​	1.0	1.2	16
	​Block placed​[until: JE 26.4]	Blocks	When the block is placed	block.metal.place	subtitles.block.generic.place​	1.0	1.2	16
	​Block breaking	Blocks	While the block is in the process of being broken	block.metal.hit	subtitles.block.generic.hit​	0.25	0.75	16
	​Something falls on a block	Entity-Dependent	Falling on the block with fall damage	block.metal.fall	subtitles.block.generic.fall​	0.5	1.25	16
	​Footsteps	Entity-Dependent	Walking on the block	block.metal.step	subtitles.block.generic.footsteps​	0.15	1.5	16

Bedrock Edition:

turtle_egg sound type
Sound	Closed captions	Source	Description	Identifier	Translation key	Volume	Pitch
	​ ?	Blocks	When the block is placed	dig.stone	​ ?	1.0	0.8–1.0
	​ ?	Blocks	While the block is in the process of being broken	hit.stone	​ ?	0.25	0.5
	​ ?	Players	Falling on the block with fall damage	fall.egg	​ ?	0.4	1.0
	​ ?	Players	Walking on the block	step.stone	​ ?	0.3	1.0
	​ ?	Blocks	Jumping from the block	jump.stone	​ ?	0.15	1.0
	​ ?	Players	Falling on the block without fall damage	fall.egg	​ ?	0.2	1.0

Unique

Java Edition

Bedrock Edition:

Data values

ID

Java Edition:

Name	Identifier	Form	Translation key
Turtle Egg	turtle_egg	Block & Item	block.minecraft.turtle_egg

Bedrock Edition:

Name	Identifier	Numeric ID	Form	Item ID[i 1]	Translation key
Turtle Egg	turtle_egg	414	Block & Giveable Item[i 2]	Identical[i 3] (Numeric: -159)	tile.turtle_egg.name

Block states

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

History

Java Edition

Java Edition
1.13			18w07a				Added turtle eggs.
							Turtle eggs currently render three-dimensional in the inventory.
			18w11a				Added drowned, which like zombies and their variants, seek out and trample turtle eggs.
			18w19a				Turtle eggs now display as a 2D sprite in the inventory.
			18w22a				If the player is inside the hitbox of one turtle egg, and another is attempted to be placed, the placement fails.
							Turtle eggs now make placement sounds when the amount in a stack is increased.
							More turtle eggs than normal can be placed in one stack by aiming at adjacent blocks.
1.14			19w03c				Turtle egg clusters now use correct cullface arguments, with the exception of four turtle eggs, which still renders a redundant face.
			19w08a				The model of turtle eggs has been changed, as to not have a stretched texture.[5]
1.16			pre3				Turtle eggs now hatch on red sand.[6]
1.19.4 Experiment Update 1.20			23w07a				Turtle eggs now hatch on suspicious sand.
1.20.2			23w32a				Turtle eggs cracking now emit a block_change vibration of frequency 11.
							Turtle eggs hatching now emit a block_destroy vibration of frequency 12.
1.21.11			25w45a				The hatching chance over the day is now controlled via the minecraft:gameplay/turtle_egg_hatch_chance environment attribute, which defaults to 0 for dimensions without a daylight cycle. As a result, turtle eggs no longer hatch in dimensions other than the Overworld.
26.1			snap5				Turtle eggs can now hatch in dimensions other than the Overworld again.

Bedrock Edition

Bedrock Edition
1.5.0			beta 1.5.0.4				Added sea turtle eggs.
1.11.0			beta 1.11.0.1				Ravagers can now destroy sea turtle eggs in their path.
1.13.0			beta 1.13.0.9				Sea turtle eggs now display as a 2D sprite in the inventory.
1.20.30			Preview 1.20.20.21				Increased the hardness and blast resistance of sea turtle eggs from 0.4 to 0.5.
1.21.30			Preview 1.21.30.22				Changed name from "Sea Turtle Egg" to "Turtle Egg" to match Java Edition.
26.20			Preview 26.20.23				Turtle eggs can no longer be destroyed by ravagers.[7]

Legacy Console Edition

Legacy Console Edition
Xbox 360	Xbox One	PS3	PS4	PS Vita	Wii U	Switch
TU69		1.76	1.76	1.76	Patch 38		Added sea turtle eggs.

Issues

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

Gallery

Renders

Screenshots

• 
  First image of turtle eggs
• 
  Second image of turtle eggs
• 
  A zombie stomping on turtle eggs
• 
  The 3 stages a turtle egg goes through before it hatches: plain, slightly cracked, and very cracked
• 
  The different numbers of turtle eggs that can fit in one block
• 
  Turtle eggs on a small island
• 
  The detection range of hostile mobs toward turtle eggs
• 
  Graph of simulation results showing how long it takes turtle eggs to hatch

In other media

• 
  Steve and Alex digging near turtle eggs
• 
  A turtle egg as it appeared in Minecraft Earth
• 
  Turtle eggs as they appear in Mojang Presents... An Update Aquatic
• 
  A turtle egg factory inside of the shell

References