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The first time you throw your lure out into the water in Minecraft, the result can be pretty disappointing. You get back a single Codfish or Salmon when a good wheat farm can net you a whole bakery’s worth of bread. But with a little time and knowledge, fishing is a great way to leapfrog over lots of grinding.
Note: This guide focuses on the Bedrock version of Minecraft, available on Windows 10, Xbox, PlayStation, Switch, and mobile.
How to Fish:
You’ll need a fishing rod to get started:
Be prepared for this process to start slowly. When you drop that lure, it can take anywhere from 5-30 seconds to catch something. By default, you’ll have an 85% chance of catching fish, a 10% chance of catching junk, and a 5% chance of catching treasure. Once you start to accrue the right enchantments, though, the process quickly snowballs.
Enchantments:
Here are the enchantments you want to maximize your fishing:
Lure II – Each level of Lure brings the wait time for a strike down by 10 seconds, making the wait 0-20 seconds instead of 5-30, meaning that a good portion of the time, you’ll catch something immediately.
Luck of the Sea III – Each level of Luck of the Sea reduces your chances of catching junk or fish and raises your chance of catching treasure, taking you from a 5% chance up to 12%. Combined with the enhanced fishing speed of Lure II, though, the real amount of treasure you’ll haul ashore is much more than that simple number.
Unbreaking III – Each level of Unbreaking increases the real life of an item by about 100% by giving you a chance, each time you use the item, to avoid ticking down the durability. Combined with Mending, you’ll have a fishing rod that will quite literally last until you lose it.
Mending I – Mending works by giving some of the XP you earn to the enchanted item, causing it to self-repair. The act of fishing itself generates XP, meaning that the rod will repair itself faster than you can deplete it.
Where To Fish:
The other big part of fishing is finding the right spot. You need open water around the bobber to catch treasure. To qualify as open water, the space around your bobber must have two blocks of water on every side of it except above, which must be open air. You can fish underground or in a building with enough water, but open sky above–glass is okay–will get you the best results.
Safe Fishing:
You can ease the grind here by setting up a quick-and-dirty fishing hut.
A good fishing hut will stretch out above the water, providing safety from mobs above and below you, while allowing you to cast out into open water below.
Furnishings to make the hut truly comfortable include a couple of treasure chests–one for fish, one for items–a frame to place the rod into when you’re not using it (ensuring you don’t lose it or drop it), and a Grindstone for disenchanting the items you don’t plan to use.
With the right enchantments and the right fishing spot, this can be a very lucrative way to gather enchantment books and bows, as well as things like name tags and, of course, plenty of fish.
AFK Fishing:
Of course, people will often do other things while they fish–read, have a drink, shoot the breeze. Once you have a mending rod, fishing doesn’t have to be a hands-on experience anymore and can be a great way to collect food, experience, and enchantment books. Instead, set up an AFK Fishing Farm. Here’s just one example of how to do it:
