What is Aqua Affinity in Minecraft? Explained

Most resources in Minecraft are easily accessible from the dry land at various altitudes. However, sometimes it’s even better to mine underwater as the precious ores can be more easily visible, and the hostile mobs are limited. Though mining underwater is pretty boring as it’s slow, Aqua Affinity in Minecraft is here to fix the problem. Thus, let’s learn how you can get and use the Aqua Affinity enchantment.

What is Aqua Affinity Enchantment?

Aqua Affinity is a Minecraft enchantment that helps you counter the mining penalty underwater. In case you didn’t know, you break blocks a lot slower underwater than on land, and this can be pretty frustrating at times. Aqua affinity is, therefore, a great option.

It is a helmet enchantment that increases your mining speed, but only underwater. You can apply aqua affinity enchantment on any helmet, including a turtle shell in the game. With it applied, your mining speed underwater becomes as much as your mining speed on land. All the mining penalties applied by the game are automatically ignored.

Now, many of you might be wondering – are there multiple levels to this enchantment? And well, the answer is no. There is only one level of aqua affinity, and you can’t make your mining speed faster underwater than on the land.

How to Get Aqua Affinity in Minecraft

Even with rare functionality, aqua affinity is not a treasure enchantment. Instead, you can quickly obtain it using enchanted books or an enchanting table. So, feel free to try out each method till you find the one that feels most convenient and easiest to use.

1. Using Enchanting Table

The quickest way to obtain the aqua affinity enchantment is by using an enchanting table. You can use our guide to make an enchanting table in Minecraft easily. Then, once it’s ready, you just have to place your helmet on the enchanting table to see the possible enchantments you can apply to it.

You might have to try the same process a few times until aqua affinity is applied. There is no need to place bookshelves around the table, as aqua affinity is a pretty basic enchantment.

Though, to maximize other enchantments you should do that anyway. You will have to use lapis lazuli to enchant your helmet when the enchantment is available. Alternatively, you can also place books on the enchanting table to find and use this enchantment, but that can take hours.

2. Using Enchanted Books

You can find enchanted books in Minecraft with various enchantments, including Aqua Affinity. These books naturally spawn within:

• Dungeons
• Pillager Outposts
• Mineshafts
• Desert Temples
• Underwater Ruins
• Woodland Mansions
• Ancient Cities

You can also get enchanted books by trading with librarian villagers and fishing. But, irrespective of how you find them, you need to use enchanted books in Minecraft. Furthermore, the block you need to apply the enchantment to the helmet is the anvil. The linked guide above will explain this process and answer all your questions.

How to Use Aqua Affinity in Minecraft

Similarly to depth strider, aqua affinity is a passive enchantment. Once you equip the enchanted helmet, the effect will take place right away. So, find a lake, river or ocean, dive into it, and start mining blocks. The aqua affinity will completely negate all mining speed penalties and you’ll get your blocks and items quickly.

You are now ready to mine and collect underwater ores in Minecraft. However, don’t stop there. The aqua affinity enchantment isn’t helpful at all if you can’t breathe underwater. So, be sure to create a conduit in Minecraft and also a water breathing potion. With that said, go and start exploring those underwater areas right now!