Frog in Minecraft: Variants, Tadpoles and Froglights
Frogs come in three variants and eat small slimes and magma cubes. A magma cube eaten by a frog drops a froglight. How to breed frogs and get all three.
Frogs are passive mobs from swamps and mangrove swamps. They hop around, swim fast, and use their tongue to eat small slimes and small magma cubes. That last part is the reason to keep them: a magma cube eaten by a frog drops a froglight, a bright light block whose color depends on the frog.
| Stat | Value |
|---|---|
| Health | 10 (5 hearts) |
| Behavior | Passive |
| Spawns | Swamp, mangrove swamp (groups of 2-5); from tadpoles |
| Breeding food | Slimeball |
| Drops | 1-3 XP |
The three variants
Frogs come in temperate (orange), warm (white) and cold (green) variants. Naturally spawned frogs take the variant of the biome they spawn in, which means swamps are mostly temperate frogs, while mangrove swamps give warm ones.
Breeding is how you get the rest. A frog’s variant isn’t inherited. It’s set by the biome where a tadpole grows up: tadpoles that mature in warm biomes become warm frogs, and those in cold, snowy biomes become cold frogs. Carry tadpoles in a bucket of water to the biome you want and let them grow there.
Breeding and tadpoles
Hold a slimeball and frogs follow you. Feed two of them and one becomes pregnant, then lays frogspawn on a water block with water next to it and air above. Three to ten minutes later the frogspawn hatches into tadpoles. Tadpoles grow into frogs after 20 minutes (feeding them slimeballs speeds it up). They die out of water, so keep them in a pond or a bucket.
What frogs eat
Frogs only attack size-1 slimes and magma cubes. Their tongue pulls the mob in and it disappears.
- A small slime eaten by any frog always drops exactly one slimeball.
- A small magma cube eaten by a frog drops one froglight:
| Frog | Froglight |
|---|---|
| Temperate (orange) | Ochre |
| Warm (white) | Pearlescent |
| Cold (green) | Verdant |
Slimes and magma cubes don’t attack frogs, so frogs are never in danger from their food.
Froglight farming
Froglights are light level 15 blocks with a soft color, popular for builds. To farm them, you need small magma cubes and frogs in the same place. Most players build a Nether portal setup that pulls magma cubes from a basalt delta, splits them down to the small size, and pushes them toward a pen of frogs. Bring one frog of each variant and you get all three colors.
Other habits
Frogs jump up to eight blocks high and take less fall damage than most mobs. They like hopping on lily pads and big dripleaf, don’t drown, and croak now and then. They’re harmless and drop nothing but XP, so the only reason to hurt one is by accident.
Common questions
How do you get froglights?
Let a frog eat a small magma cube. A temperate frog gives an ochre froglight, a warm frog gives pearlescent, and a cold frog gives verdant.
How do you get the different frog colors?
A tadpole's variant depends on the biome where it grows into a frog. Grow tadpoles in a warm biome for warm frogs and a cold one for cold frogs.
What do you feed frogs to breed them?
Slimeballs. One frog then lays frogspawn in water, which hatches into tadpoles.
Sources & verification
Facts on this page are checked against these references and in-game behavior for the stated edition(s). how we verify.
Keep reading