In Minecraft, there are not only hot biomes like deserts or savannas but also snow-covered areas where you can use snow as a valuable resource. Instead of laboriously working with a shovel, we’ll show you how to produce infinite snowballs with an automatic snow farm. Ideal for building projects, snowball fights, or battling enemies!
Minecraft Snow Facts: Everything You Need to Know
Snow, just like in the real world, can mainly be found in cold areas. There, it is either already part of the terrain or forms when it snows. This depends on the temperature of the biome. Snow doesn’t fall everywhere, making it a limited resource.
Minecraft Snow Biomes: Where to Find Natural Snow
Snow was first introduced in Alpha, but while there was a 1 in 4 chance of getting a “winter world” back then, there are now various and numerous biomes within a Minecraft world that contain snow. As you explore your world, you’ll eventually come across these. Often, they are even close together, as biomes are now also determined by temperatures.
Biomes with Snow:
- Snowy Taiga
- Snowy Plains
- Ice Spikes Tundra
- Snowy Beach
- Mountain Grove
- Snowy Slopes
- Jagged Peaks
- Frozen Peaks
Additionally, there are some cold biomes where it snows at a certain height. These include windswept biomes, taiga, and pine forests. If you’re looking for snow, be sure to check out one of the biomes we’ve introduced!
Minecraft Snow Types: What Types of Snow Are There?
In these areas, you’ll mostly find snow as a thin layer over a grass block or other natural blocks. If you break them with a shovel or your fist, they turn into snowballs. Snowballs can only be stacked up to 16. If you craft 4 together, you get a snow block. You can also throw snowballs, but they don’t do much damage.
You’re probably wondering how to mine regular snow. Well, either use a shovel with Silk Touch or use three snow blocks to make 6 snow layers. These can now also be stacked on top of each other. 8 snow layers make a full snow block, which can be mined with Silk Touch. Sometimes you can also find full snow blocks in some biomes.
With two snow blocks and a pumpkin, you can also summon a great mob that we will need for the automatic snow farm.
Lastly, there’s a relatively new snow block you might have encountered in some steep biomes. It’s unassuming but very dangerous. We’re talking about powdered snow. It differs only minimally from regular snow blocks but causes you to sink into it and slowly freeze. Not a pleasant experience! Use leather boots to walk over it. Powdered snow is not a solid block and can only be collected with a bucket.
Building a Minecraft Snow Farm: Guide for a Semi-Automatic Snow Farm
The behavior of snow between Java and Bedrock is unfortunately a bit different, as in Java, snow mined by a piston cannot turn into a snowball. In Bedrock, however, it still can. Therefore, a completely automatic farm in the regular Java edition is currently (as of October 2024) not possible.
Cool and practical designs still exist! You just have to mine the snow with a shovel. We’ll use a snow golem for this. When it walks over a block, it leaves a snow layer. And we can mine these either for snowballs or snow layers.
Biomes and their building height: Y≈64 for Plains, Sunflower Plains, Swamp, and Beach Y≈124 for Mushroom Fields and Coasts Y≈154 for Jungle Y≈184 for Savanna Plateau Y≈244 for Windswept Savanna
Building Materials
- Chest
- Hopper
- Hopper Minecart
- Rail
- 4 Slabs
- Full Building Blocks
- Shovel (preferably with enchantments)
Minecraft Snow Farm Building Instructions: Step by Step
First, we need to take care of the collection mechanism. This works a little differently in the snow farm because snow golems cannot create snow on hoppers. Therefore, we need to use a different method that works similarly.
First, build a regular chest with a hopper. Place a rail on the hopper with a shift-click and then a hopper minecart on top. Above that, place a full block. This allows an item to pass through the hopper minecart into the hopper and then into the chest.
After that, you can build a kind of platform to make the snow farm look nicer, but you don’t have to. We enclosed the chest and the hopper mechanism with andesite.
The important thing is that you now ensure the snow golem stays in place and all snowballs are collected. Use slabs and blocks for this. This way, you can still mine the snow yourself, but nothing falls beside it, and the golem can’t escape. Build the snow golem with two snow blocks and a carved pumpkin in the center of the blocks. Also, build a block above the iron golem so it doesn’t melt in the sun.
Now the farm is actually done! The block under which the hopper mechanism was built should now be covered with a snow layer. Use a shovel and aim at the side of the snow so you don’t accidentally hit the golem. Just hold down the mouse button and off you go!
Even with a normal and unenchanted iron shovel, we were able to mine many blocks. The hopper might not even be able to keep up with collecting all the snowballs. You rarely need to use the snow farm for more than a few minutes, or you can expand the storage system with more chests and hoppers. Also, use the F3 and T trick we described in our automatic fish farm. It reloads your texture pack and allows you to release the mouse button.
Conclusion: How to Build an Effective Snow Farm in Minecraft
Snow is a cool resource that you can use not only for building but also for wild snowball fights. A farm is also easy to build and gives you hundreds of snowballs within minutes! Snow golems are very underrated and should definitely be built more often. Produce endless snowballs for building projects or snowball fights on your own server. Rent your Minecraft server and let it snow!
