How to Beat the Ender Dragon
The Ender Dragon is Minecraft's front door: beat it once and the game opens up — elytra, shulker boxes and the outer End islands. The fight looks scary but it's a checklist. Bring the right kit, kill ten crystals, then finish the job.
The prep checklist
| Item | Amount | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Diamond or netherite armor | Full set, ideally Protection IV | Dragon hits and void-adjacent accidents |
| Bow + arrows | ~3 stacks (Power III+) | Crystals and strafing passes |
| Sword | Diamond+, Sharpness if possible | Perched head damage |
| Pickaxe + axe | 1 each | Breaking cages, building, doors |
| Cobblestone / dirt | 2 stacks | Pillar climbing, cover walls, bridging |
| Slow Falling potions | 2–3 (8 min) | The dragon and the void love throwing you |
| Golden apples / cooked food | 5+ / a stack | Breath chips, knockback hits |
| Carved pumpkin | 1 | Look at endermen all you want — no aggro |
| Ender pearls | 4–6 | Emergency void saves, gateway travel later |
| Beds | 4–6 (optional) | The bed trick — see below |
| Water bucket | 1 (optional) | MLG saves; water works in the End |
| Chest + spare gear | — | Leave a "death chest" at the portal: if you die, re-entry is cheap |
Eyes of ender & the stronghold
- Craft ~14–16 eyes: one blaze powder + one ender pearl each. Kill blazes in the fortress (bring Fire Resistance) and pearl-hunt endermen at night.
- Throw an eye — it floats toward the nearest stronghold. Eyes have a 20% chance to shatter per throw, which is why you carry spares.
- Move in the direction the eye drifts, throwing every ~100 blocks. When the eye dives downward, you're standing on top of it.
- Dig stairs, never straight down. The stronghold is usually 20–40 blocks below and often sits beneath or near a village.
- Find the portal room, fill all 12 frames with eyes by hand (don't throw them in the portal room — you can't retrieve them), and jump in when all 12 light up.
Save your game-changing items in a chest near the portal room if you're nervous — dying in the End drops everything in the void-adjacent arena, and recovery trips are miserable.
Phase 1: kill the crystals
Ten end crystals sit on obsidian pillars — two of them locked in iron bar cages. Every intact crystal heals the dragon, so this phase decides the fight.
- Open with your bow: most crystals pop in one arrow. Work from the tallest pillars inward while the dragon strafes.
- Watch the blast: crystals explode when destroyed. Shoot from range, or snipe the crystal as you climb past it — never stand next to one.
- Caged crystals: arrows can't reach through the bars. Climb the pillar (spiral with blocks or use a ladder column), break the cage with your pickaxe, then either melee the crystal and jump off, or shoot it from the top and glide down.
- Keep an eye on the dragon while climbing — its swoop will fling you off pillars. If you get launched, chunk your Slow Falling immediately.
Phase 2: the dragon itself
- Perched phase (your window): the dragon lands on the exit portal in the center. Its head is the weak point — run in, crit the head with your sword, retreat before the breath. This is where most of your melee damage happens.
- Dragon's breath: purple clouds linger on the ground where it perches. Don't stand in them; they deal lingering damage and can potion-lock you.
- Strafing phase: it flies in circuits and occasionally fires a fireball that explodes into a lingering cloud. Shoot it with your bow — the head takes extra damage.
- The launch: any close flyby can fling you 30+ blocks up. That's the void-death setup, so re-apply Slow Falling the moment it lands a hit near you.
- Never fight near the edge: the main island is surrounded by void gaps before the outer islands. All fights happen at center; bridging out is for after.
The bed trick (huge damage, zero netherite required)
Beds explode when used in the End — and that explosion hits harder than TNT. Speedrunners kill the dragon with nothing but beds:
- Place a bed on top of the exit portal (where the dragon perches).
- Wait for the perch, then for its head to swoop low.
- Click the bed and immediately step behind a two-block-high barrier you placed between you and the bed.
- The explosion smashes the head. Repeat with a fresh bed — typically 3–4 beds per perch.
The explosion is lethal without cover. The barrier is not optional.
Dealing with endermen
- Wear a carved pumpkin (one carved pumpkin + shears on a pumpkin). You can stare at endermen freely — they never aggro.
- Prefer a two-block ceiling: endermen are three blocks tall and can't reach you under a 2-high gap. Fight the dragon from under arches you build.
- If one aggros anyway: face it, block its view with a quick wall, or aggro-swap by getting hit into water. Don't brawl a pack mid-fight.
Dragon fight by the numbers
Key figures for the Java 1.21 fight so you know what you're up against:
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Dragon health | 200 HP (100 hearts) |
| End crystals to destroy | 10 (2 caged in iron bars) |
| Bed explosion in the End | Detonates like TNT — the bed trick's whole damage source |
| XP from first kill | 12,000 |
| Resummon | 4 end crystals placed on the portal rim |
| Perch windows | Dragon lands on the exit portal center between passes |
After the fight
- 12,000 XP drops from the first kill — several full level-30 enchant sessions at once (run the numbers in our XP Calculator).
- The dragon egg spawns on top of the portal. It teleports if you click it — punch it while a torch sits under the block behind it, or push it off with a piston, and it drops as an item.
- End gateways open around the portal rim. Throw an ender pearl (or swim through with a boat… just pearl it) into the small floating gateway to reach the outer islands.
- Elytra wait in end ships guarded by shulkers on those islands — the single best item in the game. Bring blocks, pearls and Potions of Slow Falling.
- The dragon can be resummoned with four end crystals on the portal for repeat XP runs (later kills drop far less XP).
FAQ
Can the dragon break my blocks?
Only a few block types — it destroys anything that isn't obsidian-tier, end stone, iron bars or similar "dragon-proof" blocks. Cover walls of cobble survive the perch; dirt does not.
Do I need netherite to win?
No. Protection IV diamond, a Power bow and Slow Falling potions beat the dragon comfortably. Netherite is for the next chapter.
What if I die in the End?
You respawn at your world spawn with your items lost where you fell. That's why the portal-side chest exists: spare armor, bow, pearls and food turn a death into a 10-minute setback.
How do I find an end ship with elytra?
Outer islands: look for end cities, and ships float beside roughly a third of them. Elytra hang on an item frame in the ship's loft. Shulker bullets levitate you — carry milk or fight from range.