How to Farm in Minecraft

This Minecraft tutorial explains how to farm with a hoe with screenshots and step-by-step instructions.

In Minecraft, you can plant and grow your own garden of wheat, carrots and potatoes by farming in the game. When you farm, you require water and a hoe. To speed up the growing process, you can use bone meal. Let's explore how to farm.

Required Materials to Farm

The following are the items that you will need to farm in Minecraft:

Hoes

First, you need a hoe to prepare the soil when farming. You can use any one of these hoes:

Items to Plant

Next, you need something to plant. These are the types of items that you can plant in Minecraft:

TIP: Seeds will harvest into wheat. All other items will harvest into themselves.

Fertilizer

To speed up the growing process, you can use the following as fertilizer:

How to Farm in Creative and Survival mode

1. Find Land with Water

First, you need to find an area of land that has water. Next, you need to select a hoe in the hotbar. In this example, we are going to use a wooden hoe to prepare the land into farmland.

how to farm

Next, position your pointer (the plus sign) on a block next to the water. You should see the block become highlighted in your game window.

2. Use the Hoe

The game control to use the hoe depends on the version of Minecraft:

  • For Java Edition (PC/Mac), right click on the block.
  • For Pocket Edition (PE), you tap on the block.
  • For Xbox 360 and Xbox One, press the LT button on the Xbox controller.
  • For PS3 and PS4, press the L2 button on the PS controller.
  • For Wii U, press the ZL button on the gamepad.
  • For Nintendo Switch, press the ZL button on the controller.
  • For Windows 10 Edition, right click on the block.
  • For Education Edition, right click on the block.

This will prepare the ground and expose the soil for planting turning it into farmland.

how to farm

Once you have used the hoe on the blocks that you want to farm, they will look brown (because the grass has been removed). The blocks will begin to get wet from the water and change to a darker brown.

3. Plant the Item

Next, select the item that you want to plant in the hotbar. This could be carrots, potatoes or one of the seeds. In this example, we will plant seeds.

The game control to plant the seeds depends on the version of Minecraft:

  • For Java Edition (PC/Mac), right click on the block.
  • For Pocket Edition (PE), you tap on the block.
  • For Xbox 360 and Xbox One, press the LT button on the Xbox controller.
  • For PS3 and PS4, press the L2 button on the PS controller.
  • For Wii U, press the ZL button on the gamepad.
  • For Nintendo Switch, press the ZL button on the controller.
  • For Windows 10 Edition, right click on the block.
  • For Education Edition, right click on the block.

how to farm

After you have planted your seeds on each of the blocks of soil, you should begin to see the plants grow. They will start as very small plants and with time, your plants will grow to full size on their own.

4. Fertilize with Bone Meal

You can speed up the growing process by using bone meal on the plants. To use bone meal, select it in your hotbar. The game control to use the bone meal depends on the version of Minecraft:

  • For Java Edition (PC/Mac), right click on the plants.
  • For Pocket Edition (PE), you tap on the plants.
  • For Xbox 360 and Xbox One, press the LT button on the Xbox controller.
  • For PS3 and PS4, press the L2 button on the PS controller.
  • For Wii U, press the ZL button on the gamepad.
  • For Nintendo Switch, press the ZL button on the controller.
  • For Windows 10 Edition, right click on the plants.
  • For Education Edition, right click on the plants.

how to farm

As you use the bone meal, you will see green stars appear over the plants as they fertilize them. You may need to use a couple of bone meal on each section of plants.

Now that your farm is full-grown, you need to harvest the wheat.

5. Harvest the Crop

To harvest the crop, you need to break the plant. The game control to harvest depends on the version of Minecraft:

  • For Java Edition (PC/Mac), left click on the plant.
  • For Pocket Edition (PE), you tap and hold.
  • For PS3 and PS4, press the R2 button on the PS controller.
  • For Xbox 360 and Xbox One, press the RT button on the Xbox controller.
  • For Windows 10 Edition, left click on the plant.
  • For Wii U, press the ZR button on the gamepad.
  • For Nintendo Switch, press the ZR button on the controller.
  • For Education Edition, left click on the plant.

how to farm

After you have broken the plant, you should see your crop floating on the ground. In this example, we have harvested wheat. Make sure you pick up the item before it disappears.

TIP: If you harvest your plants too soon, it will give you seeds instead of wheat. Make sure your plants are full-grown before breaking them.

Congratulations, you just learned how to farm in Minecraft.

Videos

Watch this video as we show you how to build a greenhouse in Minecraft.

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