Here is the direct answer on how to get Netherite in Minecraft: travel to the Nether, tunnel at around Y level 15 to mine Ancient Debris with a diamond or netherite pickaxe, smelt each block into Netherite Scrap, then combine four scrap with four gold ingots to craft one Netherite Ingot. To actually put that ingot on your gear you also need a Netherite Upgrade Smithing Template, which only generates in Bastion Remnant chests. That template requirement is the step that trips up most returning players.
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Netherite is the endgame material: it survives lava, floats instead of despawning when dropped, and gives armour a knockback resistance bonus that diamond simply does not have. Before the full walkthrough, here is a table of eight genuinely great survival and crafting games worth knowing if Minecraft’s resource loop is what hooks you.
| Game | Platform | Genre | Why It’s Great | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minecraft | PC, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox, Mobile | Sandbox Survival | The definitive block-building sandbox with endless creative and survival depth | 10/10 |
| Terraria | PC, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox, Mobile | 2D Sandbox Adventure | Enormous boss roster and a tighter progression curve than almost any survival game | 9.5/10 |
| Valheim | PC, Xbox | Survival Co-op | Norse mythology, real structural physics for building, and superb co-op pacing | 9/10 |
| Subnautica | PC, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox | Underwater Survival | Turns resource gathering into genuine deep-sea dread and discovery | 9.5/10 |
| Stardew Valley | PC, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox, Mobile | Farming Sim | A mining and crafting loop wrapped in the most relaxing progression in gaming | 10/10 |
| Core Keeper | PC, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox | Mining Sandbox | Top-down underground mining with a satisfying ore-tier ladder | 8.5/10 |
| Deep Rock Galactic | PC, PlayStation, Xbox | Co-op Mining Shooter | Four-player dwarven mining with fully destructible procedural caves | 9/10 |
| Astroneer | PC, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox | Space Sandbox | Terrain deformation makes excavation itself the core toy | 8/10 |
How to get Netherite in Minecraft step by step
The full chain runs: Nether portal, Ancient Debris, furnace, crafting table, Bastion Remnant, smithing table. Each stage has a specific gotcha, so work through them in order rather than assuming your last playthrough’s memory is still correct.
Step 1: Prepare properly before you go looking for Netherite in Minecraft
Do not enter the Nether under-equipped. Bring a full set of at least iron armour, ideally diamond, and enchant boots with Fire Protection if you can. Take a fire resistance potion or two, because a single mis-swung pickaxe into a lava pocket is the most common cause of losing an entire Ancient Debris haul. Carry a stack of building blocks for bridging and blocking off ghast sightlines, a shield for ghast fireballs, and enough food to sustain a long tunnelling session. Critically, bring gold ingots or gold blocks. Piglins are hostile unless you wear at least one piece of gold armour, and near a Bastion that single detail decides whether your trip is a mining run or a funeral.
Step 2: Mine Ancient Debris at the right Y level
Ancient Debris generates throughout the Nether between roughly Y 8 and Y 119, but the generation curve peaks around Y 15, with the band from Y 8 to Y 22 being the practical sweet spot. Press F3 on Java or enable coordinates on Bedrock to check your height. Ancient Debris never generates exposed to air, so it will never be visible in an open cave; you have to dig into solid netherrack to find it. The efficient approach is strip mining: dig a straight tunnel at Y 15, then branch off side tunnels every few blocks. Ancient Debris requires a diamond or netherite pickaxe to drop, so bring at least two pickaxes, ideally with Efficiency and Unbreaking. Long mining sessions are exactly where a comfortable input device earns its keep, which is the whole argument in our gaming mouse buying guide.
Step 3: Use bed and TNT mining if you want speed
Because beds explode when used in the Nether, experienced players use them as a renewable explosive. Place a bed, stand behind a blast-resistant block such as obsidian, and detonate it to clear a wide sphere of netherrack. Ancient Debris has a blast resistance of 1,200, so it survives the explosion while everything around it vanishes, leaving the debris sitting in plain sight. TNT works the same way and is safer to control. Whichever you use, always shield yourself behind an obsidian or ancient debris block and never detonate while standing in the blast radius. The technique is dramatically faster than manual strip mining once you have beds or gunpowder to spare.
Step 4: Smelt scrap and craft the Netherite Ingot
Each block of Ancient Debris smelts in a furnace or blast furnace into exactly one Netherite Scrap. Four Netherite Scrap plus four Gold Ingots, arranged anywhere in a crafting grid, produce one Netherite Ingot. That means four Ancient Debris per ingot, and since a full set of armour plus a sword, pickaxe, axe, shovel and hoe needs nine ingots, you are looking at thirty-six Ancient Debris for a complete kit. Budget your mining trips accordingly; almost nobody gets a full set in one run. A blast furnace halves smelting time and is worth building purely for this stage.
Step 5: Find the Netherite Upgrade Smithing Template
Since the Trails and Tales update, an ingot alone is not enough. You need a Netherite Upgrade Smithing Template, and it generates only in the chests of Bastion Remnants, the enormous blackstone fortresses guarded by piglins and piglin brutes. Every Bastion contains at least one, and the treasure room variant with the magma cube spawner is the most reliable source. Wear gold armour so ordinary piglins ignore you, but understand that piglin brutes attack regardless of what you wear, so approach them carefully or avoid them entirely. Once you have one template, you can duplicate it by combining it with seven diamonds and one netherite ingot in a smithing table, so a single find is enough to eventually kit out everything you own.
Step 6: Upgrade your diamond gear at a smithing table
Craft a smithing table from two iron ingots and four wooden planks. Place the Netherite Upgrade Smithing Template in the first slot, your diamond item in the second and a Netherite Ingot in the third. The upgrade preserves every enchantment already on the item, which is why the correct order is always to enchant your diamond gear to perfection first and only then convert it to netherite. Upgrading first and enchanting afterwards wastes nothing mechanically but denies you the anvil economy of working on a cheaper item. Netherite tools also gain a durability and speed bump over diamond, and netherite armour adds knockback resistance on top of higher toughness.
Why Netherite is worth the effort
The headline benefit is that netherite items are fireproof: drop them in lava and they float rather than burning, which effectively removes the worst death-loss scenario in the game. Armour gains knockback resistance, letting you push through mob crowds and hold ground against creeper blasts far better than diamond allows. Tools mine marginally faster and last considerably longer. For anyone building elaborate redstone or spending long stretches in the End, the fireproof property alone justifies the mining. Building at that scale over long sessions is also where display real estate matters, something our gaming monitor buying guide and ultrawide display buying guide both cover.
Common mistakes when getting Netherite in Minecraft
Mining with an iron pickaxe destroys the Ancient Debris with no drop, so double-check your tool before every swing. Digging straight ahead at head height into unknown netherrack invites a lava flood; dig at foot level and place blocks behind you. Forgetting gold armour near a Bastion turns a routine trip into a piglin swarm. Storing a stack of Ancient Debris in an ender chest before heading home is the single best insurance policy against dying on the walk back to your portal, since ender chest contents survive death entirely. Finally, do not enchant a netherite item before you have the template, because getting the order wrong is how people end up with a fireproof but unenchanted sword.
Best gear setup for long Nether mining sessions
Netherite hunting is a marathon, not a sprint, and comfort genuinely affects how many hours you can put in. A responsive keyboard makes bridging and block-placing far less error-prone, which our mechanical keyboard buying guide explains in detail, while a decent headset lets you hear ghast charge-ups and lava ticks before they kill you, covered in our gaming headset buying guide. Console players tunnelling for hours should also read our controller buying guide, since stick drift on a worn pad has ended more Nether trips than any ghast.
Frequently Asked Questions
What Y level is best to find Ancient Debris in Minecraft?
Y level 15 is the statistical peak for Ancient Debris generation, with the practical mining band sitting between Y 8 and Y 22. Because Ancient Debris never generates touching air, strip mining through solid netherrack at that height is far more effective than exploring open Nether caves.
How much Ancient Debris do I need for a full Netherite set?
A full armour set plus sword, pickaxe, axe, shovel and hoe requires nine Netherite Ingots, and each ingot takes four Ancient Debris plus four gold ingots. That works out to thirty-six Ancient Debris in total, which for most players means several separate mining expeditions into the Nether.
Do I really need a Smithing Template for Netherite?
Yes, on all current versions you need a Netherite Upgrade Smithing Template, and it only generates inside Bastion Remnant chests. The good news is that one template can be duplicated indefinitely by combining it with seven diamonds and a netherite ingot in a smithing table.
Does upgrading to Netherite keep my enchantments?
It does. Upgrading a diamond item to netherite in a smithing table preserves every enchantment and the item’s name, so you never lose progress. This is why the standard advice is to fully enchant your diamond gear first and convert it to netherite only once you are happy with the enchantment set.
