Overview
Redstone Dust is the wire that makes machines work, and it is also the potion ingredient that extends duration — two completely unrelated jobs from one item. As wire it carries a signal up to 15 blocks before it needs a repeater, and every door, piston farm, item sorter, hopper clock, elevator and TNT cannon in the game is built from it plus a handful of components. As a brewing ingredient it extends most potions to 8 minutes, which is the difference between a Fire Resistance potion covering a debris trip and covering a corridor. Supply is simple: redstone ore has the same triangular distribution as diamond, peaking at Y -59, and drops 4 to 5 dust per block — 8 or more with Fortune III — so any diamond-hunting trip comes home with stacks of it. Witches also drop redstone in quantity, and a witch farm is the standard renewable source. Nine dust make a block, which is used as a compact power source and in note blocks and redstone lamps. Learn the wire first and the components make sense afterwards, not the other way round.
Wiring every automatic build in the game, and extending potion duration to 8 minutes — the two things that separate a functional base from a pile of chests.
Redstone Dust is a redstone item in Minecraft 1.21.4. It stacks to 64. The usual source is Witch.
Look for it in the loot of Stronghold, Abandoned Mineshaft, and Dungeon (Monster Room). It is mined from Redstone Ore, which is most common around Y -59. You make it with Block of Redstone.
Put Deepslate Redstone Ore in a furnace and this is what comes out. It is an ingredient in 22 recipes, among them Clock, Compass, Copper Bulb and 19 more.
How to get it
Mine redstone ore with an iron pickaxe or better for 4 to 5 dust per block, 8 or more with Fortune III. The distribution peaks at Y -59, the same layer as diamonds, so one trip supplies both.
Tips
- Signal strength drops 1 per block and dies after 15; a repeater every 15 blocks keeps a long line alive.
- Redstone and glowstone cannot both go into one potion — extend or strengthen, never both.
- Fortune III on redstone ore nearly doubles the yield, so use the Fortune pickaxe you already carry for diamonds.
- Start with redstone basics and then work through five useful redstone builds.
Properties
One inventory slot holds 64, so a double chest holds 3,456.
- Stack size
- 64
- Renewable
- Yes
- Category
- Redstone
How to get it
Crafting Table
Shapeless recipe
Redstone Dust ×9
Furnace · 10s · 0.7 XP
Redstone Dust
Also works in: Blast Furnace
Furnace · 10s · 0.7 XP
Redstone Dust
Also works in: Blast Furnace
Dropped by
1 mobs drop Redstone Dust: Witch. Looting raises the maximum on most of them.
Found in
Redstone Dust is in the loot tables of Stronghold, Abandoned Mineshaft, and Dungeon (Monster Room).
- Stronghold — A sprawling underground maze of stone brick corridors, spiral staircases, storerooms, prison cells and libraries, and the only place the End portal exists.
- Abandoned Mineshaft — Long branching wooden corridors with rails, minecarts, support beams and floating sections over ravines and caves.
- Dungeon (Monster Room) — A small cobblestone-and-mossy-cobblestone room with a mob spawner in the centre and one or two chests against the walls.
Dropped by blocks
Mining Redstone Wire, Redstone Ore, and Deepslate Redstone Ore drops Redstone Dust.
Used to craft
Redstone Dust is an ingredient in 23 recipes, producing Clock, Compass, Copper Bulb, Crafter, Detector Rail, Dispenser, Dropper, Exposed Copper Bulb, Note Block, Observer, Oxidized Copper Bulb, Piston, Powered Rail, Block of Redstone, Redstone Lamp, Redstone Torch and 7 more.
Guides and tools that cover this
Frequently asked questions
How do you make Redstone Dust in Minecraft?
Redstone Dust is crafted from Block of Redstone.
What is the stack size of Redstone Dust?
Redstone Dust stacks to 64.
