How to Make a Lantern in Minecraft, Plus Soul Lanterns
Surround a torch with 8 iron nuggets to make a lantern. How to make a lantern in Minecraft, craft the blue soul lantern, and hang lanterns from chains.
Put 1 torch in the center of a crafting table and surround it with 8 iron nuggets, filling every other slot. You get one lantern. Use a soul torch instead and you get a soul lantern, which glows blue.
Iron nuggets
One iron ingot placed alone in the crafting grid gives 9 nuggets, so a lantern costs a little less than one ingot plus a torch. You can also smelt old iron tools, iron armor and chainmail in a furnace for one nugget each, which is a good use for the junk iron gear zombies and skeletons sometimes drop.
Lantern vs torch
| Torch | Lantern | Soul lantern | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Light level | 14 | 15 | 10 |
| Cost | Coal + stick | Torch + 8 nuggets | Soul torch + 8 nuggets |
| Hangs from ceilings | No | Yes | Yes |
| Can be placed in water | No | Yes (waterlogged) | Yes |
For lighting a cave quickly, torches win on cost by a mile. For a base you’ll look at every day, lanterns are worth the iron. They give one extra level of light, sit on the floor or hang from a ceiling, and keep burning underwater.
Soul lanterns
The soul torch inside is a stick, coal (or charcoal) and soul sand or soul soil, all of which you can grab in a soul sand valley in the Nether. Soul lanterns are dimmer (light level 10) but have two uses:
- Piglin repellent. Piglins avoid soul fire blocks, so a few soul lanterns around a Nether portal or base entrance keep them from crowding in.
- Mood. The blue glow fits Nether, ocean and spooky builds. Light level 10 still stops hostile mobs spawning on the blocks it reaches.
Placing and hanging
Lanterns go on top of almost anything, or underneath it. Placed against the bottom of a block they hang. The best-looking setup is a chain hanging from the ceiling with a lantern at the end; craft chains from iron nuggets and an ingot. Fences, walls and the bottom of slabs all hold lanterns too, which makes them easy to use for streetlights and porch lights. For more ideas on where they look good, see building ideas for beginners.
Lanterns don’t need redstone and can’t be switched off. If you want lights you can turn on and off, use a redstone lamp instead.
Common questions
Is a lantern brighter than a torch?
Slightly. A lantern gives light level 15 and a torch gives 14. The real reason to use lanterns is that they look better and can hang from ceilings.
How do you hang a lantern?
Place it on the underside of a block, a chain, a fence or a wall. It hangs automatically when placed against the bottom of something.
Do soul lanterns scare piglins?
Yes. Piglins avoid soul fire and items made from it, including soul lanterns, soul torches and soul campfires.
Sources & verification
Facts on this page are checked against these references and in-game behavior for the stated edition(s). how we verify.
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