Health

The health indicator is shown above the hotbar, to the other side of the hunger bar.

The health gauge and monitor in Minecraft displays how much damage the player is able to take before dying. It is usually based on a single row of 10 heart icons. Each full heart contains two halves, one health point each (the player normally has 20 maximum health points).

Hearts

The healthbar on Survival and Adventure.

The healthbar on Hardcore.

Shaking hearts when the player is at 4HP or less.

Hearts make up the health meter for the player in the Survival, Hardcore (different texture), and Adventure modes, also for mobs. Each heart represents two hit points. Hit points are lost when players (or mobs) take damage, which can be a percentage of those hearts. However, damage less than 1HP isn't visible on the health bar.

If the health meter shows HP or less, it begins to shake violently, warning that the player is low on health.

Health can be recovered through several means, both "naturally" and through status effects.

• The Instant Health effect restores health immediately, the amount depending on the source and effect level.
• On Peaceful difficulty, the health meter continuously refills over time.
• On other difficulties, health regenerates slowly when the player's hunger is at or above 18 ( × 9).
• The Regeneration effect makes health regenerate fairly quickly, and the hearts of the health meter bounce in a wave. Aside from potions of Regeneration, this is also provided by beacons and golden apples. A normal golden apple provides it (level II) for 5 seconds, restoring a total of 4HP. An enchanted golden apple provides Regeneration II for 20 seconds, regenerating about 16HP × 8‌/Regeneration V for 30 seconds, regenerating about 200HP × 100. ‌
• The Health Boost effect adds 4HP per effect level to the player's total health that can be healed or regenerated by normal means, which is removed when the effect expires. After the effect expires, the player's health may remain above the normal maximum, but the extra health is not recovered once lost to damage. This effect can be gained only through commands or mods. At the levels of 252-256 (with amplifiers 251 to 255), the player has 512 hearts (1024HP × 512, the "red health" limit for entities).
• The Absorption effect likewise adds 4HP for each effect level. Different from the Health Boost effect, this special health cannot be healed or regenerated by normal means. Naturally, it is removed when the effect expires. A normal golden apple provides it (level I) for 2 minutes, providing a total of 4HP. An enchanted golden apple provides it at higher level (level IV), providing a total of 16HP × 8. A totem provides it (level II) for 5 seconds with a total of 8HP

Damage is split between the health and armor bars. Each full armor point takes 8% of damage, to a maximum of 80%, rounded up. Armor points also protect less damage (and deal more hearts) with stronger attacks.‌

On Hardcore mode, hearts have a different texture ().

The Poison and Wither effects turn hearts a sickly green color and black, respectively. On Hardcore, they turn when poisoned and when withered. Freezing in powder snow cause hearts to turn blue ( on Hardcore mode).

In Creative mode, the player is immune to all forms of damage. In Bedrock Edition, this includes the void and the /kill command.

The player's health bar is invisible while holding or wearing an item that gives negative health points that exceed the player's current health points. For example, the player's default health is 20, and if holding an item with the attribute −21 health, the player can take two hits before dying, regardless of how much damage these hits inflict. The first one deals enough damage to reduce health to 1HP, and the second one kills the player. If the player uses a modified item to reduce health, sometimes the death screen appears. After clicking respawn, the player would shake in the death position and this can be fixed by ceasing to use the modified item.

Wolves and iron golems are the only mobs that show their remaining health visually. Horses, donkeys, mules, llamas, allays, and the wither ^{[Java Edition only]} are the only mobs that regenerate health naturally over time.

Death

Mobs leaving red corpses and fire (because of daylight and player-made lightning) in multiplayer.

Death occurs when all of a player or mob's health is depleted.

Upon the death of a player, a death message describing the cause of death is shown to everyone in that world. The death of a player's pet also creates a death message, but one that is shown only to its owner.

The /kill command also instantly brings about death, and a parrot can be instantly killed by feeding it a cookie.‌

Players and most mobs fall on their left side to the ground when killed; the death animation always lasts 20 ticks (1 second). Squid don't have a death animation; spiders, endermites, and silverfish flip upside-down; the ender dragon ascends and explodes. When killed, mobs drop items at the location of death. In Java Edition they also drop experience upon death. In Bedrock Edition, once a fallen body disappears, it turns to dust and drops experience orbs at the disappearance location.

In Java Edition, mobs still count toward the mob cap during their death animation.

In Bedrock Edition, armor stands have a brief death animation when killed with a harming, wither, or poison potion. In Java Edition, summoning an armor stand with no health causes the death animation.

In Minecraft Education, tripod cameras have a death animation when killed by a potion effect.

Player effects

The death screen in Survival and Adventure mode in Java Edition

The death screen in Hardcore mode in Java Edition

The death screen in Survival and Adventure mode in Bedrock Edition

The death screen in Hardcore mode in Bedrock Edition

For players, a "You Died!" screen (or "Game Over!" in Hardcore mode) appears, displaying a death message; in Java Edition, the player's score is also displayed. In Java Edition, the view of the world is tinted red, render distance is reduced to default, the camera-view slowly tilts as if falling over, shudders, and zooms in slightly. In Bedrock Edition, the screen is slightly darkened, a maroon vignette appears and closes around the screen, render distance is set to default, camera switches to third-person view and zooms out for the purpose of allowing the player to see their cause of death. The following options appear on the screen:

• Respawn, either in the last bed the player slept in, at their default spawn point (their first spawn point in the game), their respawn anchor, or at the spawn point set by commands. In Hardcore mode, the player can respawn only in Spectator mode, and cannot continue because cheats are disabled.
• Return to the title screen.

The death screen is not shown upon death if:

• The player holds a totem of undying in the main hand or off-hand and died without falling into the void, in which case the player resurrects upon death. Resurrection does not happen if the player fell into the void.
• The game rule doImmediateRespawn is set to true, in which case the player instantly respawns upon death without the death screen appearing, but still shows death message.

Any items or blocks that were in the player's inventory (except items enchanted with Curse of Vanishing) are dropped from their head, and scattered around the spot where the player died (unless the game rule keepInventory is set to true). Like any dropped item, these drops decay after five minutes while that chunk is loaded.

The player also loses any experience accumulated, reverting the level back to 0 (unless the game rule keepInventory is set to true) and drops experience orbs with a precise total value of player last level × 7 experience points (with a maximum of 100). After reaching between levels 7 and 8, the player always drops only 100 experience points regardless of level.

The player also loses all effects upon respawning, even when the game rule keepInventory is set to true.

Despite the fact that dead players disappear like all other mobs, it is still possible for the player to see their own hand while in the first-person mode.

Entities' health

Entity	Health
Playable	Player 20HP × 10
Passive	Allay 20HP × 10	Armor Stand 20HP × 10‌ 6HP‌	Armadillo 12HP × 6	Axolotl 14HP × 7	Bat 6HP	Camel 32HP × 16
	Cat 10HP	Chicken 4HP	Cod 3HP	Cow 10HP	Donkey 15HP × 7.5 to 30HP × 15	Frog 10HP
	Glow Squid 10HP	Horse 15HP × 7.5 to 30HP × 15	Mooshroom 10HP	Mule 15HP × 7.5 to 30HP × 15	Ocelot 10HP	Parrot 6HP
	Pig 10HP	Pufferfish 3HP	Rabbit 3HP	Salmon 3HP	Sheep 8HP	Skeleton Horse 15HP × 7.5
	Snow Golem 4HP	Sniffer 14HP × 7	Squid 10HP	Strider 20HP × 10	Tadpole 6HP	Tropical Fish 3HP
	Turtle 30HP × 15	Villager 20HP × 10	Wandering Trader 20HP × 10
Neutral	Bee 10HP	Cave Spider 12HP × 6	Dolphin 10HP	Drowned 20HP × 10	Enderman 40HP × 20	Fox 10HP
	Goat 10HP	Iron Golem 100HP × 50	Llama 15HP × 7.5 to 30HP × 15	Panda Most variants: 20HP × 10 Weak: 10HP	Piglin 16HP × 8	Polar Bear 30HP × 15
	Spider 16HP × 8	Trader Llama 15HP × 7.5 to 30HP × 15	Wolf Wild: 8HP Tamed: 40HP × 20	Zombified Piglin 20HP × 10
Hostile	Blaze 20HP × 10	Bogged 16HP × 8	Breeze 30HP × 15	Creaking 1HP (invincible if natural)	Creeper 20HP × 10	Elder Guardian 80HP × 40
	Endermite 8HP	Evoker 24HP × 12	Ghast 10HP	Guardian 30HP × 15	Hoglin 40HP × 20	Husk 20HP × 10
	Magma Cube Big: 16HP × 8 Medium: 4HP Small: 1HP	Phantom 20HP × 10	Piglin Brute 50HP × 25	Pillager 24HP × 12	Ravager 100HP × 50	Shulker 30HP × 15
	Silverfish 8HP	Skeleton 20HP × 10	Slime Big 16HP × 8 Medium: 4HP Small: 1HP	Stray 20HP × 10	Vex 14HP × 7	Vindicator 24HP × 12
	Warden 500HP × 250	Witch 26HP × 13	Wither Skeleton 20HP × 10	Zoglin 40HP × 20	Zombie 20HP × 10	Zombie Villager 20HP × 10
Bosses	Ender Dragon 200HP × 100	Wither‌ 300HP × 150	Wither‌ Easy: 300HP × 150 Medium: 450HP × 225 Hard: 600HP × 300
Unused	Giant‌ 100HP × 50	Elder Guardian Ghost‌ 20HP × 10	Illusioner‌ 32HP × 16	Old Villager‌ 20HP × 10	Old Zombie Villager‌ 20HP × 10	Zombie Horse 15HP × 7.5
Minecraft Education	Agent ∞ ( × ∞)	Camera 4HP	NPC ∞ ( × ∞)

Achievements

Icon		Achievement	In-game description	Actual requirements (if different)	Gamerscore earned	Trophy type (PS)
PS4	Other
		Cheating Death	Use the Totem of Undying to cheat death	Have the Totem of Undying in your hand when you die.	30	Silver
		Overkill	Deal nine hearts of damage in a single hit.	Damage can be dealt to any mob, even those that do not have nine hearts of health overall.	30	Bronze
		Over-Overkill	Deal 50 hearts of damage in a single hit using the Mace	—	20	Silver

Advancements

Icon	Advancement	In-game description	Actual requirements (if different)
	Adventure	Adventure, exploration and combat	Kill any mob, or be killed by any living entity.
	Over-Overkill	Deal 50 hearts of damage in a single hit using the Mace	–
	Postmortal	Use a Totem of Undying to cheat death	Activate a totem of undying by taking fatal damage.

Video

Note: This Video is from Java Edition 1.5, so the changes were not applied yet.

History

Java Edition Classic
May 20, 2009							Notch mentions plans to add a health bar.
August 18, 2009							Health bar and fall damage teased.
August 20, 2009							Health bar blinking when damaged, damage invulnerability, and health bar shaking teased.
0.24_SURVIVAL_TEST							Added all of the above.
							Mushrooms now regain health.
							Enemies now fall over when killed.
Java Edition Indev
?							Dead mobs would fall on their left side instead of other random directions.
							Before suffocation was implemented, players that were covered by blocks could see through dirt and stone. Suffocation was added after Notch discovered that players were abusing this exploit to find underground caves and hollowed carvings. The patch added suffocation damage and making the player unable to see anything when experiencing it. However, this glitch is not completely fixed and is still possible to be done even in the existing version of the game.
							In Survival mode, eating a red mushroom would deal the player 3HP of damage because they were poisonous.
Java Edition Alpha
v1.0.4							Players no longer suffocate when riding in a minecart.
Java Edition Beta
1.5							Unarmed damage is increased from 1HP to 2HP.
1.8			Pre-release				Unarmed damage is decreased from 2HP to 1HP.
							Regeneration effect added, increasing health.
Java Edition
1.0.0			Beta 1.9 Prerelease 2				Mobs can now have armor points.
							Hearts now look different in Hardcore mode.
			RC1				The sound of the player taking damage is changed from a man's grunt to be more gender-neutral.
1.2.1			12w05b				Death screen has a slight delay before buttons become active, to avoid accidentally clicking buttons when killed.
1.3.1			12w25a				Removed the downward knockback while drowning, which essentially trapped drowning players in multiplayer underwater.
			?				The health bar no longer has an animation for damage that shows how many hearts are lost.
1.4.2			12w38a				Changed hurt sounds for player again.
1.8			14w32a				The health bar has an animation for damage that shows how many hearts are lost again.
1.11			16w39a				Added the totem of undying, which can save a player from death.
1.16.2			20w30a				Capitalized the first "d" in the "You died!" text.
Pocket Edition Alpha
v0.2.0							Health bar added.
v0.12.1			build 1				Regeneration effect is added that increases health.
			build 10				The sound of the player taking damage is changed from a man's grunt to be more gender-neutral.
Pocket Edition
1.1.0			alpha 1.1.0.0				Added the totem of undying, which can save a player from death.
Bedrock Edition
1.19.10			Preview 1.19.10.21				Death messages are now displayed on the death screen.
1.19.80			Preview 1.19.80.20				Updated the death screen.
1.20.30							The new experimental death screen is no longer preview only.
Legacy Console Edition
Xbox 360	Xbox One	PS3	PS4	PS Vita	Wii U	Switch
TU1	CU1	1.00	1.00	1.00	Patch 1	1.0.1	Added the health bar.
TU5							The sound of the player taking damage is changed from a man's grunt to be more gender-neutral.
TU14		1.04					Removed the downward knockback while drowning.
TU36	CU25	1.28	1.28	1.28	Patch 7		The player's hand now disappears on the death screen in first person view after 1 second when the player is not rendered anymore.
TU54	CU44	1.52	1.52	1.52	Patch 24	1.0.4	Added the totem of undying, which can save a player from death.
TU56	CU48	1.55	1.55	1.55	Patch 26	1.0.6	Death screen has a slight delay before buttons become active, to avoid accidentally clicking buttons when killed.
TU69		1.76	1.76	1.76	Patch 38		Changed hurt sounds for player again.

Gallery

Screenshots

• 

  A preview of the health system seen on Notch's blog. Note how the sprite for the half-heart has a black line in the middle.

• 

  A preview example of the revised in Bedrock Edition death screen, depicting Efe dying from a creeper explosion.

• 

  the revised in Bedrock Edition death screen, depicting Steve dying from a creeper explosion.

• 

  Health displayed in the tab menu.

• 

  A generic death screen used on minecraft.net.

In other media

• 

  "Rainbow Life Bar," an official T-Shirt design made to celebrate Pride Month.

See also

• Ore UI, the Bedrock Edition UI refresh

External links

• Everything you need to know about health in Minecraft – Minecraft.net