Boat

A boat is both an item and a vehicle entity used primarily for fast transport of players and passenger mobs over bodies of water.

Obtaining

Boats can be retrieved by repeatedly punching them until they drop as an item.

Boats can be crafted with any overworld planks.

Tools and weapons with damage above 4 can instantly destroy a boat in one hit.‌^{[Java Edition only]}

Crafting

Ingredients	Crafting recipe	Description
Matching Overworld Planks		‌[Java Edition only]
Matching Overworld Planks + Wooden Shovel		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]

Usage

Boats can be used for the transportation of players and mobs, sold for emeralds, or burnt as fuel.

Trading

Master-level fisherman villagers always offer to buy a boat for an emerald. The type of boat depends on the biome outfit type of the villager; plains villagers offer to buy oak boats, taiga and snowy villagers offer to buy spruce boats, savanna villagers offer to buy acacia boats, desert and jungle villagers offer to buy jungle boats, and swamp villagers offer to buy dark oak boats.

Fuel

When used as fuel in a furnace, a boat lasts 60 seconds, smelting up to 6 items.

Transportation

Entering

File:Oak Boat shake.gif

The animation of an oak boat when atop a bubble column.

A player enters a boat by using it, if the boat is not fully occupied (boats can hold two entities). Unlike beds, there is no message above the hotbar for attempting to enter a fully occupied boat.

Exiting

A boat can be exited by sneaking or, in Bedrock Edition, pressing down the right analog stick on a controller, tapping the "Leave Boat" button when using touch controls, or jumping. When exiting a boat, the player is placed in the direction the player is facing, or, if facing directly up or down, the player is placed in front of the boat. The exiting player is placed on land if that is possible from the dismounting position.

Motion

Boats do not turn with mouse-look.

With a keyboard or gamepad, boats are controlled using the forward, left (turns left), right (turns right), and backward keys. Using the sprint key increases the field of vision, but does not increase speed as if sprinting.

With touchscreen controls, two buttons for steering appear. The right button or key steers to the left, and the left button or key steers to the right. Pressing both buttons moves the boat forward.

Since JE 1.9, it is no longer possible to ride a boat upstream. A boat lift, usually made from tripwire, piston, and optionally a slime block, can be used to move a boat up.

Behavior

File:BoatAnimals.png

Multiple entities in each boat.

Speed

Boats move according to the player's control or water currents, with speed affected by the surface traversed. Boats move extremely quickly on ice, allowing for the construction of fast transportation systems in any dimension.

Substance	Speed
Water	8.0 m/s	28.8 km/h
Ice, Frosted Ice, Packed Ice	57.1 m/s	205.7 km/h
Blue Ice	72.7 m/s	261.8 km/h
Land	2.0 m/s	7.2 km/h

Flotation

A boat floats unless it enters a waterfall or moves over a bubble column, which cause boats to capsize or sink.

When a boat moves over a bubble column, it begins to shake. If the bubbles are caused by a magma block, all passengers are expelled and the boat sinks. A sunken boat floats only when it has been destroyed and replaced, or when it emerges from the currents keeping it down.‌^{[Bedrock Edition only]}

Destruction

As boats are entities, they have health. Boats effectively have just over 49px9px (exactly 4 damage is not quite enough to destroy a boat), and regenerate ¹⁄₁₀ per game tick.

Boats can be destroyed by explosions, fire and lava (but not magma blocks), cactus (in java and bedrock pre-1.16.100) and by being punched.

When a boat is destroyed under normal conditions, it drops itself in item form. In certain conditions, such as when falling for exactly 12, 13, 49, 51, 111, 114, 198, 202, 310, or 315 blocks, it drops two sticks and three wood planks upon being destroyed.

Passengers

Boats can support two riders, including mobs. Mobs cannot exit a boat and are trapped until the boat gets destroyed, or until the player uses a fishing rod or lead to remove the mob. This can be used to easily transport mobs, although hostile mobs still attack while in boats.

A player cannot both move (row) and use items at the same time. Note that it is still possible to initialise an item use (e.g. start eating) and row the boat while the item is still in the middle of the use animation. Although the boating animation overrides the item use animation, the item can still be successfully consumed. Does not work with items that are triggered by the release of the use button (e.g. bow, trident).‌^{[Java Edition only]}

In Java Edition, boats can completely nullify fall damage for itself and any players/mobs riding it, making it useful for transportation/travel through mountains or through the Nether. This does not work in Bedrock Edition, however: while the boat survives, its occupants still receive fall damage.

Riding a boat does not deplete hunger, making it an efficient way to travel.

Being in a boat limits the player's mouse-look to the forward 210° arc.

Collision

When on the ground, boats have 0.455 the height of a block.

Riding a boat over a lily pad causes the lily pad to drop, although the boat speed stutters a bit.

Game Edition Differences

Java Edition

• When moving fast enough, a "water spray" visual effect represents the bow wake.
• A sunken boat is sunk forever, unable to be retrieved until it is broken by the player.
• For mobs to enter a boat, they must be on the side of the boat. A mob cannot control the boat.

Bedrock Edition

• A sunken boat resumes floating when it emerges from the current or the waterfall that was keeping it down.
• Mobs can be 'picked up' by riding a boat near them.
• Leads can be attached to boats, though the lead often breaks on land, due to boats moving much slower on land.

Sounds

Sound	Subtitle	Source	Description	Namespaced ID	Translation key	Volume	Pitch	Attenuation distance
File:Boat paddle land1.oggFile:Boat paddle land2.oggFile:Boat paddle land3.oggFile:Boat paddle land4.oggFile:Boat paddle land5.oggFile:Boat paddle land6.ogg	Rowing	Friendly Creatures	Plays when riding boat on land	entity.boat.paddle_land	subtitles.entity.boat.paddle_land	1.0	0.8 - 1.2 Template:Checkthecode	16
File:Boat paddle water1.oggFile:Boat paddle water2.oggFile:Boat paddle water3.oggFile:Boat paddle water4.oggFile:Boat paddle water5.oggFile:Boat paddle water6.oggFile:Boat paddle water7.oggFile:Boat paddle water8.ogg	Rowing	Friendly Creatures	Plays when riding boat on water	entity.boat.paddle_water	subtitles.entity.boat.paddle_water	0.8	0.8 - 1.2 Template:Checkthecode	16

Data values

ID

Java Edition:

Boat	Namespaced ID	Item tags (JE)	Form	Translation key
Oak item	oak_boat	boats	Item	item.minecraft.oak_boat
Spruce item	spruce_boat	boats	Item	item.minecraft.spruce_boat
Birch item	birch_boat	boats	Item	item.minecraft.birch_boat
Jungle item	jungle_boat	boats	Item	item.minecraft.jungle_boat
Acacia item	acacia_boat	boats	Item	item.minecraft.acacia_boat
Dark Oak item	dark_oak_boat	boats	Item	item.minecraft.dark_oak_boat

Boat	Namespaced ID	Translation key
Template:EntitySprite Entity	boat	entity.minecraft.boat

Bedrock Edition:

Boat	Namespaced ID	Alias ID (BE)	Numeric ID	Form	Translation key
Oak item	oak_boat	boat / 0	333	Item	item.boat.oak.name
Spruce item	spruce_boat	boat / 1	333	Item	item.boat.spruce.name
Birch item	birch_boat	boat / 2	333	Item	item.boat.birch.name
Jungle item	jungle_boat	boat / 3	333	Item	item.boat.jungle.name
Acacia item	acacia_boat	boat / 4	333	Item	item.boat.acacia.name
Dark oak item	dark_oak_boat	boat / 5	333	Item	item.boat.big_oak.name

Boat	Namespaced ID	Numeric ID	Translation key
Template:EntitySprite Entity	boat	90	entity.boat.name

Entity data

See also: Chunk format

Boats have entity data associated with them that contain various properties of the entity.

History

Java Edition Alpha
v1.0.6					32px 32px Added boats.
Java Edition Beta
1.8		Pre-release			It is now possible to score a critical hit against a boat.
Java Edition
1.3.1		12w15a			Boats can now be shot out from dispensers.
		1.3			32px The texture of the oak boat item has been changed.
		12w21a			Boats no longer take damage when colliding with lily pads. Instead, the lily pads themselves break.
		12w23a			Boats can now accelerate to faster than previous speeds, and are now easier to control.
		12w27a			Boats now drop their item instead of 3 wood planks and 2 sticks if broken by a player.
1.6.1		?			New boat physics with lower inertia, but left, back and right controls have been removed.
					Boats now take damage and break when colliding with many lily pads in a short time.
1.7.2		13w36a			Players can now /summon mobs riding boats, though mobs cannot control boats.
		13w43a			Boats no longer inflict fall damage when running aground.
					Boats being broken by lily pads has been slightly improved.
					Left, back and right controls added again.
1.8		14w06a			Mobs riding boats can now control them, so that they can chase or flee enemies, move toward food, move about randomly, or whatever they would do on land. The exceptions are the ghast and bat, both of which cannot control boats.
1.8.2		pre2			Boats can now survive crashes at higher speeds.
?					Boats no longer break snow layers they run into.
1.9		15w41a			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px Boats have been overhauled to match the boats from Pocket Edition Alpha 0.11.0. They now have oars for paddling and are more durable and now allows passengers to board.
					Mobs can now board boats, though they can no longer control them.
					A new set of controls have been introduced: it includes holding down the right and left keys to move forward, and using the right key to move the right oar, turning the boat to the left (and vice-versa). Mouse movement no longer turns boats, and the forward and back keys no longer have any effect.
					Players can no longer use items or attack from boats unless they were at a complete stop.
					The crafting recipe for boats has been changed to require a wooden shovel as shown below. Recipe Ingredients Crafting recipe Oak Planks + Wooden Shovel
					Added variants of all wood types, though only the oak boat can be crafted.
					The NBT tag Type (string) have now added for the boat entity, taking values oak, spruce, birch, jungle, acacia and dark_oak.
		15w42a			Birch, spruce, acacia and jungle boats can now be crafted using the same recipe as oak, except with the corresponding planks.
					The new boats are now comparable in speed to the old boats (slightly faster than sprinting), though with less momentum.
					Players can now use items and attack immediately after they stop rowing.
		15w43c			The texture of boats has been remapped, so that they now have a separate texture per oar and per side of the boat.
		15w45a			The dark oak boat can now be crafted.
		15w51a			Boats now drop their corresponding planks when broken.
		16w04a			Boats are now faster and now move forward and backward using the forward and backward keys respectively, and steer left and right using the left and right keys respectively. The rowing mechanism introduced in 15w41a, holding the right and left keys, is removed and no longer moves the boat forward. The controls are now more similar to boats before the overhaul.
					Boats now sink when underwater, or within flowing water of any depth.
					The crafting recipe of boats has been restored to the original recipe, no longer requiring a wooden shovel as it has since 15w41a (though matching wood planks is still required).
					Riding a boat no longer subjects water-sensitive mobs to being damaged by water, and no longer protects sunlight-sensitive mobs from being damaged by sunlight.
					Dismounting in a boat now attempts to place the player on land.
		16w06a			Riding entities such as boats are now run by the client rather than by the server.
1.11		16w32a			The entity ID has been changed from Boat to boat.
		16w33a			Boats can now be used to fuel furnaces.
1.12		17w17a			A boat paddles sound has been added.
1.13		17w47a			The oak boat ID has been changed from boat to oak_boat.
					Prior to The Flattening, these items' numeral IDs were 333, 444, 445, 446, 447 and 448.
1.14		18w43a			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px The textures of all boats have been changed.
		18w50a			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px The textures of all boats have been changed to match the new wooden planks.
1.15		19w37a			Boats as fuel now smelt 6 items in a furnace instead of 1.
Pocket Edition Alpha
September 19, 2014					Tommaso Checchi tweeted a picture of a player riding a boat, stating that the most important thing is to "get the paddling right."
January 26, 2015					Tommaso Checchi tweets a screenshot of multiple riders in a single boat.
February 20, 2015					Tommaso Checchi tweets a screenshot of multiple boats with only mobs in them.
v0.11.0		build 1			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px Added boats. Each wood type has its own respective variant, though they share the same sprite as items.
					Boats can support two riders, including mobs.
					Boats are larger in size than in Java Edition.
					Boats are more resistant to crashing against land than in Java Edition.
		build 12			Projectiles can now be shot from boats.
v0.12.1		build 1			Added all boat variants to the creative inventory.
					32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px New inventory icons for boats have been added. The sprite now includes paddles and represents their respective wood color.
v0.13.0		build 1			Boats are now slightly faster than sprinting, and no longer deplete hunger.
					Players can now use items and attack immediately after they stop rowing.
		build 3			Boats now stack on top of each other.
Bedrock Edition
1.2.0		beta 1.2.0.22			Boats now move faster on ice.
1.5.0		beta 1.5.0.0			The steering of boats has been changed when using keyboard and mouse - W now moves the boat forward and S reverses it.
		beta 1.5.0.4			Boats can now sink or float on bubble columns.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px The textures of all boats have been changed.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.4			Boats can now be bought from fisherman villagers.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.57			Trading has been changed, master-level fisherman villagers now offer to buy boats based on their villager biome outfit.
					Due to trading changes, birch boats can no longer be sold to fisherman villagers.
1.16.100		beta 1.16.100.51			Custom named boats now save their name after placing and breaking.
		beta 1.16.100.56			The item ID boat has been split up into <type>_boat.
Legacy Console Edition
TU1	CU1	1.0	Patch 1	1.0.1	32px 32px Added boats.
TU12					The maximum number of boats in a world has been increased to 40.
					Boats now break when they hit land hard.
TU14		1.04			Boats are no longer broken by lily pads anymore, instead they run straight through the lily pad now, breaking and sometimes dropping it.
					When boats crash, they can now sometimes drop themselves as items.
					Boats are now less glitchy and more responsive now.
					The maximum speed of boats has been increased.
					When exiting, players now move from the boat.
					When broken by a player, they drop a boat now.
TU46	CU36	1.38	Patch 15		32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px Boats have been overhauled to match Pocket Edition Alpha 0.11.0 boats.
TU57	CU49	1.56	Patch 27	1.0.7	The crafting recipe of boats has been changed to require a wooden shovel.
		1.90			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px The textures of all boats have been changed.
New Nintendo 3DS Edition
0.1.0					32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px Added boats.

Issues

Issues relating to "Boat" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.

Trivia

• Sand, red sand, concrete powder, gravel, anvils, and dragon eggs drop as items when they fall onto a boat that is in water.
• Boats travel at fast speeds when on ice, packed ice, and frosted ice. They travel even faster on blue ice.
• The crafting recipes for boats are the only recipes that can be unlocked in the recipe book without having any items, by jumping into water.
• Dolphins chase players in boats.
• Boats are the only wood-based item that cannot be crafted using crimson planks or warped planks.
• A chest is short enough that a boat falls onto it rather than crashes into it.
• In Legacy Console versions of the game, holding the movement stick to the side in a boat on blue Ice causes the player to spin quickly. If a passenger is in the boat while this occurs, when the player exits the boat after it reaches maximum velocity (attained after about three seconds), for most mobs, the mob's head may spin uncontrollably. For some mobs, however, nothing happens (such as slimes and ghasts). The mob may also get its head stuck at an angle. Thorough testing was done on Minecraft: Wii U Edition, although the glitch was originally discovered on the Xbox 360 Edition.
• Another glitch in Legacy Console Edition causes boats to float downward slowly, while attaining a high horizontal speed.

Gallery

• AllBoats.png

  All types of boats next to each other.

• Screenboat.png

  The old boat floating.

• BoatStackingFun.png

  A bunch of pre-1.9 boats stacked up.

• Boats boats boats boats!!.jpg
• I guess it's getting there.png
• All aboard the hype boat!.png

  Image of the completed Bedrock Edition boats, tweeted by Tommaso Checchi.

See also

• Transportation

References

Items

View at: Template:Items/content [edit]