From zombies, skeletons and pillagers to blazes and piglin brutes, every creature under the moon is out to get you in Minecraft. While shields aren’t an absolute necessity, it sure comes in handy to protect you from these pesky creatures. It could even serve as your savior in the battlefield, making up for a couple hearts of difference between life and death. Here’s how you can craft your very own shield.

How To Craft a Shield

Like most items in Minecraft, you’re going to need a crafting table to make it. Right click the crafting table to access its crafting grid. You’re going to need six wooden planks and one iron ingot. Any type of wooden planks will work, even when used together (E.g. 2 cherry planks and 4 spruce planks). Arrange the planks in a ‘y’ shape and place the one iron ingot in the top middle slot.

To equip the shield, move it to your off-hand slot in your inventory (E). Right-click to raise the shield and block attacks. Keep in mind that your shield can only protect you from the front, so make sure to face your enemies as you fend them off!

How To Get Materials

For the six wooden planks, you’re going to need wood logs. Punch, or use an axe to chop down trees. Place the wood in one of the slots in the crafting grid. One wood log will only give you 4 wooden planks. For this particular recipe, you would need two wood logs.

To find an iron ingot, you will need to venture into ravines, Dripstone Caves or explore mountains. Iron blocks will usually spawn at certain altitudes, but you can spot them easily enough in these areas. To mine the iron ore, you have to use at least a stone pickaxe. The block won’t drop raw iron if you use a low-tier pickaxe like a wooden or golden pickaxe. An iron ore will only drop one unit of raw iron. Then, you need to smelt 1 raw iron in a furnace or blast furnace to produce 1 iron ingot.

How Long Does A Shield Last

Your shield can only sustain a certain amount of damage before it breaks -and knowing your luck, it will probably happen mid-battle! So to prevent that from happening, you should probably keep track of your shield’s health. You’ll be able to find the shield’s durability bar under the item’s icon when you open your inventory.

To be specific, a shield has a durability of 336 (the amount of damage it can take). For reference, a wooden sword typically deals 4 attack damage, a zombie 3 attack damage and a ravager 12 attack damage per ram. All things considered, your shield should actually last for some time before breaking. 

However, if you’re the warrior type, you will find yourself running your shield supply dry in the monster-riddled world of Minecraft. You can make your shield last longer by either repairing it or enchanting it.

Repairing a shield

Shields can be repaired by using a crafting table, a grindstone or an anvil. With a crafting table, you can combine two damaged shields together -adding together their durability. The product is a single shield with higher durability. Similarly, the grindstone also requires two damaged shields and produces one single shield.

The anvil also repairs the shield by combining two damaged shields, or by combining one damaged shield with any wooden planks. One wooden plank restores only 25% of the shield’s durability. However, using an anvil comes with an enchantment cost, which takes a certain amount of a player’s experience levels.

Enchanting a shield

By using an anvil, you can enchant your shields with Curse of Vanishing, Mending and Unbreaking. Simply acquire the enchanted book with your desired enchantment, then place the damaged shield in the first slot and the book in the second slot. Depending on the level of enchantment used, the enchantment cost will vary.