Crossbow

A crossbow is a ranged weapon similar to a bow that uses arrows or fireworks as ammunition.

Obtaining[]

Crafting[]

Repairing[]

Mob loot[]

Pillagers[]

When killed, a pillager has a small chance (8.5%) of dropping a loaded or unloaded crossbow with random durability; the drop rate increases by 1% per level of Looting: 9.5% with Looting I, 10.5% with Looting II and 11.5% with Looting III. The dropped crossbow can rarely (10% chance) be enchanted at level 5–19 regardless of being enchanted when it spawned.

Crossbows dropped by pillagers may have multiple enchantments, including duplicate enchantments on the same weapon.

Piglins[]

Piglins have a chance of wielding a crossbow upon spawning, and they also have a small chance (8.5%) of dropping a loaded or unloaded crossbow of random durability when killed; this rate increases by 1% per level of Looting: 9.5% with Looting I, 10.5% with Looting II and 11.5% with Looting III. It can rarely (10% chance) be enchanted at level 5–19 regardless of being enchanted when spawned.

Chest loot[]

Trading[]

Journeyman-level Fletcher villagers offer to sell an unenchanted crossbow for 3 emeralds.

Master-level Fletcher villagers have a ¹⁄₁₆ (6.25%) chance of selling an enchanted crossbow for 8 emeralds.‌^{[Bedrock Edition only]}

Master-level Fletcher villagers have ²⁄₃ chance of selling an enchanted crossbow for 7-22 emeralds.‌^{[Java Edition only]}

Usage[]

Despite using iron ingots in their crafting recipe, crossbows cannot be smelted into iron nuggets.^[1]

Weapon[]

Crossbows are similar to bows, but take longer to load and are slightly more powerful, shooting farther with slightly higher accuracy. Alternatively, they can be loaded with a firework rocket, which flies in a straight trajectory.

Load them by using them, which makes the player move at sneak speed. Unlike bows, the arrow or firework rocket can be fired only if the player releases the use button after the crossbow is loaded‌^{[Java Edition only]} or if the crossbow finishes its loading animation ‌^{[Bedrock Edition only]}. At this point, it must be used a second time to fire its bolt.

Once it has reached full charge, the player's speed returns to normal. After that, shooting a charged crossbow does not delay any of the player's current action like sprinting or swimming.

The crossbow can even be placed in another inventory slot or into an item frame without the arrow or firework rocket being unloaded or fired. A charged crossbow also remains charged after enchanting it with an enchantment table or with an anvil.

In order to use the crossbow, at least one arrow or firework rocket must be present in the inventory. The player can choose the type of arrow to fire based on its location in their inventory:

• Arrows in the off-hand, or the selected hotbar slot if the crossbow is in the off-hand, are prioritized first.
• If there are no arrows in the off-hand or selected hotbar slot, the arrow closest to slot 0 is selected.
• Firework Rockets must always be placed in the off-hand or selected hotbar slot, even if the player has no arrows of any type in their inventory.
  • This makes it much more difficult to unintentionally shoot uncharged firework rockets (such as the type a player would use for Elytra propulsion), therefore dealing 0 damage.

Crossbows take 1.25 seconds (25 ticks) to load.

The player can load either an arrow, spectral arrow, tipped arrow (of any effect) or a firework (of any color/type).

Endermen teleport away from projectile paths, so they cannot be hit with crossbow arrows. They can still get harmed by firework rocket explosions, either by direct hits or being in the blast radius of one on the ground.

Attack strength:

Java Edition:

Damage	Arrow	Max firework
Minimum	7	11 × 5.5
Average	9	14.5 × 7.25
Maximum	11 × 5.5	18 × 9

Bedrock Edition

• Always 9

Fireworks[]

Firework rockets can be fired by loading the crossbow only while holding the rockets in the off-hand. They fly at 32 m/s. Firework rockets with higher flight duration have a longer time before they explode and therefore travel farther; commands can be used to increase the flight time and range of the rocket outside the normal window. Firing a firework rocket uses 3 durability points per shot.

Firework rocket range
Minimum	Average	Maximum	Gunpowder
32m (20 ticks)	40.8m (25.5 ticks)	49.6m (31 ticks)	1 ()
48m (30 ticks)	56.8m (35.5 ticks)	65.6m (41 ticks)	2 ()
64m (40 ticks)	72.8m (45.5 ticks)	81.6m (51 ticks)	3 ()

Firework rockets also work with the Multishot enchantment, enabling the player to shoot 3 firework rockets at a time. The increased durability usage stacks, resulting in 9 durability being consumed with each shot.

A shot firework rocket explodes instantly when it hits a mob or block.‌^{[Java Edition only]} If the firework rocket has no explosion effect, it deals no damage. The explosion of a firework rocket deals 5 to 6 points of damage, with one firework star. The explosion has a radius of roughly 4 blocks, which is unaffected by the firework star's effect. Each additional firework star on the rocket deals an additional 1 to 2 points of damage, for a maximum of 11 × 5.5 to 18 × 9 with 7 firework stars. The flight duration of the firework increases the maximum range the firework can travel before exploding, but does not affect the damage output. Likewise, the damage remains the same regardless of any dyes used. Unlike an arrow shot from a bow, the firework does not slow down under water.

Fireworks crafted without firework stars shot from crossbows upon contact with terrains, slide on them. They continue their original trajectories as soon as they break contact from the blocks they slid on.

Repair[]

Crossbows can be repaired in an anvil or grindstone by combining two crossbows. Any loaded ammunition is retained from the crossbow in the first slot but sacrificed from the crossbow in the second slot.

Enchantments[]

Multishot and Piercing are mutually exclusive. Normal methods of enchanting allow only one of them to be applied to a crossbow.

Crossbows have a base enchantability of 1. Enchantments specific to crossbows include Quick Charge, Multishot and Piercing.

Fuel[]

Crossbows can be used as fuel in furnaces, smelting 1.5 items per crossbow.

Sounds[]

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

Data values[]

ID[]

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

Item data[]

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

See Bedrock Edition level format/Item format.

Achievements[]

Advancements[]

Icon	Advancement	In-game description	Parent	Actual requirements (if different)	Resource location
	Ol' Betsy	Shoot a Crossbow	Adventure	—	adventure/ol_betsy
	Take Aim	Shoot something with an Arrow	Monster Hunter	Using a bow or a crossbow, shoot an entity with an arrow, tipped arrow, or spectral arrow.	adventure/shoot_arrow
	Two Birds, One Arrow	Kill two Phantoms with a piercing Arrow	Ol' Betsy	Use a crossbow enchanted with Piercing to kill two phantoms with a single arrow shot.	adventure/two_birds_one_arrow
	Who's the Pillager Now?	Give a Pillager a taste of their own medicine	Ol' Betsy	Kill a pillager with a crossbow.	adventure/whos_the_pillager_now
	Arbalistic	Kill five unique mobs with one crossbow shot	Ol' Betsy	This is a hidden advancement, meaning that it can be viewed by the player only after completing it, regardless of if its child advancement(s), if any, have been completed.	adventure/arbalistic
	Sniper Duel	Kill a Skeleton from at least 50 meters away	Take Aim	Be at least 50 blocks away horizontally when a skeleton is killed by an arrow after the player has attacked it once.	adventure/sniper_duel
	Bullseye	Hit the bullseye of a Target block from at least 30 meters away	Take Aim	Be at least 30 blocks away horizontally when the center of a target is shot with a projectile by the player.	adventure/bullseye

History[]

September 29, 2018					Crossbows are announced at MINECON Earth 2018.
Java Edition
1.14		18w43a			Added crossbows.
					Crossbows can be enchanted with either the Quick Charge (Highest Level III), Piercing (Highest Level IV) or Multishot (Highest Level I).
		18w47a			Crossbows can now be found inside loot chests at the top of pillager outposts.
		19w11a			Fletcher villagers now sell crossbows and enchanted crossbows.
1.16		20w07a			Added piglins, which can spawn with and drop crossbows.
		20w16a			Crossbows now generate randomly enchanted in bastion remnants chests.
1.18		21w37a			Crossbow durability is increased to 465 to match Bedrock Edition.
1.19.4		23w07a			The crossbow recipes are no longer unlocked by sticks.
Upcoming Java Edition
Villager Trade Rebalance (Experimental)		23w31a			Enchantments exclusive to crossbows are no longer obtainable from villager trading.
Bedrock Edition
1.8.0		beta 1.8.0.10			Added crossbows.
					Crossbows are currently apart of Experimental Gameplay.
1.9.0		beta 1.9.0.0			Added pillagers, which use and drop crossbows.
		beta 1.9.0.3			Crossbows now appear bigger in a pillager's hand.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			Crossbows are now fully implemented and separate from Experimental Gameplay.
					Crossbows can now be found in pillager outpost chests.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.4			Unenchanted and enchanted crossbows can now be bought from fletcher villagers.
1.12.0		beta 1.12.0.3			Journeyman-level fletcher villagers now have 100% chance to sell unenchanted crossbow, rather than 50% chance.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.51			Added piglins, which can spawn with and drop crossbows.
		beta 1.16.0.57			Crossbows now generate randomly enchanted in bastion remnants chests.
PlayStation 4 Edition
1.90					Added crossbows.

Issues[]

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

Trivia[]

• Alongside pillagers, crossbows were inspired by Minecraft Dungeons, even though they were added in the base game first.^[2]
• Crossbows enchanted with Quick Charge VI and above get stuck on the first frame on the recharging animation because the resulting charge time is negative, and the game never reaches the time markers that tell it to advance the animation or the reloading procedure itself. It is technically possible to charge such crossbows, but this would require overflowing the value that determines how long the crossbow has been charged. This takes such an amount of time that this is practically impossible: for example, charging a crossbow with Quick Charge VI would take 69.4 years to complete.
• Although Piercing allows arrows to bypass shields, they can't get through the wither armor.
• The crossbow's first-person loading animation in Bedrock Edition is different from Java Edition.
• Even if a crossbow is already wound with a projectile, when it drops on the ground, it always looks uncharged.^[3]
• In real life, crossbows don't shoot the same arrows as bows, rather they shoot shorter, thicker, and oftentimes fletchless arrows (usually called "bolts") made to withstand the crossbow's increased power, which can shatter conventional arrows.

Gallery[]

• 

  A crossbow shown at MINECON Earth 2018.

• 

  A pillager armed with a crossbow, shown at MINECON Earth 2018.

• 

  How the crossbow is equipped.

• 

  An enchanted crossbow.

• 

  Steve charging crossbow in Java Edition.

• 

  Alex charging crossbow in Java Edition.

• 

  Pillager charging crossbow.

• 

  Piglin charging crossbow.

• 

  The Minecraft Dungeons variant of the crossbow

References[]

External Links[]

• Taking Inventory: Crossbow – Minecraft.net on October 20, 2022