All 13 Villager Jobs in Minecraft and Their Workstations

Minecraft has 13 villager jobs, and a villager takes one by claiming a nearby workstation block: a lectern makes a librarian, a composter makes a farmer, and so on. Two other villager types exist, nitwits and unemployed villagers, but neither can trade, which is why you’ll see the number 15 quoted as well.

Every job and its workstation

Job	Workstation	What it’s good for
Armorer	Blast furnace	Iron and diamond armor, shields
Butcher	Smoker	Buys raw meat, sells cooked food
Cartographer	Cartography table	Explorer maps, banner patterns
Cleric	Brewing stand	Ender pearls, redstone, lapis, bottles o’ enchanting
Farmer	Composter	Buys crops for emeralds, sells golden carrots
Fisherman	Barrel	Buys fish and string, sells enchanted fishing rods
Fletcher	Fletching table	Buys sticks, sells arrows and tipped arrows
Leatherworker	Cauldron	Leather armor, saddles
Librarian	Lectern	Enchanted books; buys paper for emeralds
Mason	Stonecutter	Terracotta, quartz, polished stone blocks
Shepherd	Loom	Wool, beds, banners
Toolsmith	Smithing table	Enchanted iron and diamond tools
Weaponsmith	Grindstone	Enchanted iron and diamond swords and axes

A nitwit has no job and never will. An unemployed villager (plain brown robe, no apron or hat) just hasn’t found a free workstation yet.

How a villager picks up a job

An unemployed villager looks for an unclaimed workstation nearby. When it finds one it can path to, it claims it, green particles appear over its head, and its outfit changes to match the profession. If you want a specific job, put the workstation down next to the villager and wait a few seconds.

This is also how you reroll trades. Break the workstation, the villager goes back to unemployed, place the block again, and it rolls a fresh set of novice offers. Keep doing that until a librarian offers the book you’re after. The catch: after your first trade, the profession is locked. You can still break the workstation, but the villager keeps its job and its trades.

Levels and restocking

Each villager has five levels: Novice, Apprentice, Journeyman, Expert and Master. Trading with it fills a progress bar; each new level adds more offers. Master-level villagers have the best trades (a master armorer sells diamond chestplates, for example).

A villager restocks its trades up to twice a day, but only by working at its own workstation. If you build a trading hall, every villager needs to be able to reach its block. Every trade also drops a few experience orbs for you, typically 3 to 6.

Which jobs are worth collecting

If you only set up a few, set up these:

• Librarian. Enchanted books, including Mending, Protection IV and Efficiency V. This is the main reason anyone builds a trading hall. See Mending for why it matters.
• Farmer. Easy emeralds: sell pumpkins, melons or carrots from your crop farms.
• Cleric. Sells ender pearls, which helps if endermen are scarce before your stronghold trip.
• Armorer, toolsmith, weaponsmith. Diamond gear for emeralds, so you can skip a lot of mining.

Fletchers are the other cheap emerald source, since they buy sticks.

Getting more villagers

You’ll need more than the two or three in a typical village. Breeding villagers only takes food and spare beds. Curing a zombie villager is slower, but the cured villager gives you huge discounts. Villagers are also the engine of an iron farm, where their jobs don’t matter at all.

Java and Bedrock

The job list and workstations are the same in both editions, and both lock the profession after the first trade. Individual offers, prices and some trade chances differ, so a librarian on Bedrock won’t always match a Java guide line for line. For mob stats and behavior, see the villager page.