How To Make Charcoal In Minecraft

Charcoal has been in the game for many years now. It is a substitution for the standardCoal so it can be used to help smelt all the items you need. You can also craft a few items with it by swapping it in place of the Coal in any recipes that use it. Unlike its counterpart, Charcoal is a renewable resource. This means you can craft it quite easily to avoid potentially having to hunt down those sometimes elusive veins of Coal Ore. This makes it a game changer in the early game when you require much Coal to fuel all your smelting needs. 

Minecraft Fuel Sources Matrix by NameHero

The following matrix can be used as a reference for your fuel source needs. It includes fuel unit costs for smelting a single item, as well as in stacks of x16, x32, and x64. Pay special attention to the entries with Java or Bedrock flags indicating that the values provided are meant only for that specific edition. 

How To Get And Use Charcoal

Charcoal can only be obtained through two ways: smelting items or by breaking a Campfire. When smelting an item into Charcoal, it can be any type of log but not planks because they do not smelt into Charcoal. If you plan to make a ton of Charcoal, the best two smelting fuels would be a Lava Bucket and/or a Block of Coal. Lava Buckets have the longest burning value of 1,000 seconds (20,000 ticks), and the block of Coal has a burning value of 800 seconds (16,000 ticks), making these two items the longest lasting fuel source options for smelting. 

Charcoal acts identical to Coal, you can substitute it into any recipe in its place. Charcoal has a smelting burn time of 80 seconds (1,600 ticks), which is the same as Coal. You can also use Charcoal to craft a few items such as the Torch, Soul Torch, Campfire, and Fire Charge. Torches and soul torches differ in look and light levels. When using a soul torch, you have a shorter light coverage or radius than that of the standard Torch. Campfires can be used as a light source, as well as cooking up to four food items at once. Fire Charges can be used just like flint and steel, except when you use them, they break immediately and can’t be used again unless you have another Fire Charge. This makes them a one-time use item like matches. 

When making these crafting recipes, you can use either Charcoal or Coal.

Crafting Recipe: Torch		Crafting Recipe: Soul Torch
Crafting Recipe: Campfire		Crafting Recipe: Fire Charge
Crafting Recipe: Block of Coal

How To Find Coal

Coal ore is often found near the surface or on the sides of any mountain. Tons of Coal ore can be found at Y-96, though it can spawn anywhere from Y-0 all the way up to Y-256. Coal ore is easier found in stone rather than Deepslate. In fact, Deepslate Coal is one of the rarest ores in the game.

Burning Wood To Get Charcoal

To start smelting logs into Charcoal, you will need a Furnace which can be created by getting x8 Cobblestone and putting it into your Crafting Table. You also need to find some trees for Wooden Logs, with Oak Log being the easiest to find. Once you have created your Furnace and gathered some Wooden Logs, you can use any type of wood logs. (i.e.:  Acacia Log, Birch Log, Cherry Log, Dark Oak Log, Jungle Log, Mangrove Log, Oak Log, or Spruce Log). Next, you can right-click your Furnace to place it down and right-click it again to put the logs in the top half and some other wooden items in the bottom half of your furnace.

Crafting Recipe: Furnace

For this example, I crafted some Oak Planks into some sticks. You get x1 Charcoal for every x3 Sticks, while every x1 Oak Log or x1 Oak Plank yields x1.5 Charcoal. You can either craft some Wooden Planks into Sticks or you can use another log to burn and use as fuel. This is the better choice when crafting larger quantities as the Oak Log burns longer than each Stick when used as a fuel source.. 

Smelting Recipe: Charcoal

Lava Farm (Infinite)

If you want to use lava as your main fuel source, I have a build that gives you an infinite amount of lava. For this farm you need at least x1 Lava Bucket, x1 Dripstone Block, x1 Pointed Dripstone Tip, x1 Cauldron, and at least x4 blocks of any kind to keep the lava in place, I recommend Glass Blocks as it makes for a more appealing aesthetic, which you can see in the image below. You can make this farm as big as you want.

List Of All Fuel Sources In Minecraft

The following chart outlines the various fuel rates of all fuel sources in Minecraft Bedrock and Java editions:

Conclusion

Charcoal is a super handy resource in Minecraft. It’s like a renewable version of Coal that you can make by burning wood in a Furnace. You can use it to smelt stuff, craft Torches, and even make Campfires. It’s a great way to keep your fuel supply up, especially in the early game when you might not have access to a lot of Coal. So next time you’re chopping down trees, don’t forget to save some wood for crafting Charcoal!