Overview
A dispenser uses whatever it holds rather than merely dropping it, and that distinction is the whole of its usefulness. Give it arrows and it fires them; a bucket and it places or picks up water and lava; bone meal and it fertilises the block in front; shears and it shears a sheep or harvests a beehive; TNT and it primes and launches the block; a fire charge and it shoots a fireball; a flint and steel and it lights a fire; a splash potion and it throws one; a boat or a minecart and it places one on the track. Anything it does not know how to use, it simply ejects like a dropper. It draws from its nine slots at random, which means a dispenser loaded with two different items will fire them in an unpredictable order — usually a bug in your design rather than a feature. Practically, dispensers are how automatic farms plant and harvest, how mob traps deal damage, how a self-filling water source works, and how a firework launcher fires. It needs a redstone pulse rather than a steady signal, so it fires once per rising edge.
Automating anything that a player would otherwise do by hand: watering farms, bone-mealing crops, shearing sheep, firing arrows into a mob trap, lighting TNT, and placing and retrieving water.
Minecraft classifies Dispenser as a redstone block. Dispenser is made at a crafting table. Expect to wait: its hardness of 3.5 is well above average.
Mine it with a wooden pickaxe or better, or you get no drop at all. Broken correctly, it drops itself. Sixty-four fit in one inventory slot.
The recipe calls for Cobblestone, Bow, and Redstone Dust. It is not used in any crafting recipe.
How to get it
Craft it from 7 cobblestone, 1 bow and 1 redstone dust. The bow means either 3 string from spiders or a lucky early drop, which is usually the limiting ingredient rather than the cobblestone.
Tips
- It fires on a rising edge, so a lever left on dispenses once — use a button, an observer or a clock for repeats.
- It draws from a random occupied slot, so keep only 1 item type in a dispenser you need to behave predictably.
- A dispenser with a water bucket placed and retrieved on a clock is the standard mechanism for a flushing farm.
- Shears in a dispenser harvest a beehive without angering the bees, which no other automation can do.
How long it takes to break
Hardness 3.5 puts Dispenser at 18 seconds a block bare-handed, or 0.6 seconds with the right tool at netherite tier.
Iron takes 0.9 seconds against diamond's 0.7, so the upgrade worth making for this block is the one to iron.
A weaker tool still breaks it, but anything under wooden returns nothing — you spend the time and lose the drop, which is how most veins get wasted.
Each Efficiency level adds level² + 1 to the tool's speed, so a level V tool clears this about 4 times faster than an unenchanted one.
| Tool | No enchantment | Efficiency III | Efficiency V |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hand * | 18 s | 18 s | 18 s |
| Wooden | 2.7 s | 0.45 s | 0.2 s |
| Stone | 1.4 s | 0.4 s | 0.2 s |
| Iron | 0.9 s | 0.35 s | 0.2 s |
| Diamond | 0.7 s | 0.3 s | 0.2 s |
| Netherite | 0.6 s | 0.3 s | 0.15 s |
| Golden | 0.45 s | 0.25 s | 0.15 s |
Properties
Dispenser has a blast resistance of 3.5, so a nearby explosion will usually destroy it. It blocks light completely and emits no light of its own. A single slot takes 64, the usual full stack. The block is tagged for pickaxes, and only that class gets the speed bonus; everything else mines at bare-hand rate.
- Transparent
- No
- Required tool
- Wooden Pickaxe
Where it generates
- Found in
- Jungle Pyramid
Crafting recipe
Crafting Table
Dispenser
Drops
Mined with Wooden Pickaxe, Dispenser drops itself.
Guides and tools that cover this
Frequently asked questions
How do you get Dispenser in Minecraft?
Dispenser is crafted from Cobblestone, Bow, and Redstone Dust.
What tool do you need to break Dispenser?
Wooden Pickaxe or better is required; anything weaker destroys the block without dropping it.
Is Dispenser blast resistant?
Dispenser has a blast resistance of 3.5, so an explosion nearby will destroy it.
How many Dispenser fit in one stack?
Dispenser stacks to 64, which puts 3,456 of them in a double chest.
How long does Dispenser take to break?
0.6 seconds with a netherite-tier tool of the right class, or 18 seconds bare-handed.
