Beginner's Guide: Surviving Your First Night in Minecraft

Even though Minecraft has been on the market for over 15 years now, the first night is always creepy and especially challenging for new players. The game is primarily designed for survival, as the name of the normal game mode suggests. Surviving in a world that appears idyllic at first glance but can be quite dangerous at night.

The first night can vary greatly depending on the spawn point and map, making it difficult to account for all factors. Nevertheless, we will try our best to provide you with the best examples of how we survived our first night in Minecraft. The more you play, the easier it will get!

Collecting Your First Resources

When you create a world in Minecraft, it is generated randomly. You wake up in an unfamiliar world and should first get your bearings. Where exactly am I? What is around me? In the first few seconds, get a good overview of your surroundings to find your way around.

Next, you should look for the most important resources. Wood is at the top of the list and is easy to find in most biomes. In our game, we spawned in a spruce forest, but you might have oak, birch, or even jungle around you. Either way, start by punching down a few trees with your bare fists.

Once you’ve collected some logs, open your inventory. One of the first helpful things awaits you there. Click on the green book to open the recipes. Then craft wooden planks and from those, a crafting table. Additionally, use the wood to create sticks and craft a wooden pickaxe.

Your next priority should be stone. You can find this on cliffs or in caves. Don’t go too deep, but use your pickaxe to mine some stone, which will turn into cobblestone in your inventory. If you’re lucky, you might also find black spots in the wall. That’s coal! Mine it as well; we will need it later.

Craft Your First Tools!

With some cobblestone, more wood, and coal in your pocket, life becomes much easier. Craft additional stone tools, including a new pickaxe, a shovel, and an axe. The recipe book, which updates with each new material you collect, will help you. You can make torches from sticks and coal to light up dark areas. You should also have a sword ready, as it will be very helpful in the next phase!

Search for Food

After all that work, your character will start to get hungry, and you might even find you can’t run anymore. The drumsticks in your health bar may also look weak. It’s time to eat! Depending on the biome, keep an eye out for different food sources. If you’ve already found a village, this aspect becomes much easier.

For food, you can:

• Kill animals
• Find a village and make bread from hay bales
• Get carrots or potatoes from a village
• Collect wild berry bushes (that’s what we did!)
• Break grass and start a farm
• Catch or fish for fish
• Get apples from oak trees

If you find raw meat or fish, you should cook it in a furnace beforehand. This will keep you fuller for longer and prevent the risk of poisoning yourself. You can fuel the furnace with coal or burnable wooden materials.

Look Out for Sheep

Speaking of animals, you should also keep an eye out for sheep. They not only provide delicious meat but also valuable wool. Three wool and three wooden planks will give you a bed, allowing you to skip the first night! If you’re lucky enough to have found iron, you can shear sheep with shears. Otherwise, you’ll have to kill them to get one wool each.

Unfortunately, we weren’t so lucky in our game; sheep were nowhere to be seen… nor any other animals. This makes things a bit harder.

Shelter for the First Night

The day is likely coming to an end. You’ve experienced a lot on your first day! And hopefully, you’re prepared for the night. Look up to observe the position of the sun. When it nears the horizon, it’s time to find shelter!

There are several ways to survive the night. Build a hut out of wood or another material, dig into the ground, or find a cave. In our case, we chose the latter. Block off the cave so no monsters can attack you. With a bed, you could sleep through the night; however, we weren’t so fortunate and had to wait.

Be Brave and Fight?

You can use the first night to sort your resources and maybe even build some chests if your inventory is getting full. Or cook some more steaks in the furnace for a cozy night.

But, you can also be a bit braver and venture outside. Many monsters await you, including skeletons, creepers, spiders – or in our case, zombies. Beware! Zombies no longer shy away from water and will transform into drowned after some time. Swing your sword from a distance and eat something if your hearts start to deplete.

Tip: Undead monsters like zombies and skeletons burn in daylight. All others will disappear. Only spiders remain, but they are harmless during the day and won’t attack you.

Conclusion – The Beginning is Always Hard!

One of the most beautiful experiences in Minecraft is surviving the first night and being able to watch the sunrise in the morning! Congratulations, you’ve successfully survived your first night in Minecraft and are now hopefully ready for an exciting adventure.

Ready to take your Minecraft experience to the next level? With your own Minecraft server, you can ensure you always play in a controlled environment. Rent your server and start your adventure with friends! It’s much easier to survive the first night together. Plus, it’s a lot more fun to play with others!