Blindness

Overview

Blindness collapses your render distance to a few blocks and takes sprinting away, which in practical terms means you are lost and slow at the same moment. There is no potion for it in Java Edition, so the only way to inflict or receive it in ordinary survival is suspicious stew: an azure bluet gives eight seconds of it, and an open eyeblossom from the pale garden gives eleven. Both are short, and both are enough to make a cave descent genuinely dangerous. The reason the effect matters more in 1.21.4 than it used to is the pale garden, where eyeblossoms are common and the creaking is hunting you — a stew eaten by accident in that biome is a real risk rather than a curiosity. Milk clears it, and so does a honey bottle, which is the better answer whenever you are carrying buffs worth keeping. It is worth being precise about what Blindness is not: the warden and the sculk shrieker inflict Darkness, a separate effect that pulses the light level instead of shrinking your view. Confusing them is the commonest mistake players make about the deep dark.

Practically nothing you want — but recognising it instantly tells you what you just ate, and a bowl of the right stew is a cheap prank on a shared world.

Reduces your view to a few blocks and prevents sprinting. Suspicious stew is the survival source — an azure bluet gives 8 seconds of it, an open eyeblossom 11. The Warden inflicts Darkness, which is a different effect.

As a status effect, Blindness counts as harmful. No potion produces it, so it lasts however long the source keeps applying it.

While it is on you, the top-right of the inventory shows the icon and the time left, and you give off particles in the effect's colour, dimmer when the source is ambient. No beacon carries it, so each dose is finite.

How to get it

Craft suspicious stew with an azure bluet for 8 seconds of Blindness, or an open eyeblossom for 11. Both recipes take 1 flower, 1 red mushroom, 1 brown mushroom and 1 bowl, and there is no potion form in Java Edition.

Tips

• A honey bottle clears it and leaves your other buffs alone, unlike milk, which strips everything you are carrying.
• Stop moving the moment it lands; walking blind into a ravine kills more players than the effect's duration ever could.
• It is not what the warden inflicts — that is Darkness, which dims the world rather than shrinking it.
• Open eyeblossoms only open at night in the pale garden, as the pale garden guide explains.

What each level does

Levels are shown one-based in the inventory and zero-based in commands, so Blindness II is written amplifier 1. Per level:

Anything above I is command-only — the amplifier field runs as far as 255.

Properties

Blindness has no brewed form. It comes from Suspicious Stew (azure bluet), Suspicious Stew (open eyeblossom), and Command, and it runs for as long as the source does. Milk clears it — so does a honey bottle, and honey is the better answer because it removes only poison-type effects and leaves your buffs alone.

Where it comes from

Blindness comes from Suspicious Stew (azure bluet), Suspicious Stew (open eyeblossom), and Command.

• Suspicious Stew (azure bluet)
• Suspicious Stew (open eyeblossom)
• Command

Command

With cheats enabled it hands you Blindness I for thirty seconds; raise the last number to raise the level, since 1 is II.

Guides and tools that cover this

• GuidesHow to Brew Every Potion in Minecraft→
• ToolsPotion Brewing Planner→

Frequently asked questions

Related pages

Night VisionHungerPoisonWeaknessBad OmenDarknessGlowingInfested