How to Make A Minecraft Furnace in 2024 [All Furnace Types]
Reviewed by Huzaifa Haroon- A furnace in Minecraft is used for smelting ores and cooking food. It's a core utility block and can be easily crafted using 8 cobblestones and a crafting table.
- First, create a crafting table using wooden planks. Then, in the crafting table, arrange 8 cobblestone blocks to make a furnace. To use the furnace, you need fuel like wood or coal, and it has two input slots for items and fuel, and one output slot.
- Besides the standard furnace, there are three variants: the Blast Furnace for faster metal smelting, the Smoker for quicker food cooking, and the Minecart with Furnace, which serves as a moving engine on rail tracks. Each variant has its specific use and speed advantages.
If you’ve just started your Minecraft journey, you might find yourself a bit overwhelmed by the sheer number of things that need to be crafted to progress further. There’s no need to rush the game; Minecraft is all about taking things nice and slow and building the stuff of your dreams. That’s why we’ll be starting with one of the most fundamental utility blocks in the game; the furnace.
Table of Contents
What is A Furnace?
A furnace is a utility block that can smelt ores, metallic items and also be used to cook food. It is mostly used to craft more complex materials, extracting metal from ores, cooking food and even upgrading your gear or tools. A furnace can be found in villages but the easiest way to get one is to craft it.
READ MORE: How To Make a Blast Furnace in Minecraft [3 Easy Steps] ➜
How To Craft A Furnace
Since the furnace is a fundamental block, it’s pretty easy to craft. All you’ll need are 2 things:
- A Crafting Table
- 8 stone blocks
Since this guide is for beginners, we’ll be using cobblestone as the source of stone, as it is the easiest stone block to obtain.
1. Crafting Table
Before the furnace, the Crafting Table is the most essential block in all of Minecraft. It increases the crafting grid’s capacity from a 2×2 to a 3×3 grid. At any rate, here’s how you can craft a crafting table in Minecraft:
- First off, you’ll need a decent amount of wood. Since you’ll need wood to craft your shield too, make sure to get it all in one go. At any rate, wood is the easiest resource to obtain in Minecraft. Simply, chop or punch away at the trees to get some. 3 logs should be enough.
Trees are abundant in Minecraft - Once you’ve got the wood, open up your crafting menu. Place 1 log of wood in any crafting slot to obtain 4 wooden planks.
You can place the log in any slot of the crafting menu - Now, remove all the wood logs from the crafting slots and fill all the slots with the wooden planks you just crafted. The result will be a crafting table.
Fill the crafting slots with the planks you just crafted - Place the crafting table somewhere in your base.
It’s best to keep the crafting table in your base or hidout - Finally, exit the crafting screen and access it once more to see the changes.
Now you’ll have a 3×3 grid for crafting
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2. Cobblestone
Cobblestone is the most common stone in Minecraft. It can be found by digging just below the ground level. We’ll be needing a total of 8 blocks.
Crafting the furnace
Now that you’ve got everything in order, place the cobble stones exactly as shown in the crafting table grid.
Place the crafted furnace in your inventory. Equip it and set it somewhere in your base.
READ MORE: How to Make A Shield in Minecraft – Easiest Guide With Pics ➜
Using a Furnace
The furnace is pretty easy to use. To open up the furnace menu, stand next to it and right-click on PC or press the left trigger (ZL on the Switch, L2 on PlayStation and LT on Xbox). On the furnace menu, there will be 2 slots on the left-hand side and 1 on the right. The right slot will have the output while the left hand slots will have the inputs.
The 2 slots are placed at the top and bottom. In the top slot, you’ll need to place the item you’re trying to smelt/cook and in the bottom slot, you’ll need to place the fuel. The smelting process begins automatically. You can stop it anytime by removing an item from any of the 2 left slots. The process will continue to be carried out until either 1 of the items is used up completely.
↪ Fuel
Similar to a real-life furnace, a furnace in Minecraft also needs fuel to generate heat. Fuel is usually any flammable substance that is to be placed in the bottom slot of the furnace menu. The most commonly used fuel sources are:
- Wood
- Coal
Any items that are made of wood may also be used.
Types of Furnace
There are a total of 3 kinds of furnaces:
- The normal furnace
- Blast Furnace
- Smoker
What we’ve been discussing so far is the normal furnace. Let’s tak about the other 2 types:
1. Blast Furnace
A blast furnace is a variant of the furnace that exclusively performs the smelting function. It does not cook food at all. The blast furnace also performs the smelting process at twice the speed of a normal furnace, all at the same fuel cost. It can smelt metallic items and ores, and uses the exact same layout as a normal furnace.
READ MORE: How To Craft, Repair & Use an Anvil in Minecraft ➜
2. Smoker
A smoker is the other variant of the furnace that is exclusively used to cook food at twice the rate of a normal furnace. It cannot smelt any ores, metallic items or any other materials. A smoker is usually used to create more complex ingredients or dishes that can replenish your health to a much greater extent than raw food. It also employs the same layout as a furnace and has the same fuel cost.
3. Minecart with Furnace
A minecart with a furnace is not technically a variant of the furnace, as it doesn’t really give a material output like a normal furnace. Since it is just like what it sounds; a minecart with a furnace in it, it acts like an engine for the minecart. You put in fuel in the furnace and the minecart moves according to the rail tracks it has been placed on. For how long it travels depends on the amount of fuel you put in.
How does a normal furnace compare to its variants?
| Features | Furnace | Blast Furnace | Smoker | Minecart with Furnace |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Works on food? | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Works on ores? | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| Works on metals? | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| Works on metal armor/gear? | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| Moves on rail tracks | No | No | No | Yes |
| Speed | Normal | 2x of furnace | 2x of furnace | Burns fuel to move for a specific amount of time |
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Conclusion
No matter what, a furnace is detrimental to your Minecraft journey. You can progress all the way to end, yet you’ll still find yourself using a furnace, as it is the only block that can smelt and cook. Whether you decide to construct its variants is up to you, but having a furnace is a must; either you create the best armor or the best dishes you can think of.
FAQs
A furnace is a utility block that can be used to smelt metallic items and ores. It can also be used to cook food. A furnace needs fuel to carry out these processes, such as coal or wood.
A furnace can be found in villages, but the best way to obtain one is to craft it. It can be crafted using 8 stone blocks of any kind. However, for convenience, cobblestone is often recommended.
There are 4 variants of the furnace: the normal furnace, the blast furnace, the smoker, and the minecart with furnace. Except for the minecart with furnace, smelting or cooking can be done in any of these variants. The differences lie in the duration of the processes and the specific processes each variant can carry out. The fuel cost remains the same for each variant.
Reviewed by Huzaifa Haroon
