Enchanting is one of the most powerful progression systems in Minecraft. The right enchantments turn mid-tier gear into something that can carry you through endgame content; the wrong ones waste your XP and your anvil uses. This tier list ranks every major enchantment so you know exactly what to prioritise and what to ignore.
If you need a primer on how the system works, check out our enchanting guide before diving in. For getting specific enchantments cheaply and reliably, the trading hall with Librarian villagers is the most efficient method in the game.
How Enchanting Works (Quick Overview)
You can apply enchantments in two ways: via the enchanting table (randomised, costs XP and lapis) or via an anvil using enchanted books (targeted, costs XP and anvil uses). Books can be sourced from loot chests, fishing, villager trading, and librarian villagers. Each item has a maximum number of anvil uses before it becomes “too expensive” — another reason to plan your enchantment stack carefully.
Some enchantments are mutually exclusive. The most important incompatibilities to know: Fortune and Silk Touch cannot coexist on the same tool, and Infinity and Mending cannot both go on a bow.
S-Tier: Must-Have Enchantments
These enchantments are so universally strong that you should put them on every eligible piece of gear as a top priority.
| Enchantment | Max Level | Applies To | Why It's S-Tier |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mending | I | All gear | Repairs durability using XP orbs — makes items last indefinitely |
| Unbreaking III | III | All gear | Dramatically reduces durability loss; essential on everything |
| Protection IV | IV | Armor | Best all-round damage reduction; replaces Fire/Blast/Projectile Protection for general play |
| Efficiency V | V | Pickaxe, axe, shovel | Massive mining speed boost; anything below V feels sluggish |
| Sharpness V | V | Sword, axe | Best general-purpose melee damage; outperforms Smite against non-undead enemies |
| Fortune III | III | Pickaxe, shovel, axe | Multiplies ore drops — essential for diamonds, ancient debris, and more |
| Feather Falling IV | IV | Boots | Dramatically reduces fall damage; one of the best survivability enchants in the game |
| Power V | V | Bow | Adds up to 150% damage to arrows; the single most important bow enchant |
A-Tier: Very Strong, Use When Relevant
These enchantments are excellent but either apply only to specific situations or items, or are slightly behind their S-Tier counterparts.
- Silk Touch — Picks up blocks exactly as they are (ores, glass, bookshelves, grass). Incompatible with Fortune. Keep a separate Silk Touch pickaxe for collecting blocks; use Fortune on your main mining pick.
- Looting III — Increases mob drop quantity and rare drop chance. Essential if you farm for items like Ender Pearls, Blaze Rods, or Wither Skeleton Skulls.
- Sweeping Edge III (Java Edition only) — Boosts sweep attack damage significantly. Great for mob farms and crowd control. Does not exist in Bedrock Edition.
- Quick Charge III — Reduces crossbow reload time to about half a second. Transforms the crossbow into a genuinely competitive ranged weapon.
- Smite V — Deals massive bonus damage to undead mobs (zombies, skeletons, phantoms, the Wither, and the Wither Skeleton). Strong if you fight undead specifically, but Sharpness V is better all-round.
- Loyalty III — Trident returns to you after being thrown. Makes the trident a practical ranged weapon without losing it in lava or water.
- Flame — Sets targets on fire with arrows. Useful for dealing chip damage and cooking animal drops automatically.
- Respiration III — Extends underwater breathing significantly. Strong for ocean monument raids and underwater building projects.
B-Tier: Situational but Useful
B-Tier enchantments are worth using when you have a specific need. They add genuine value in the right context but aren't essential for most players.
- Aqua Affinity — Removes the underwater mining speed penalty. Low priority unless you spend significant time building or mining underwater.
- Knockback II — Pushes enemies back on hit. Useful for keeping mobs at bay, but can be actively annoying in tight spaces like mob farms or cave combat.
- Depth Strider III — Increases movement speed underwater. A solid quality-of-life enchant for ocean exploration. Incompatible with Frost Walker.
- Frost Walker — Creates ice under your feet as you walk over water. More of a novelty than Depth Strider but has niche uses. Incompatible with Depth Strider and Feather Falling.
- Punch II — Adds knockback to bow shots. Situationally useful for keeping enemies away from you at range, but competes with other bow enchantments for space.
- Infinity — Lets you fire infinite arrows from a single arrow in your inventory. Incompatible with Mending, so you can't self-repair an Infinity bow. Better for players who don't yet have reliable XP farms.
- Piercing IV — Crossbow bolts pass through multiple entities. Strong in corridors or for hitting multiple targets.
C-Tier: Niche or Low Priority
These enchantments work, but most players will rarely find them necessary or worth pursuing.
- Thorns III — Reflects a portion of melee damage back at attackers. The downside: it rapidly consumes your armor's durability. Without Mending it's costly; even with it, the tradeoff is marginal.
- Channeling — Calls a lightning bolt on a mob hit by a trident during a thunderstorm. Fun, and useful for converting pigs into Piglins and creepers into charged creepers, but the thunderstorm requirement makes it impractical as a combat tool.
- Riptide — Launches you forward when you throw the trident in rain or water. Incompatible with Loyalty and Channeling. Niche and weather-dependent.
- Impaling V — Deals bonus damage to aquatic mobs (Java: water-touching only; Bedrock: all aquatic mobs). Useful for ocean monument raids, otherwise very limited.
- Multishot — Fires three crossbow bolts at once (only one arrow consumed). Decent for AOE but Piercing is usually more consistent for single targets.
D-Tier: Avoid
These enchantments offer no meaningful advantage — or actively work against you.
- Curse of Vanishing — Item disappears on death instead of dropping. Never intentionally apply this; avoid items that have it unless you have a backup.
- Curse of Binding — Prevents you from removing the item from its slot until you die or it breaks. Dangerous on armor, completely useless in normal play.
- Bane of Arthropods V — Bonus damage to spiders, cave spiders, silverfish, endermites, and bees. Too narrow to justify a sword slot when Sharpness V works on everything.
- Fire Aspect II — Sets target on fire with melee hits. Sounds useful, but the burn damage often destroys mob drops. Only situationally worth it for cooking chicken or mutton automatically.
Best Enchantment Combinations by Item
Sword
- Sharpness V
- Unbreaking III
- Mending
- Looting III
- Sweeping Edge III (Java only)
Pickaxe
- Efficiency V
- Fortune III (main pickaxe) or Silk Touch (secondary pickaxe)
- Unbreaking III
- Mending
Armor Set (Helmet / Chestplate / Leggings / Boots)
- Protection IV on all four pieces
- Unbreaking III on all four pieces
- Mending on all four pieces
- Feather Falling IV on boots
- Aqua Affinity on helmet (optional)
- Respiration III on helmet (optional)
- Depth Strider III on boots (optional, replaces Frost Walker)
Bow
- Power V
- Flame
- Punch II (optional)
- Unbreaking III
- Infinity (if no XP farm) or Mending (if you have an XP farm)
Crossbow
- Quick Charge III
- Piercing IV or Multishot
- Unbreaking III
- Mending
Trident
- Loyalty III
- Unbreaking III
- Mending
- Impaling V (ocean use) or Riptide III (water travel)
How to Get Specific Enchantments
The enchanting table is random, which makes targeting specific enchantments unreliable. The most efficient method for getting exactly what you want is to use Librarian villagers in a trading hall. Librarians sell enchanted books, and you can reset their trade by breaking and replacing their lectern before they're locked in. This lets you cycle through enchantments until you find the book you need.
Other reliable sources include:
- Loot chests — Dungeons, mineshafts, ancient cities, and end cities contain enchanted books
- Fishing — With a Luck of the Sea III rod you can catch enchanted books regularly
- Pillager raids — Hero of the Village effect gives discounts on villager trades post-raid
Conclusion
The core priority for any Minecraft playthrough is simple: get Mending and Unbreaking III on everything, stack Protection IV across your armor, and put Efficiency V and Fortune III on your tools. From there, layer in the A-Tier picks based on your playstyle. Avoid the Curses entirely, and treat Fire Aspect and Bane of Arthropods as filler enchantments at best. With the right enchantment stack, your gear will last indefinitely and your farming, combat, and mining efficiency will improve dramatically.
For help setting up the XP farm you need to power all that Mending, check our enchanting guide for tips on maximising your enchanting setup.
Sources
- Minecraft Wiki. Enchanting. wiki.gg
- Minecraft Wiki. Enchantment mechanics and incompatibilities. wiki.gg
References
- Minecraft Wiki. Enchanting. wiki.gg
- Minecraft Wiki. Enchantment mechanics and incompatibilities. wiki.gg
I've been playing video games for over 20 years, spanning everything from early PC titles to modern open-world games. I started Switchblade Gaming to publish the kind of accurate, well-researched guides I always wanted to find — built on primary sources, tested in-game, and kept up to date after patches. I currently focus on Minecraft and Pokémon GO.