How to Attach Lead to a Boat in Minecraft

While the Minecraft 1.21 update might not have introduced a lot of groundbreaking features, it did bring the two editions even closer. How, you might be wondering? Well, the update has brought about the ability to use lead on boats! Want to learn how to attach lead to boats in Minecraft? Well, keep reading to learn how!

Attach Lead to a Boat in Minecraft

In case you don’t already have a Minecraft lead and a Minecraft boat ready, you can follow our two linked guides that explain how you can craft them. With that out of the way, let’s now see how you can attach a lead to a boat.

Well, it’s fairly simple. Select the lead on your hotbar and use it on a boat (right-click or use the secondary action button). It can be an empty boat or with some passengers inside. You’ll see it get attached to a boat, just like it would do to many other entities in the game. You can now move around and the attached boat will follow you.

However, unlike Minecraft mobs, the boat cannot go up a block, as the lead will just break. So, you can only lead it easily on the same Y level or while going downslope. This sadly also counts for blocks that are just a little bit shorter than full blocks, like path blocks.

If a boat is on a path block, it cannot go onto a grass or dirt block next to it, as it cannot even go one pixel up. So, steer clear of those blocks and you’ll have a very easy time leading a boat. You can also lead other boat variants, such as chest boats and bamboo rafts.

Attach Lead to a Boat in Minecraft: Uses

Sure, it’s pretty weird that you can attach a lead to a boat in Minecraft, but this mechanic is far more impressive than you think. Why? Because it actually has two relevant uses. These are:

1. Easy Mob Transport

Thanks to the fact you can lead a bunch of boats at once, that means you can also transport lots of mobs at once. Nudge them into the boat or simply lead the boat towards them to place them inside it.

Then, travel towards the desired location and all the mobs will safely follow inside their boats. Just make sure to attach the lead to a boat and not any mob inside it. This can save so much time, as you don’t need to make many trips back and forth.

Furthermore, boats are the most useful on the water of course. So, use the rivers, lakes, and oceans to transport the mobs, as this is far more reliable and faster. It can be a bit difficult to control many boats with mobs inside since they can collide and cause some strange physics to take place. So just be patient in this process.

2. Large Portable Storage

If you can transport lots of mobs at once, it stands to reason you can move lots of items around as well. Attach leads to lots of chest boats and you’ll be able to carry an entire storage system if you want to.

Furthermore, you can fill those chest boats with llamas and you’ll have maximum storage space available. This can help a lot if you’re moving your base or have lots of resources far away.

And now you know how to attach lead to boats in Minecraft Java and Bedrock edition! As you can see, it’s so easy but still makes for such a useful feature. So, stop wasting time and go transport mobs and items easily right away.