Piston

Piston

150px150px

150px150px

Renewable	Yes
Stackable	Yes (64)
Tool
Blast resistance	0.5
Hardness	1.5
Luminant	No
Transparent	No
Flammable	No
Catches fire from lava	No

A piston is a block capable of pushing blocks, players, and mobs when given a redstone pulse.

A sticky piston has the same function as a piston but can also pull the block on its face back when it retracts, unlike the regular piston, which leaves the pushed block in place.

Obtaining

Breaking

A piston can be broken using any tool with equal efficiency, and always drops itself. In Java Edition, it is faster to break them with a pickaxe, although the Efficiency enchantment does not increase the mining speed.^[verify] The pickaxe is the preferred tool for the head also, despite it being made almost completely of wood.

Block	Piston
Hardness	1.5
Tool
Breaking time
Default	2.25
Wooden	1.15
Stone	0.6
Iron	0.4
Diamond	0.3
Netherite	0.25
Golden	0.2

Natural generation

Three sticky pistons generate as part of each jungle temple.

Crafting

Name	Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Piston	Any Planks + Cobblestone + Iron Ingot + Redstone Dust
Sticky Piston	Slimeball + Piston

Usage

See also: Tutorials/Piston uses and Mechanics/Redstone/Piston circuits

Pistons are always placed facing toward the player. When powered, the piston's wooden surface (the "head") starts extending immediately in Java Edition; or either Template:Convert later or immediately, depending on how it was powered, in Bedrock Edition. When it extends, it pushes at most 12 blocks. The piston makes a sound that can be heard within a 31×31×31 cube centered on the activating piston. Any entities in the path of the extending head are pushed with the blocks. If there is no place for the entities to go, the block pushes inside them, suffocating mobs if the block is not transparent when pushed into the eye height of the mob.

When a piston loses power, its head retracts. Like extending, this retraction starts immediately in Java Edition; or, depending on how it was powered, after 1 tick in Bedrock Edition. It finishes retracting Template:Convert after it starts. A sticky piston also pulls the block attached to its head, but not any of the other blocks it may have pushed.

Sticky pistons stick to a block only when retracting, so a block next to the piston head can be pushed aside by another piston and sticky pistons cannot hold falling blocks horizontally against gravity. In Java Edition, pistons finish extending early and start retracting if given a pulse shorter than Template:Convert. These shorter pulses cause sticky pistons to "drop" their block, leaving it behind when trying to push it with a short pulse. Also, this causes the block to end up in its final position earlier.

A piston that pushes a slime block bounces any entity that it displaces in the direction the piston is facing. In addition, when a slime block is moved by a piston, any movable blocks adjacent (not diagonally) to the slime block also moves. See the "Slime blocks" section below for more details.

In Bedrock Edition, blocks that stick to walls (such as levers) can be placed on pistons or sticky pistons.

Limitations

Pistons can push most blocks, and sticky pistons can pull most blocks, except those listed in the table below. Sticky pistons simply leave a block behind if it cannot pull it.

Pistons cannot push blocks into the void or beyond the top of the map. They also cannot push more than 12 blocks. If the requirements for a block to be pushed are not met, the piston simply does not extend.

Blocks that cannot be pushed or pulled

Block	Effect (Java Edition)	Effect (Bedrock Edition)
Barrier Beacon Bedrock Command Block Crying Obsidian Enchanting Table End Gateway End Portal End Portal Frame Ender Chest Grindstone Jigsaw Block Jukebox Lodestone Nether Portal Obsidian Piston (extended) Respawn Anchor Spawner	colspan=2 Template:Tc
Glazed Terracotta	colspan=2 Template:Tc
Barrel Beehive Bee Nest Blast Furnace Brewing Stand Chest Daylight Detector Dispenser Dropper Furnace Hopper Lectern Smoker Trapped Chest	rowspan=4 Template:Tc	Template:Tc
Double Chest	Template:Tc
Banner Sign	Template:Tc
Campfire Soul Campfire	Template:Tc
Bamboo Bed Budding Amethyst‌[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17.0] Button Cactus Cake Carpets Carved Pumpkin Chorus Flower Chorus Plant Cobweb Cocoa Door Dragon Egg Fire Flower Pot Flower Head Template:EntityLink Jack o'Lantern Ladder Lava Leaves Lever Lily Pad Melon Moss Block‌[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17.0] Moss Carpet‌[upcoming: JE 1.17 & BE 1.17.0] Mushroom Nether Wart Template:EntityLink Pointed Dripstone Pressure Plate Pumpkin Redstone Comparator Redstone Dust Redstone Repeater Redstone Torch Scaffolding Sea Pickle Shulker Box Snow Sugar Cane Torch Tripwire Tripwire Hook Turtle Egg Vines Water Weighted Pressure Plate Wheat	colspan=2 Template:Tc
Anvil	Template:Tc	Template:Tc
Concrete Powder Gravel Red Sand Sand	colspan=2 Template:Tc

Pistons do not move blocks that are "attached to a block", as they detach and drop as an item.

Exceptions

• Rails: as long as they remain on top of a solid face of a block in their new position, and that block isn't moving at the same time.
  • An exception is when the rail and block supporting it are on two parallel extended pistons at which the rail remains attached. Trying to move both on the same piston using slime blocks does not work, nor does moving them on perpendicular pistons (although the latter temporarily appears to work because of a bug MC-75716).
  • Rails re-orient themselves after being pushed, similar to when placed manually.
• Carpets

Powering pistons

File:PistonTrick.png

Pistons powered by one line of redstone.

Pistons can be powered in various ways:

• If a redstone wire is in a line shape toward the piston. In Java Edition, the wire does not automatically curve to the piston.
• Pistons can be powered by a powered block directly adjacent to them, whether it is strongly powered or weakly powered.
• Pistons can be powered by a redstone torch directly adjacent to them.
• In Java Edition, pistons can be powered by any powered block one block above and to the side, including the "activated space" above it (if a piston, both sticky and normal were to be facing up and a block of redstone placed on its head, it extends when powered, but doesn't retract when the power it receives from the side or back turns off). However, the piston doesn't extend or retract until it receives a block update. This property is called quasi-connectivity and can be used to make a BUD switch.
• A repeater cannot transfer power through a piston, as pistons are a transparent block.
• An upward-facing piston can't be powered by a block above it, unless it is extended In Java Edition.
• In Bedrock Edition a redstone torch attached to a piston turns off whenever the piston is powered.
• Pistons can also be powered by observers. This will create a clock if the setup is correct
• pistons can push up and down indefinitely if the setup is correct

Slime blocks and honey blocks

A				B

Piston A may extend because the slime block ignores the adjacent obsidian. Piston B may not extend because the diamond block is prevented from moving by the obsidian and so the slime block also refuses to move.

When a slime block is pushed or pulled by a piston, while moving, adjacent blocks also move with the slime block, unless a non-piston movable block stops the blocks that are "grabbed" by the slime blocks. These blocks may in turn push other blocks, not just the blocks in the line in front of the piston. For example, a slime block sitting on the ground attempts to move the ground block underneath itself, which in turn has to push additional ground blocks in the direction of motion just as if it were being pushed directly by a piston.

Glazed terracotta is an exception; it does not move when adjacent slime blocks are moved.

The same occurs when a slime block is moved by an adjacent Slime Block. For example, a 2×2×2 cube of Slime Blocks may be pushed or pulled as a unit by a single piston acting on any of the blocks in the cube.

A slime block adjacent to a block that cannot be moved by pistons ignores the immobile block. But if an adjacent block could be moved but is prevented by the presence of an immobile block, the slime block is prevented from moving.

Slime blocks are not pulled by a non-sticky piston, nor are they moved if an adjacent (non-Slime) block is moved by a piston.

The maximum of 12 blocks moved by a piston still applies. For example, a 2×2×3 collection of Slime Blocks may be pushed or pulled by a sticky piston as long as no other movable blocks are adjacent to it.

A piston cannot move itself via a "hook" constructed of slime blocks, but self-propelled contraptions can be created with multiple pistons. For that, see the article Tutorials/Flying machines.

The same happens for the honey block, but it does not stick to slime blocks.

Technical components

Piston Head

Piston Head

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Renewable	Yes
Stackable	?
Tool	Any tool
Blast resistance	0.5
Hardness	1.5
Luminant	No
Transparent	Yes
Flammable	No
Catches fire from lava	No

The piston head is a technical block used as the second block of an extended piston. A block state defines whether it is a normal or a sticky piston head. It can be placed using the /setblock command or with the debug stick, though if not part of a proper piston, it disappears after receiving any block tick, such as when a block is placed next to it unless the player uses the debug stick. It drops nothing.

In Java Edition, the normal and sticky piston heads are distinguished by a block state. In Bedrock Edition, they used separate block IDs.

Metadata

See also: Data values

In Bedrock Edition, piston heads use the following data values:

Block states

See also: Block states

Moving Piston

Moving Piston

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Renewable	Yes
Stackable	?
Tool	None
Blast resistance	0
Hardness	?
Luminant	No
Transparent	Yes
Flammable	No
Catches fire from lava	No

The moving piston is an unobtainable technical block that contains part of a piston head, and/or part of one or two blocks that the piston is carrying into or out of the grid cell (including blocks carried indirectly via slime blocks). Since moving blocks vary in how much of each grid cell they occupy, they can't be stored as normal blocks and are instead stored as block entities. It is overwritten with air, the piston head or the carried block at the end of the piston stroke; but if it is placed through editing and no piston is connected, it remains indefinitely.

It is invisible and non-solid in Java Edition, and cannot be broken without the use of commands or TNT. Although it is non-solid, fluids cannot pass through it. It also prevents players from building at its location. Mobs can see through it, but cannot walk through it. The game treats the block as a stone block when it comes to the player's footstep sounds. It is similar to Invisible Bedrock in properties with the exception that the player can walk through the moving piston but not invisible bedrock.

Block states

See also: Block states

Block data

See also: Block entity format

The moving piston has a block entity associated with it that holds additional data about the block.

Sounds

Generic

Java Edition:

Sound	Subtitle	Source	Description	Namespaced ID	Translation key	Volume	Pitch	Attenuation distance
File:Stone dig1.oggFile:Stone dig2.oggFile:Stone dig3.oggFile:Stone dig4.ogg	Block broken	Blocks	Once the block has broken	block.stone.break	subtitles.block.generic.break	1.0	0.8	16
File:Stone hit1.oggFile:Stone hit2.oggFile:Stone hit3.oggFile:Stone hit4.oggFile:Stone hit5.oggFile:Stone hit6.ogg	None	Blocks	Falling on the block with fall damage	block.stone.fall	None	0.5	0.75	16
File:Stone hit1.oggFile:Stone hit2.oggFile:Stone hit3.oggFile:Stone hit4.oggFile:Stone hit5.oggFile:Stone hit6.ogg	Block breaking	Blocks	While the block is in the process of being broken	block.stone.hit	subtitles.block.generic.hit	0.25	0.5	16
File:Stone dig1.oggFile:Stone dig2.oggFile:Stone dig3.oggFile:Stone dig4.ogg	Block placed	Blocks	When the block is placed	block.stone.place	subtitles.block.generic.place	1.0	0.8	16
File:Stone hit1.oggFile:Stone hit2.oggFile:Stone hit3.oggFile:Stone hit4.oggFile:Stone hit5.oggFile:Stone hit6.ogg	Footsteps	Blocks	Walking on the block	block.stone.step	subtitles.block.generic.footsteps	0.15	1.0	16

Bedrock Edition:

Sound	Source	Description	Namespaced ID	Volume	Pitch
File:Stone dig1.oggFile:Stone dig2.oggFile:Stone dig3.oggFile:Stone dig4.ogg	Blocks	Once the block has broken	dig.stone	1.0	0.8
File:Stone hit1.oggFile:Stone hit2.oggFile:Stone hit3.oggFile:Stone hit4.oggFile:Stone hit5.oggFile:Stone hit6.ogg	Blocks	Falling on the block with fall damage	fall.stone	0.4	1.0
File:Stone hit1.oggFile:Stone hit2.oggFile:Stone hit3.oggFile:Stone hit4.oggFile:Stone hit5.oggFile:Stone hit6.ogg	Blocks	While the block is in the process of being broken	hit.stone	0.37	0.5
?	Blocks	Jumping from the block	jump.stone	0.12	1.0
?	Blocks	Falling on the block without fall damage	land.stone	0.22	1.0
File:Stone hit1.oggFile:Stone hit2.oggFile:Stone hit3.oggFile:Stone hit4.oggFile:Stone hit5.oggFile:Stone hit6.ogg	Blocks	Walking on the block	step.stone	0.3	1.0
File:Stone dig1.oggFile:Stone dig2.oggFile:Stone dig3.oggFile:Stone dig4.ogg	Blocks	When the block is placed	use.stone	1.0	0.8

Unique

Java Edition:

Sound	Subtitle	Source	Description	Namespaced ID	Translation key	Volume	Pitch	Attenuation distance
File:Piston extend.ogg	Piston moves	Blocks	When a piston extends	block.piston.extend	subtitles.block.piston.move	?	(<1)	16
File:Piston contract.ogg	Piston moves	Blocks	When a piston contracts	block.piston.contract	subtitles.block.piston.move	?	(<1)	16

Data values

ID

Java Edition:

Name	Namespaced ID	Block tags (JE)	Form	Translation key
Piston	piston	None	Block & Item	block.minecraft.piston
Sticky Piston	sticky_piston	None	Block & Item	block.minecraft.sticky_piston
Piston Head	piston_head	None	Block	block.minecraft.piston_head
Moving Piston	moving_piston	dragon_immune wither_immune	Block	block.minecraft.moving_piston

Name	Namespaced ID
Block entity	piston

Bedrock Edition:

Name	Namespaced ID	Numeric ID	Form	Translation key
Piston	piston	33	Block & Item	tile.piston.name
Sticky Piston	sticky_piston	29	Block & Item	tile.sticky_piston.name
Piston Head	pistonArmCollision	34	Block	tile.pistonArmCollision.name
Sticky Piston Head	stickyPistonArmCollision	472	Block	tile.stickyPistonArmCollision.name
Moving Block	movingBlock	250	Block	tile.movingBlock.name

Name	Savegame ID
Block entity	PistonArm

Metadata

See also: Data values

In Bedrock Edition, pistons use the following data values: Template:/DV

Block states

See also: Block states

The piston and sticky_piston blocks use following block states:

History

Java Edition Classic
May 21, 2009					Notch shows interest in adding blocks that can pull and push other blocks when a pulse from a wire is received; he called them "Pulley1", which would pull a block up, and "Pulley2", which would push a block up.
Java Edition Beta
June 7, 2011					Jeb tweets an image of pistons in development.
					32px The piston texture as screen-captured while in development had iron bands running over the head. The bands were removed for the release, leaving only iron brackets around the corners and edges.
1.7					32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px Added pistons and sticky pistons, alongside associated head and moving blocks.
					32px 32px Two blocks with the piston face texture on all sides exist.
					32px 32px The original piston was a mod posted on the Minecraft Forums by Hippoplatimus. The code for that version was given to Jeb, who then worked on implementing pistons into vanilla Minecraft. Hippoplatimus is in the game's credits under "Additional Programming", like other modders whose work made it into vanilla Minecraft.
					Another user, DiEvAl, privately submitted code as well, including the idea of Tile Entities to track moving blocks.
1.7_01					Sticky pistons no longer stick when they aren't retracting.
1.7.3					It is now impossible to place a jack o'lantern onto a sticky piston.[is this the correct version?]
Java Edition
?					The wireframe hitbox of the moving piston block is now halfway aligned.
1.3.1		12w22a			Sticky pistons now generate naturally inside jungle temples. In the temples, the pistons are used to form a puzzle mechanism.
		12w27a			Pistons have been updated to make them less error-prone, thus they also appear to update slower. This also alters the way pistons work, so the player might have to adapt their repeater delays and similar. For this change, pistons now take 2 redstone ticks (4 game ticks) to extend, but they still retract instantly.
1.8		14w17a			32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px 32px The models with facing up and down has been changed.
					32px Six-sided piston blocks no longer have a model.
		14w18a			Slime blocks now push and pull blocks adjacent when connected to sticky pistons.
					Extending a piston with a slime block on top of it launches the entity (mobs, players, items, launched arrows, etc) into the air.
		14w19a			Slime blocks can now push entities sideways and downward when attached to a piston.
		14w25a			Since all blocks have been converted to use block states, block/data-value combinations 33/6, 33/7, 29/6 and 29/7 (6-sided pistons) have been removed.
		14w32a			The piston extension block no longer has a hitbox.
1.9		15w49a			Unextended pistons, downward-facing pistons, and upward-facing piston extensions are now considered to have a solid top surface, like upside-down stairs and top-half slabs. There also existed a bug where when a piston retracted, it would pull entities through them.
1.11.1		16w50a			Added a new byte tag source for the piston_extension block entity, which is true if the block represents the piston head itself, and false if it represents a block being pushed. Pistons moving entities to the other side has been fixed.
1.12		17w16a			Sticky pistons do not pull glazed terracotta, and when pistons move slime blocks, they do not move glazed terracotta attached to the side of the slime block.
		pre3			Slime blocks can no longer pull glazed terracotta attached to any side of a piston, whatsoever.
1.13		17w47a			The moving block ID of pistons has been changed from piston_extension to moving_piston.
					Prior to The Flattening, these blocks' numeral IDs were 29, 33, 34 and 36.
					Pistons now can push note blocks.
		pre6			Sticky pistons now pull glazed terracotta again.
		pre8			Sticky pistons no longer pull glazed terracotta.
1.14		18w43a			32px 32px The texture of pistons has been changed.
		18w44a			Pistons are no longer transparent.
1.16		20w06a			The hardness of pistons has been increased from 0.5 to 1.5.
					Pickaxes are now more efficient on pistons.
Upcoming Java Edition
1.17		20w45a			Particles now appear if a block is broken by a piston.
Pocket Edition Alpha
v0.15.0		build 1			32px 32px Added pistons and sticky pistons.
					Pistons and sticky pistons have a version exclusive animation and the ability to push block entities.
?					32px Pistons and sticky pistons with data values 6 and 7 now have an extremely glitchy appearance. It is not known when this block was introduced, and it was removed some time between 1.10.0 and 1.13.1.
Bedrock Edition
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			32px 32px The texture of pistons has been changed.
1.13.0		?			Sticky piston heads are now a separate block from normal heads, instead of being differentiated by a block state. The namespaced ID is now stickypistonarmcollision, while the numerical ID is 472.
?					The movingblock for pistons can no longer be placed using commands.
Legacy Console Edition
TU3	CU1	1.0	Patch 1	1.0.1	32px 32px Added pistons and sticky pistons.
TU14		1.04			Pistons now take double the amount of time (2 redstone ticks or 4 game ticks) to extend, but they still retract instantly.
		1.90			32px 32px The texture of pistons has been changed.
New Nintendo 3DS Edition
0.1.0					32px 32px Added pistons and sticky pistons.

• Pistonscreen.png

  First screenshot of pistons.

Piston head/moving piston "items"

Main article: Direct item forms of blocks

Java Edition Beta
1.7					32px Piston heads have an unobtainable item form corresponding to its block ID, which uses the piston head texture. It can be obtained via inventory editors with numeric item ID 34.
					This item has a blank name in the inventory.
					32px The moving piston has an unobtainable item form corresponding to its block ID, which uses the top texture of the grass block. It can be obtained via inventory editors with numeric item ID 36.
					This item has a blank name in the inventory.
					If certain colors of cloth were obtained in a world prior to their mass removal in late Infdev, items of these could convert forward into piston head or moving piston items.
1.8		Pre-release 2 ;)			Added pick block functionality. This will change the currently selected slot to any containing these otherwise-unobtainable items, but will not allow them to be obtained if not already in the hotbar.
Java Edition
1.0.0		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 2			Mousing over a piston head or moving piston in the inventory now causes a game crash.
		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 4			Mousing over a piston head or moving piston in the inventory now no longer causes a game crash, rendering a tiny empty tooltip box instead.
		Beta 1.9 Prerelease 5			32px The grass block top texture changed in this version, and as a result, this changed the moving piston item form appearance.
1.2.5		pre			Piston heads and moving pistons can now be obtained via Pick Block in creative.
1.3.1		?			Piston heads and moving pistons can no longer be obtained with pick block in Creative.
		12w16a			Piston head and moving piston items can now be obtained in singleplayer worlds via the /give command using their respective numeric IDs.
					In chat, they are referred to as "null.name".
1.5		13w02a			32px The item form of the moving piston block has changed to the piston head texture following block and item texture storage reforms.
1.6.1		13w26a			The names for piston heads and moving pistons as items has been changed to "tile.null.name".
1.7.2		13w37a			The direct item forms of piston heads and moving pistons have been removed from the game. They can no longer exist as an item in any way, only as placed blocks.
Bedrock Edition
?					The moving piston item is called tile.pistonArmCollision.name.
?					32px The piston head block uses this item texture.
?					The moving piston item is called tile.movingBlock.name.
?					32px The moving piston block uses this item texture.
?					Sticky piston heads are now a separate block ID from piston heads.
?					The item form of the sticky piston head is probably called tile.stickyPistonArmCollision.name.

• PistonHeadInv.png

  A piston head in the inventory.

• Moving piston darkening.png

  A comparison between a normal stone block, and a stone block with a block 36 on it

• Moving piston visibility.png

  A "sphere" made out of block 36.

Issues

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

Trivia

• When toggled between on and off rapidly with a gravity affected block (such as sand) above it, a piston can eventually break the block, which can be picked up as a resource. However, gravel broken this way never drops flint.
• Mobs can spawn inside the piston head block.
• Carpet can be placed on the piston extension block, and remains even if it is replaced with a solid block using /setblock.
• In Bedrock Edition, the piston head is invisible and non-solid when placed with commands. The moving piston cannot be placed with block placement commands in this edition.
• Piston head extend animations are different in Java Edition from those in Bedrock Edition.
• The piston heads in Bedrock Edition look slightly different than the ones in all other versions.
• If a piston is at the top of a world and is facing the top or is at the bottom and is facing the bottom, it cannot extend.
• The moving_piston is transparent and does not emit light.
  • If a light-emitting block is moved, the player can see it turn dark briefly. If an opaque block is moved, the player may see light passing through it.

Gallery

• PistonParadox.png

  Notch's explanation on how the rod (a full block long when extended) fits into the piston box (whose depth is a block minus the face's thickness).

• Pistongates.png

  Fundamental logic gates, implemented purely with pistons and redstone repeaters, clockwise from upper left: AND, OR, XOR, and NOT.

• Pistonslowclockgenerator.png

  Slow clock generator with pistons and redstone.

• Piston Waterflow control.png

  An example of a piston-controlled waterflow.

• Glassp.gif

  An example of sticky piston use with glass panes.

• Piston Artwork.png

  Artwork of a Piston connected to a Lever.

See also

• Slime Block
• Redstone
• Tutorials/Piston uses
• Tutorials/Headless pistons
• Mechanics/Redstone/Piston circuits

References

Redstone

View at: Template:Redstone/content [edit]