Overview
Absorption hangs a row of yellow hearts above your real health, and damage eats those first. They never regenerate — once spent, they are gone until you eat another apple — which makes the effect a shield with a fixed budget rather than a healing source. That is exactly the right shape for the situation it exists for: the moment before a fight you expect to take a big hit in. Golden apples are the common source, and they are the reason the item feels so much better than its hunger value suggests. Bite one before a creeper, and the blast comes off the yellow hearts instead of you. The enchanted golden apple gives a far larger pool, and that pool is a genuine part of why a single enchanted apple can carry a losing fight. There is a subtlety worth knowing: armour reduces the hit before it reaches the yellow hearts, so the buffer is worth more in full netherite than in nothing, and it does not stop effects — you can still be set on fire or withered while your yellow hearts are full. Ravagers, wardens and creepers are what the buffer is for; poison and starvation are not.
Buying a buffer before a known big hit — a creeper detonation, a ravager charge, a warden's melee swing — so that the damage lands on hearts you can afford to lose.
Grants temporary yellow hearts that absorb damage before your real health. They do not regenerate.
Absorption is a beneficial status effect. It has no potion form: it lasts exactly as long as its source keeps applying it.
You will see it as an inventory icon in the top-right corner with a countdown, plus a trail of particles in the effect's colour — faint rather than absent when a beacon or a conduit applied it. There is no beacon version, so it always runs out.
How to get it
Eat a Golden Apple, crafted from 8 gold ingots around 1 apple, for 4 absorption health over 2 minutes. An Enchanted Golden Apple grants a much larger pool and lasts the same 2 minutes.
Tips
- Eat the apple before the fight, not during it; the yellow hearts do not refill, so they are worth nothing spent late.
- Golden apples cost 8 gold ingots, which a piglin bartering farm supplies far faster than mining does.
- It does not block status effects — fire, poison and wither keep ticking whatever your absorption pool looks like.
- Stack it with Resistance from a beacon for the strongest defensive setup available in survival.
What each level does
What the inventory calls level II is amplifier 1, because the amplifier counts from zero. Level by level:
Anything above IV is command-only — the amplifier field runs as far as 255.
| Level | Effect |
|---|---|
| I | +4 absorption health (2 yellow hearts) that does not regenerate |
| II | +8 absorption health (4 yellow hearts) that does not regenerate |
| III | +12 absorption health (6 yellow hearts) that does not regenerate |
| IV | +16 absorption health (8 yellow hearts) that does not regenerate |
Properties
Absorption has no potion form; it comes from Golden Apple and Enchanted Golden Apple and lasts as long as its source keeps applying it. A bucket of milk removes it, at the cost of every other effect you have running.
- Category
- Positive
- Highest level in survival
- IV
- Particle colour
- #2552A5
- Removed by
- Milk
Where it comes from
Absorption comes from Golden Apple and Enchanted Golden Apple.
- Golden Apple
- Enchanted Golden Apple
Command
Cheats on, this applies Absorption I for half a minute. That final digit is the amplifier — 1 gives you level II.
Give the effect
/effect give @s minecraft:absorption 30 0Clear it
/effect clear @s minecraft:absorptionGuides and tools that cover this
Frequently asked questions
How long does Absorption last?
Since Absorption has no brewed form, the source that applied it decides the duration.
How do I get rid of Absorption?
A bucket of milk, which also removes everything else you have on.
Is Absorption good or bad?
Beneficial, so it is worth keeping up.
What does Absorption II do?
Absorption II gives +8 absorption health (4 yellow hearts) that does not regenerate.
