Overview
Ocean ruins are worth stopping for twice: once early, for the buried treasure maps that turn a boat trip into a Heart of the Sea, and once after 1.20, for sniffer eggs. Warm-water ruins are the ones that matter for the second reason — the suspicious sand in and around them is the only place in the entire game a Sniffer Egg generates, so a brush belongs in your inventory before a shovel does. Hit suspicious sand with anything other than a brush and the item inside is destroyed, which is the single most common way players lose a sniffer without ever knowing they had one. The ruins themselves come in two flavours, sandstone in warm water and stone in cold, and in two sizes: single rooms scattered across the sea floor, and sprawling multi-building complexes with several chests each. Drowned generate inside them at world creation rather than spawning in over time, so a small ruin can hold three or four waiting in the dark, occasionally one with a trident. Dig your approach from above and fight in the open water rather than in a flooded doorway, where you cannot back up and cannot see.
Buried treasure maps, which chain straight into a Heart of the Sea, plus emeralds, gold nuggets, enchanted books and fishing rods from the chests. Warm ruins are the only source of sniffer eggs, and every ruin is free sandstone or stone brick at the bottom of the sea.
Scattered clusters of sunken buildings, in a sandstone warm-water variant and a stone cold-water variant. Small ruins are single rooms; large ones are multi-building complexes with several chests. They generate with drowned already inside, sometimes many. Since 1.20 warm ocean ruins contain suspicious sand, and this is the only place sniffer eggs can be found anywhere in the game, so bring a brush rather than a shovel. Loot chests here frequently contain buried treasure maps.
It is common in the Overworld, restricted to Ocean, Warm Ocean, Lukewarm Ocean, Cold Ocean and 2 more, and it generates ocean floor, sometimes partly above the waterline near shore.
How to get it
Ruins are common across ocean, warm ocean, lukewarm ocean, cold ocean, frozen ocean and deep ocean biomes, and near shorelines part of a ruin often breaks the waterline. A single warm ocean can hold 5 or more clusters within a few hundred blocks.
Tips
- Brush the suspicious sand, never mine it: a shovel destroys the sniffer egg or pottery sherd inside without telling you.
- Take the buried treasure map out first and read it before exploring further, because it usually points at a beach you have already passed.
- Drowned generate inside the rooms rather than spawning later, so a ruin is at its most dangerous the first time you open it.
- Cold-water ruins carry no sniffer eggs — if that is what you came for, keep swimming until the water turns turquoise.
Version notes
Added in 1.13 with the rest of the ocean rework. 1.20 put suspicious sand into warm ruins, making them the sole source of sniffer eggs and several pottery sherds.
Properties
It generates in the Overworld, which is the only dimension with a day-night cycle and weather, and the one every distance in the game is measured against. In a world with cheats on, /locate structure minecraft:ocean_ruins gives the coordinates of the nearest one. Without cheats, an explorer map from a cartographer villager is the reliable route for the structures that have one; everything else is exploration.
- Biomes it generates in
- 6
- Notable loot items
- 7
Where it generates
Ocean Ruins generates in 6 biomes: Ocean, Warm Ocean, Lukewarm Ocean, Cold Ocean, Frozen Ocean, and Deep Ocean. Outside those it will not generate at all, however far you travel.
Notable loot
Its loot includes Sniffer Egg, Emerald, Gold Nugget, Wheat, Coal, Fishing Rod, and Enchanted Book. These are the notable entries rather than the full loot table — the common filler (bread, coal, iron nuggets) is omitted, and in some structures the best of it comes from a vault or a spawner rather than a chest.
Mobs found here
Drowned, Cod, Salmon, and Tropical Fish generate here. Several of them spawn nowhere else, which is usually the reason to make the trip.
What to watch out for
3 things to prepare for before you go in:
- Drowned generate inside, some with tridents
- Drowning while exploring enclosed rooms
- Poor visibility without a conduit or Night Vision
Guides and tools that cover this
Frequently asked questions
Where do sniffer eggs come from?
Suspicious sand in warm ocean ruins, brushed rather than mined. They generate nowhere else in the game, so a warm ocean trip is mandatory if you want a sniffer.
Do ocean ruins always contain chests?
Small ruins often have one or none; large multi-building ruins usually have several. Buried treasure maps are the most common notable item across all of them.
What is the difference between warm and cold ocean ruins?
Warm ruins are built of sandstone and carry suspicious sand with sniffer eggs; cold ruins are stone and stone brick and do not. Loot tables otherwise overlap heavily.
How do I find Ocean Ruins?
Ocean Ruins generates in the Overworld, only in Ocean, Warm Ocean, Lukewarm Ocean, Cold Ocean and 2 more, and is common. /locate structure minecraft:ocean_ruins finds the nearest one instantly with cheats on.
What loot is in Ocean Ruins?
The notable entries are Sniffer Egg, Emerald, Gold Nugget, Wheat, Coal, Fishing Rod and 1 more.
When was Ocean Ruins added?
Ocean Ruins was added in Java Edition 1.13.
Related pages
Structures that share Ocean Ruins's loot, its mobs or its biomes — not simply the next few in the list.
