Soul Sand

Overview

Soul sand does three things no other block does, and every one of them is useful. It slows anything walking on it to roughly half speed and sinks you slightly into the block, which makes it a defensive floor and a nuisance to cross — the Soul Speed enchantment, obtainable only by bartering with piglins, cancels that penalty entirely and then some. Underwater it creates an upward bubble column that pushes players, mobs and items to the surface, which is the standard soul-powered elevator and the drop shaft in most item transport designs; magma blocks do the reverse. And it is the only block nether wart grows on, which makes it a prerequisite for every potion in the game, since nether wart is the base ingredient for the awkward potion. Beyond that, four blocks of soul sand arranged in a T with three wither skeleton skulls on top summon the wither, which is the only source of the nether star a beacon needs. Soul sand generates in the soul sand valley biome and in patches around the Nether, and it needs only a shovel.

Growing nether wart for every potion, building bubble-column elevators, slowing mobs in a defensive corridor, and summoning the wither for the nether star a beacon needs.

Minecraft classifies Soul Sand as a Nether block. There is no way to craft it; you have to find it and mine it. It breaks almost instantly, with a hardness of just 0.5.

You can break it by hand without losing the drop. It drops as the same block you mined. With a blast resistance of only 0.5 it will not survive an explosion.

Sixty-four fit in one inventory slot. Its crafting uses are Soul Campfire and Soul Torch.

How to get it

Dig it with a shovel in soul sand valleys or in patches near lava lakes throughout the Nether. 4 blocks plus 3 wither skeleton skulls summon the wither; nether wart grows only on this block.

Tips

A soul sand block under water makes an upward bubble column — that is the standard elevator and item lift.
Soul Speed, bartered from piglins, turns soul sand from the slowest surface into one of the fastest.
Nether wart grows only on soul sand and needs no light or water, which makes an indoor wart farm trivial.
Bring soul sand back to the Overworld for wart farming rather than farming in the Nether where it is dangerous.

How long it takes to break

Soul Sand sits at hardness 0.5: 0.75 seconds per block with your fists, 0.1 with the correct netherite tool.

An iron tool takes 0.15 seconds and a diamond one 0.1, so the jump that actually matters for this block is the one to diamond.

No particular tool tier is required: any tool, or none at all, still yields the drop, so the table below is about speed rather than about whether you get anything.

The Efficiency formula is level² + 1 added to tool speed — at V that is about 2 times the unenchanted rate.

Tool	No enchantment	Efficiency III	Efficiency V
Hand	0.75 s	0.75 s	0.75 s
Wooden	0.4 s	0.1 s	instant
Stone	0.2 s	0.1 s	instant
Iron	0.15 s	instant	instant
Diamond	0.1 s	instant	instant
Netherite	0.1 s	instant	instant
Golden	0.1 s	instant	instant

Properties

With 0.5 blast resistance Soul Sand goes down to any nearby explosion. It is fully opaque and produces no light. Stack size is 64 — the standard full stack. It does not renew, so the world's supply is fixed. A shovel 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
Renewable: No