How to Find Emeralds in Minecraft

Emeralds are the ultimate currency in the world of Minecraft. You can trade emeralds with the villagers and traders to get a variety of rare items within seconds. Unfortunately, doing so requires a lot of emeralds. Well, lucky for you, we are here with a guide covering how to find emeralds in Minecraft, and there’s one method for every play style. So bring your pickaxes and drink Minecraft potions, as it is time to hop in on the emerald collection train.

How to Find Emeralds in Minecraft (2022)

There are a variety of methods to obtain emeralds in Minecraft, and we will cover them all in separate sections. Use the table below to find the method which suits your needs.

What is An Emerald in Minecraft

Emeralds are a common mineral in Minecraft that acts as the main trading currency of villagers and wandering traders. As per the Minecraft ore distribution, emeralds are even rarer than diamonds. Plus, you can use them to unlock a variety of rare content early in the game.

In terms of appearance, the emeralds look similar to diamonds but are green in color. Though, even with a similar appearance, unlike most other ores in the game, you can’t use emeralds to craft tools or any particular utility.

How to Find Emeralds in Minecraft

You can get emeralds in Minecraft through the following methods:

• Trading with Villagers
• Collecting Mob Loot
• Mining Emerald Ore
• Chest Loot

Trading

Emeralds are mainly used to buy items from villagers and wandering traders. But, thanks to a reverse trading mechanism in place, you can also get emeralds from villagers by giving them specific items. Each type of villager in Minecraft offers players different trades option to get emeralds. Some of the best trade offers you should look for are:

• Give wheat to the farmer
• Trade rotten flesh with the cleric (obtainable in large quantities with a mob XP farm in Minecraft)
• Coal to the armorer
• Raw chicken to butcher (use a chicken farm in Minecraft to collect lots of raw chicken and XP)
• Sticker to fletcher

Mob Loot

If you are confident in your combat skill, you can also obtain emeralds by killing mobs. Both Vindicators and Evokers have a chance of dropping emeralds on dying. You can increase the number of drops by using the Looting III sword enchantment. But these aren’t the only hostile mobs that drop emeralds.

At times, Minecraft also spawns foxes with emeralds in their mouth. You can offer food to foxes or kill them to obtain these emeralds. You can use our guide to tame foxes in Minecraft after collecting the emerald from them.

Chest Loot

If you get lucky, you can also find emeralds as an item in some of the chests in Minecraft. These chests can be found in the following spots:

• Buried Treasure^
• Desert Temple
• End City
• Igloo
• Stronghold*
• Jungle Temple
• Shipwreck
• Underwater Ruins
• Village

*Bedrock edition only
^Java edition only

Out of all the listed spots, the chests in shipwrecks have the highest chance of spawning with pieces of emeralds.

Emerald Ore

If killing mobs, trading, or looting doesn’t work or doesn’t match your playstyle, you can always rely on the traditional method of mining emerald ores. Though, keep in mind that their natural generation is much rarer than even the diamonds in Minecraft.

The game tries to generate emeralds between the world height of Y=-16 and Y=320. You can find maximum emerald ore blocks generating at Y=256 in Minecraft.

Moreover, in the Bedrock edition, the windswept hills and mountain biomes generate more emerald ores than other biomes of Minecraft. You can mine the emerald ore using an iron or better pickaxe. But if you use something else, the ore will end up getting destroyed.

Bonus: What are Rubies in Minecraft

If you ever wondered why emeralds looked similar to rubies, it’s not a mere coincidence. Back in 2012 (version 1.3.1), Minecraft originally introduced rubies as the villager trading currency. They used to spawn in chest rooms of desert temples. Later, possibly to avoid confusion with Redstone, Minecraft replaced rubies with emeralds in version 1.14.

Get Emeralds for Trading in Minecraft

With that, you are now ready to collect tons of emeralds and unlock the best trades in Minecraft within no time. And that’s not the only ore worth exploring the Minecraft world for. You can use this guide for finding diamonds in Minecraft and start another adventure right away. Meanwhile, you can use the emeralds you collected before to get enchanted books from librarians, which you can later use to enchant your diamond gear. Though, leaving trading aside, do you think Minecraft should have other uses for emeralds like upgrading your weapons or tools? Tell us in the comments below!