- Paper can be made using 3 sugar cane stalks found near river banks and swamps in Minecraft.
- Players can also find paper inside loot structures like shipwrecks, villages, and stronghold libraries.
- Paper is essential for crafting books, maps, fireworks, cartography tables and more.
Apart from exploring the world, planting crops, and battling various mobs, there is also a crafting aspect to Minecraft. One of the many items you can craft in Minecraft is paper. Whether you’re making your first book, preparing for enchantment, or stacking up fireworks for Elytra travel, paper is important for all of them. So, if you’re wondering how to make paper in Minecraft, we have covered all the methods for crafting or finding it. We have also discussed all the uses of paper in this guide.
Minecraft Paper Crafting Recipe
Paper is an item in Minecraft used as an ingredient in several important crafting recipes. These include banners, maps, books, and fireworks in Minecraft. These recipes are really important for both early- and late-game players. So, players always find themselves searching for or crafting more paper in the game.
Ingredients Required to Make Paper
The paper crafting recipe is fairly straightforward and has remained unchanged across the recent Minecraft updates. Here are the materials you need:
| Item | Amount | Where to Get |
|---|---|---|
| Sugar cane | 3x | Found near water bodies like rivers, oceans, or swamps |
To make paper in Minecraft, you will require at least 3 sugar cane and a crafting table. It’s a great idea to start gathering sugar cane in large quantities from the start.
How to Make Paper in Minecraft: Step-by-Step Crafting Instructions
You can not only craft paper but also find it in various locations. But first, let’s learn how to make paper in Minecraft, starting with the crafting method:
- Interact with the crafting table to access its grid.
- Fill out the middle row on the left with three sugar canes.
- You will see 3 units of paper in the right output cell.
We have tested this recipe in all the versions released recently and kept in mind the difference between Minecraft Java and Bedrock. So, you don’t need to worry about any change in its recipe. This is the only way to make paper in Minecraft.
How to Find Sugar Cane Fast
Before you can learn how to make paper in Minecraft, you first need to find sugar cane. Fortunately, this is one of the most easily renewable crops in the game, and here are the steps to get them.
Best Biomes for Sugar Cane Generation
Sugar cane grows naturally near water and is usually three or four blocks tall. It can generate in any Minecraft biome in the Overworld, but you will mostly find sugar cane growing in the swamps and especially in the desert regions.
With that said, here’s a pro-tip for farming sugarcanes. If you scale your sugar cane farm using redstone Flying Machines, never leave the area (unload the safe chunks) or log off while the machine is actively moving. Doing so can break the redstone components mid-air, forcing you to rebuild the farm.
Can You Grow Sugar Cane with Bonemeal or Bamboo?
No, you cannot grow sugar cane with bonemeal, and it’s a common misconception among players. Sugar cane grows at a fixed rate, and the only way to get more crops faster is to build a farm.
Also, if you were wondering, Bamboo cannot be used to make paper in Minecraft.
Wandering traders also have a chance to sell you sugar cane for one emerald. But if you want this useful ingredient in bulk, you can automate the process by making a sugar cane farm in Minecraft. Apart from that, you will require a crafting table to bring everything together.
How to Find Paper Naturally (No Crafting Required)
Furthermore, you can find paper while exploring your Minecraft world. It is commonly generated in chests found in the following structures:
- Shipwrecks: The Supply and Map chests can have around 1-10 pieces of paper
- Villages: The Cartographer’s chest can contain 1-5 units of paper
- Strongholds: The Library chest can have 2-7 units of paper
There’s also a clever shortcut that many experienced players recommend if sugar canes refuse to spawn nearby. Instead of spending hours at the river, head to a village or a stronghold with a library that can contain books in Minecraft. Since books are one of the main reasons why players want to learn how to make paper in Minecraft, collecting them directly skips the requirement completely.
5 Essential Uses for Paper in Minecraft
Once you learn how to make paper in Minecraft, it unlocks several powerful and useful item recipes. Whether you’re building an enchantment room, exploring maps, or soaring through the skies using Elytra, you will need paper in all of them. So, check out some of the most unique applications of this item.
1. Crafting Books & Enchanting Setups
Books are essential in the early game as they allow you to make bookshelves. With at least 15 bookshelves around an enchanting table, you will be able to place Minecraft enchantments of the highest level on your gear. The crafting recipe for a book requires three pieces of paper and one piece of leather.
2. Making Maps (Java vs. Bedrock Recipes)
You can use paper to map out your surroundings, get oriented more easily, and even make awesome custom art. If you would like to learn more about how to make a map in Minecraft, follow the linked guide. For this recipe, you will need eight pieces of paper and one compass in Minecraft.
There is a different recipe for the empty map in the Bedrock edition, which requires nine pieces of paper. You don’t need a compass on the Bedrock edition.
3. Cartography Tables & Villager Jobs
With a cartography table in Minecraft, you can modify maps. See the table below to learn what combining maps with different items gives you:
| Item You Combine with a Map | What You Get |
|---|---|
| Paper | Zoomed-out map (one zoom level) |
| Empty Map | Copied map |
| Glass Pane | Locked map |
| Compass | Locator map (Bedrock Edition only) |
Besides using the cartography table for your own needs, you can also use it to turn unemployed villagers into cartographers. Check our guide on villager jobs in Minecraft to learn more about cartographers. The recipe for this block in Minecraft requires two pieces of paper and four planks.
4. Firework Rockets for Elytra Flight
Learning how to make paper in Minecraft on PC and console is essential for crafting fireworks. They are used in the late game since you can boost yourself in the air with your Elytra in Minecraft. For fireworks used for this purpose, you will need one piece of paper and 1-3 pieces of gunpowder.
On the other hand, if you want to use fireworks for their primary purpose in real life, you will need firework stars. These items make the fireworks explode and display an array of colors. Recipes for fireworks include one piece of paper, 1 to 7 firework stars, and up to 3 gunpowder.
While sugar cane is highly renewable, remember that fireworks also require gunpowder. If you are farming paper strictly for Elytra travel, pair your sugar cane farm with a standard Creeper farm in Minecraft or a general mob grinder to ensure your gunpowder supply matches your massive paper yield
5. Custom Banner Patterns
If you are looking for more design options for your banners, the Minecraft banner patterns can help you with that. They will display unique designs ready to be placed on a banner. Crafting a recipe for these items requires one piece of paper and one special item. Depending on the special item you use, the following banner patterns can be crafted:
| Special Item | Banner Pattern |
|---|---|
| Creeper Head | Banner Pattern Creeper Charge |
| Oxeye Daisy | Banner Pattern Flower Charge |
| Wither Skeleton Skull | Banner Pattern Skull Charge |
| Enchanted Golden Apple | Banner Pattern Thing |
| Vines | Banner Pattern Bordure Indented (Bedrock Edition only) |
| Bricks | Banner Pattern Field Masoned (Bedrock Edition only) |
How to Farm Paper Sustainably with Automated Crafters
If you want infinite paper, build a Minecraft sugar cane farm at your base. Not only can it give you lots of paper, but you can also get sugar as a by-product. The farm requires dirt blocks, a few solid blocks, pistons, redstone dust, an observer, a hopper, a chest, and fifteen sugar canes. You can refer to our linked guide above to learn about the building process
A few tips on building this farm include placing lily pads on top of the water surface to walk over it without falling in. Furthermore, you can make zero-tick farms on bedrock, whereas you use an observer and a piston setup on the Java edition.
Many players get confused about using the new Crafter block for learning how to make paper in Minecraft. However, it’s simple. If you pipe sugar cane directly into the Crafter in Minecraft, it can give you sugar instead of paper.
To fix this, you must interact with the Crafter UI to manually disable (lock) 6 of the 9 slots, leaving exactly one horizontal or vertical line of 3 slots open. Then, ensure your hopper distribution fills those three slots evenly before triggering the redstone pulse.
Is Trading Paper for Emeralds Worth It?
Paper in Minecraft is also applicable to trading with villagers. Cartographers and librarians on both versions of the game purchase paper for emeralds. The only difference is that librarian villagers on the Bedrock edition definitely offer to buy paper, whereas librarians on the Java edition have about a 66% chance to offer the paper trade.
So, yes, it is worth trading with the villagers for paper because you get a lot in exchange for a single emerald in Minecraft.
Now you know everything about making and using paper in the game. Have you found the most efficient way to make paper in Minecraft? Tell us in the comments section below.
No. You can only craft paper with sugar cane. However, you can also find paper in a few different structures.
The most efficient way to make paper is by gathering a lot of sugarcane. Since the sugar cane farm is rather simple, you can set it up relatively early and therefore be able to make a lot of paper efficiently. You can also visit biomes like deserts or swamps, where sugar cane generates more.
Unfortunately, no villager sells paper. Cartographers and librarians buy paper from you and give you emeralds in return. You can get paper only by crafting or finding it.
Pranav Maytray
