Overview
A carved pumpkin is a pumpkin with a face cut into it, and it has one property that matters more than everything else combined: worn on the head it stops endermen becoming hostile when you look at them. Endermen aggravate when a player looks directly at their upper body, which makes the End and any warped forest a constant exercise in staring at the floor — a carved pumpkin removes the mechanic entirely, at the cost of a vignette around the edges of the screen. That is why a carved pumpkin is standard kit for every End trip and every enderman farm. Its second use is golems: a carved pumpkin placed on top of two snow blocks creates a snow golem, and on top of the T-shaped iron block arrangement creates an iron golem — an ordinary uncarved pumpkin does neither. It is made by using shears on a placed pumpkin, which also drops 4 pumpkin seeds, and adding a torch turns it into a jack o'lantern. Carved pumpkins also generate naturally in pillager outposts and in some village farms.
Blocking the enderman look-aggro mechanic when worn on the head, creating snow golems and iron golems, and crafting into a jack o'lantern for decorative lighting.
Carved Pumpkin is a plant block in Minecraft Java Edition 1.21.4. It has no crafting recipe — you collect it by mining it where it generates. Hardness 1 puts it in the middle of the pack for mining speed.
No specific tool is required to collect it. Broken correctly, it drops itself. It offers almost no protection from explosions (1 blast resistance).
A full stack holds 64. Its only crafting use is Jack o'Lantern.
How to get it
Use shears on a placed pumpkin, which produces 1 carved pumpkin and 4 pumpkin seeds. Carved pumpkins also generate on pillager outpost fences and can simply be taken.
Tips
- Wear one before entering the End or a warped forest and endermen will ignore your gaze entirely.
- Only the carved version makes golems; an uncarved pumpkin will not work for either.
- Shears on a placed pumpkin give the carved block plus 4 seeds, so carving is free seeds as well.
- Add 1 torch to make a jack o'lantern, which gives light level 15 and keeps the face.
How long it takes to break
At a hardness of 1, Carved Pumpkin takes 1.5 seconds to punch out and 0.2 seconds with a netherite-tier tool of the correct class.
You are looking at 0.25 seconds on iron and 0.2 on diamond — the iron step is where the time actually falls.
The drop does not depend on the tool — bare hands work as well as anything — so the table below is purely about speed.
The Efficiency formula is level² + 1 added to tool speed — at V that is about 4 times the unenchanted rate.
| Tool | No enchantment | Efficiency III | Efficiency V |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hand | 1.5 s | 1.5 s | 1.5 s |
| Wooden | 0.75 s | 0.15 s | 0.1 s |
| Stone | 0.4 s | 0.15 s | instant |
| Iron | 0.25 s | 0.1 s | instant |
| Diamond | 0.2 s | 0.1 s | instant |
| Netherite | 0.2 s | 0.1 s | instant |
| Golden | 0.15 s | 0.1 s | instant |
Properties
Carved Pumpkin resists blasts at 1, which is not enough to survive anything explosive nearby. Light does not pass through it, and it emits none of its own. A single slot takes 64, the usual full stack. An axe is the fastest choice here. A tool of the wrong class is no better than your fist — the speed bonus is tied to the block's own tool tag.
- Transparent
- No
- Required tool
- Any
Drops
Mined with any, Carved Pumpkin drops itself.
Used to craft
Carved Pumpkin is an ingredient in 1 recipes, producing Jack o'Lantern.
Guides and tools that cover this
Frequently asked questions
How do you get Carved Pumpkin in Minecraft?
Mine Carved Pumpkin with any and it drops itself.
What tool do you need to break Carved Pumpkin?
No specific tool is required — Carved Pumpkin can be broken by hand.
Is Carved Pumpkin blast resistant?
Carved Pumpkin has a blast resistance of 1, so an explosion nearby will destroy it.
How many Carved Pumpkin fit in one stack?
64 per stack, so a double chest holds 3,456 Carved Pumpkin.
How long does Carved Pumpkin take to break?
With the correct tool at netherite tier it takes 0.2 seconds; by hand it takes 1.5 seconds.
