Lantern

Soul lanterns are turquoise variants crafted from soul torches.

Obtaining[]

Natural generation[]

Regular lanterns can generate as lamps or lamp posts above farms and on some buildings in snowy tundra villages and in bastion remnants.

Soul lanterns can generate in ancient cities.

Breaking[]

When broken with a pickaxe, a lantern drops itself. When broken without a pickaxe, it drops nothing. A lantern always drops if its supporting block is removed.

Crafting[]

Trading[]

Apprentice-level librarian villagers have a 50%‌^{[Bedrock Edition only]} or 66.7%‌^{[Java Edition only]} chance of selling a regular lantern for an emerald as part of their trades.

Usage[]

The lantern is among the most luminous of light sources, emitting a light level of 15, while the soul lantern emits a light level of 10.

Lanterns can be placed on the top or bottom surfaces of most solid blocks, although some require sneaking. More information can be found at Opacity/Placement.

When placed below a block the lantern appears to hang. They connect to chains seamlessly.

In addition to lighting, lanterns provide these effects:

• Like torches, lanterns melt snow slowly.
• Soul lanterns repel piglins.

Placement mechanics[]

Both lanterns and soul lanterns can be placed (if a support platform is presented) or hanging (if a ceiling block is presented). The type of the block (solid, opaque, transparent, etc... given the block has top/bottom solid surface) does not affect the ability to hang of a lantern, similar to torches. Press use on the targeted block or a block adjacent to the air block the lantern is going to occupy to place it. If the latter is used and both the support/ceiling block is presented:

• Press use on the upper half of the adjacent block to "hang" the lantern up.
• Press use on the lower half of the adjacent block to "place" the lantern down.

This is only true if the eye level of the player is perpendicular to the targeted air block onto an adjacent block's surface. A solid block that is adjacent to the targeted air block generates two values, or "areas" on the solid block itself atop of each other that decide which placement position is used for the lantern based on which area the crosshair is aimed at, changing dynamically when the angle created by the block surface and the player's LoS line is deviated. This means that if the player is looking up at a block, hanging is prioritized; and looking down causes placing to be prioritized.

When the adjacent ceiling/surface of the targeted air block is blocked from view, the game will prioritize the placement position on the other visible surface/ceiling completely (e.g. the lantern is placed on the ceiling if the surface is not visible due to the player standing lower than the block). This is true only if the solid block whose ceiling/surface was mentioned is blocking the surfaces itself and does not taking into account other objects that might obstruct the placement of the lantern.

If the object the lantern is placed on receive a block update that does not support the placement of the lantern, it is removed and drop as an item (e.g. lantern on a trapdoor and the trapdoor is flipped).

Sounds[]

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

Data values[]

ID[]

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

Block states[]

Java Edition:

Bedrock Edition:

History[]

October 6, 2010					Notch says that with the addition of the lantern, torches would flicker out and need to be re-lit with flint and steel. The lantern would serve as a permanent source of light.
January 5, 2011					Lanterns were originally planned to be added in the Halloween Update, but were delayed due to lack of time.
January 13, 2011					Notch says that lanterns were "postponed".
January 20, 2011					Notch says he's "not sure" when lanterns can be implemented.
November 18, 2011					Notch announces at the Mojang Panel at MineCon 2011 that lanterns would not be added due to large negative community response toward the effects the new item would have had on torches.
April 4, 2012					Notch tweets that the team decided to not implement lanterns and instead other types of lighting were added, such as redstone lamps and glowstone.
November 9, 2018					LadyAgnes tweets an image of a lantern, implying that they are once again in development.
Java Edition
1.14		18w46a			Added lanterns.
		18w49a			Lanterns can now spawn naturally in snowy tundra villages.
		19w05a			Lanterns now have a unique sound for being placed and broken.
		19w11a			Librarian villagers now sell lanterns.
1.14.3		pre3			Lanterns can now be placed and hung on iron bars and glass panes.
1.16		20w06a			Added soul fire lanterns.
		20w07a			The textures of soul fire lanterns have been changed. The wood colors from the textures have been removed. They are also now animated.[1]
		20w16a			Lanterns now generate as part of bastion remnants.
		20w17a			"Soul Fire Lantern" has been renamed to "Soul Lantern".
					The ID of soul lanterns has changed from soul_fire_lantern to soul_lantern.
1.16.2		20w30a			Lanterns and soul lanterns can now be waterlogged.
1.17		21w13a			The model of the hanging lanterns has now been tweaked so that the backside textures of the chains are mirrored.
1.19		Deep Dark Experimental Snapshot 1			Soul lantern now generate as part of ancient city.
Bedrock Edition
1.9.0		beta 1.9.0.2			Added lanterns.
					Lanterns can currently be obtained only from the creative inventory and with Experimental Gameplay enabled.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			Lanterns now have animated textures.
					Lanterns are now craftable.
					Lanterns now generate in snowy tundra villages.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.1			Lantern sounds have been added.
		beta 1.11.0.4			Lanterns can now be bought from librarian villagers.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.51			The item texture of lanterns has been changed.
					Added soul fire lanterns.
		beta 1.16.0.57			"Soul Fire Lantern" has been renamed to "Soul Lantern".
					Regular lanterns now generate in bastion remnants.
1.16.100		beta 1.16.100.54			Lanterns and soul lanterns can now be waterlogged.
PlayStation 4 Edition
1.90					Added lanterns.

Issues[]

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

Trivia[]

• Turtle eggs can support lanterns placed both above and below them, despite the fact that this causes the lanterns to appear floating.^[2]
• Before they were added to Minecraft, lanterns were already present in Minicraft.

Gallery[]

• 

  The first image of lanterns.

• 

  The official header for snapshot 18w46a, featuring lanterns.^[3]

• 

  A screenshot from JAPPA showing lanterns used in a village build.^[4]

• 

  A lantern inside a house that was made by a player.

• 

  A lantern naturally generated in a bastion remnant.

See also[]

• Torch
• Sea lantern

References[]