If you’ve ever chased a trident across a windy plains biome or swum after one deep in an ocean monument after a bad throw, you know how frustrating it is to lose your best weapon mid-fight. That’s where the loyalty enchantment comes in, and if you’re asking what does loyalty do in Minecraft, you’re in the right place to get all the practical details you need to use it properly. I’ve been playing survival mode nonstop for over 6 years, and loyalty is one of the first enchants I hunt for as soon as I get my first trident, because it completely changes how you use this rare, high-damage underwater weapon. It’s not just a quality of life upgrade either – it opens up entirely new combat and exploration strategies you can’t pull off with any other tool.
Core Effects of What Loyalty Does in Minecraft for Tridents
Loyalty is a trident-exclusive enchantment, meaning you can’t apply it to swords, bows, axes, or any other tool or weapon in the game. At its most basic function, it makes your trident boomerang back to your hand after you throw it, so you never have to run across the map to retrieve it again. It comes in three levels, from Loyalty I to Loyalty III, with higher levels reducing the amount of time it takes for the trident to return to you after a throw. Loyalty only works if you don’t switch to a different item slot after throwing the trident, a mistake I’ve made way too many times when a creeper sneaks up on me mid-throw. If you do switch slots, the trident will just drop on the ground near you once it finishes its flight path, and you’ll still have to pick it up manually. It also won’t come back to you if you die before it returns, and it can’t be retrieved if you throw it into the void, no matter how high your loyalty level is.
How to Get the Loyalty Enchantment in Your World
Getting loyalty is far easier than getting a trident in the first place, so once you’ve farmed a few tridents from drowned mobs, you won’t have to grind much to get the enchant. You can get it from three main sources, depending on your playstyle and what resources you have available. First, you can get it directly from an enchanting table when you enchant a trident – it’s a low to mid-tier enchant, so you don’t need a level 30 setup to roll it, though level 15+ enchants have the highest chance of giving you Loyalty III. You can also get it as an enchanted book from librarian villagers, which is my go-to method, since you can reset a librarian’s trades until you get exactly the level of loyalty you want. Fishing is the third option, especially if you have Luck of the Sea on your fishing rod, though this is far less consistent than trading or enchanting.
If you’re looking to get Loyalty III as fast as possible, follow these quick tips:
- Prioritize trading with librarian villagers if you already have tridents from a drowned farm, as this lets you pick exactly the level you want without random enchant rolls
- Avoid wasting lapis on level 1-5 trident enchants if you’re looking for Loyalty III, as these almost never roll the max level of the enchant
- Combine lower level loyalty books on an anvil to make Loyalty III if you can’t find a max level book right away, as this only costs a few extra experience levels
You can’t combine loyalty with the Riptide enchantment on the same trident, so you’ll have to pick which effect fits your playstyle better. Riptide lets you launch yourself across the map when you throw the trident in water or rain, so it’s better for travel, while loyalty is better for combat and general use. You can pair loyalty with Mending, Unbreaking, Channeling, and Impaling with no issues, though.
Best Use Cases for Loyalty Enchanted Tridents
Once you have a max level loyalty trident, you’ll find yourself using it for far more than just underwater fights. It’s one of the most versatile weapons in the game, and it works in almost every scenario you’ll run into in survival mode. First, it’s perfect for underwater exploration, whether you’re raiding an ocean monument or hunting for buried treasure. You can throw it at guardians or drowned from a safe distance, and it’ll come right back to your hand without you having to swim after it in tight, dark spaces. For PvP fights, Loyalty III tridents are one of the best long-range weapons in the game, as they deal more base damage than a power V bow if you pair them with Impaling V, and you don’t have to carry stacks of arrows with you everywhere.
It’s also great for general mob farming, especially if you have a tall hostile mob farm that you stand on top of. You can throw the trident down at mobs from the platform, and it’ll come right back up to you without you having to climb down to pick up drops or your weapon. I used a loyalty trident for my wither fight last year, and it made the battle way easier than using a bow, since I didn’t have to worry about arrows bouncing off the wither’s armor half the time. Loyalty tridents work even when you’re flying with elytra, so you can fight mobs mid-air without landing, a trick that’s saved me more than once when a group of phantoms has attacked me while I’m traveling across the map. You can even use it to shoot down end crystals while you’re fighting the ender dragon, without having to climb up obsidian pillars to get close.
Common Mistakes to Avoid When Using Loyalty
For such a simple enchant, there are a surprising number of small mistakes that can make you lose your trident entirely, or waste resources on builds that don’t work. First, as I mentioned earlier, never switch your hotbar slot after you throw the trident if you want it to come back to you. I lost two perfectly good enchanted tridents early on when I panicked and switched to my sword to block a creeper explosion mid-throw, and the trident just despawned before I could go back for it. Don’t throw loyalty tridents at mobs that are standing on the edge of a cliff or void platform, because if your aim is slightly off and the trident goes past them into the void, it’s gone forever. Max level loyalty won’t pull it back from the void, no matter how long you wait.
Another common mistake is trying to throw a loyalty trident through a Nether or End portal. If you throw your trident through a portal, it will not come back to you through the portal, it’ll stay in the other dimension until you go through to get it. I tried this once when I was being chased by a group of piglins near a Nether portal, and I had to run back through the portal to get my trident, which almost got me killed by the same piglins I was running from. You also don’t need to waste a loyalty enchant on a trident you only use in creative mode, since tridents automatically return to you in creative without any enchants. Finally, don’t skip pairing loyalty with Mending if you can – every time your trident hits a mob, it’ll absorb a bit of XP to repair itself, so you’ll never have to repair it on an anvil again as long as you’re earning XP.
At the end of the day, if you’ve ever wondered what does loyalty do in Minecraft, it’s more than just a convenience enchant that saves you from chasing your trident across the map. It turns one of the rarest weapons in the game into a versatile tool for exploration, combat, and farming that works on land, underwater, and even in the air. Take the time to get a Loyalty III trident with Mending and Impaling V, and you’ll find yourself using it far more often than your bow or sword for most day-to-day tasks. I keep one in my hotbar at all times now, and I can’t imagine playing survival mode without it.