If you’ve ever been one-shot by a creeper mid-diamond mining run or lost all your hard-earned gear to a blaze spawner ambush, you know how much difference strong, upgraded gear makes in Minecraft. Learning how to enchant in Minecraft PC is one of the highest-impact skills you can pick up to make every playthrough smoother, whether you’re grinding to defeat the Ender Dragon or just building a remote base far from spawn. I’ve been playing Minecraft on PC for over a decade, and I still get giddy when I roll a perfect Protection IV armor piece on my first try. This guide breaks down every part of the vanilla enchanting process, no mods or cheat commands required, so you can start upgrading your gear right away.
What You Need to Start Enchanting in Minecraft PC
Enchanting has a fairly low barrier to entry once you have a few basic resources collected, though you’ll need to put in a bit of work to unlock max-level enchants. Early on, you can get usable low-level enchants with just an enchanting table and a small amount of lapis, but to get the best possible upgrades, you’ll need a full setup. Once you have all these materials gathered, you’re ready to start learning how to enchant in Minecraft PC without any extra steps.
- 1 enchanting table, placed with at least 2 blocks of empty space around it on all sides
- 15 bookshelves, arranged 1 block away from the table in a 2-high ring, with no blocks between shelves and the table
- At least 30 experience levels, earned from mining, fighting mobs, farming, or smelting items
- Lapis lazuli, 1-3 pieces per enchant depending on the level of the upgrade you pick
- The gear, tool, weapon, or book you want to apply the enchantment to
If you don’t have enough bookshelves early in your playthrough, you can still use the enchanting table for low-level upgrades, they just won’t be as powerful as max-level options. Always keep at least 10 lapis in your base storage at all times, because nothing is worse than hitting level 30 and realizing you have no lapis to spend your hard-earned experience on.
How to Pick the Right Enchantments for Every Item
If you’re new to how to enchant in Minecraft PC, it’s normal to feel overwhelmed by the list of random options that pop up when you open the table. Not all enchants work on all items, and some are mutually exclusive, meaning you can’t apply them to the same piece of gear. It’s important to pick enchants that align with how you plan to use the item, instead of just grabbing the highest-level option available every time.
For example, if you’re planning a trip to the Nether, Fire Protection on your armor will be far more useful than standard Protection, since most Nether damage comes from fire and lava. If you’re focused on mining for rare resources, Fortune III on your diamond pickaxe will triple your ore drops on average, so it’s worth prioritizing that enchant first for any long-term survival playthrough.
You can also enchant empty books to save useful enchants for later, instead of wasting them on a tool you don’t plan to use long-term. Avoid wasting high level enchants on wooden or stone tools; they break so fast that you’ll lose all the experience you invested in just a few minutes of use.
Pro Tricks to Get the Exact Enchant You Want
Many players who are still learning how to enchant in Minecraft PC assume they’re stuck with whatever random enchants the table offers, but that’s not true at all. There are a few simple tricks you can use to reroll bad enchant lists and get the exact upgrades you’re looking for, without wasting dozens of levels on random rolls.
The easiest trick is to reset your enchantment list by doing a low-level enchant on a junk item, like a wooden shovel or leather helmet. A level 1 enchant only costs 1 level and 1 lapis, and it will completely refresh the list of options available for higher-level enchants. You can do this as many times as you want until you see the enchant you’re looking for.
Combining enchanted books on an anvil is another reliable way to build perfect, custom gear, even if it costs a bit more experience upfront. For example, if you get a Sharpness V book and an Unbreaking III book from separate enchants, you can combine both on a single diamond sword to get a top-tier weapon. Enchanting books first instead of directly on gear lets you mix and match enchants without wasting rare materials.
Mending is the most sought-after enchant in the game, and for good reason: it repairs your gear as you earn experience, so you never have to craft another diamond pickaxe again if you have Mending on it. You can get Mending from librarian villager trades, fishing, or rare chest loot in dungeons and ancient cities. Prioritize getting at least one Mending book as early as possible in your playthrough, it will save you dozens of hours of mining for diamonds to replace broken gear.
Common Enchanting Mistakes to Avoid
These small mistakes are super common for players who are just figuring out how to enchant in Minecraft PC, but they’re easy to avoid once you know what to look for. Most of them boil down to not understanding the core mechanics of the enchanting table and anvil, and they can waste hours of your time if you don’t catch them early.
The most common mistake new players make is placing bookshelves too close to the enchanting table, or placing blocks between the shelves and the table. The enchanting table needs a clear line of sight to the bookshelves to get their power boost, so even a single torch placed between a shelf and the table will lower your maximum available enchant level.
Another mistake is wasting all your experience on low-level enchants when you’re only a few levels away from 30. Max-level enchants give you way more value for your experience, so it’s almost always better to grind a few extra levels by mining coal or fighting mobs instead of settling for a low-tier upgrade.
You also want to be careful about combining incompatible enchants on an anvil. For example, you can’t put Silk Touch and Fortune on the same pickaxe, so trying to combine those two books will waste your experience for no reason. Every time you combine items on an anvil, the future repair cost for that item goes up, so try to apply all your enchants to a single item in one go to avoid sky-high anvil costs later.
Enchanting doesn’t have to be a confusing, random process once you understand the basic mechanics behind it. Once you master how to enchant in Minecraft PC, you’ll find that even the hardest parts of the game, from raiding ancient cities to fighting the Warden, feel far more manageable. Don’t be afraid to experiment with different enchants for your play style, whether you prefer building, exploring, or fighting hordes of mobs. Even small enchants like Unbreaking I on your early game tools can make a huge difference in how much you enjoy your playthrough.