How to Activate a Conduit in Minecraft

Evan Gower August 9, 2019

With the release of Update Aquatic in July of 2018, Minecraft received many new technical features as well as new content. As the name implies, the update focused mainly on water-based features and blocks. This includes blue ice, coral, and the powerful conduit.

The conduit is a very special new block that generates an area-of-effect status. It isn’t too difficult to create and activate but there is a process to it. Below, you’ll find instructions for how to craft it, how to activate it, and the benefits it provides.

What Are Conduits?

Conduits are a type of block similar to beacons in that they produce an area around them that provides a status effect for players. The main difference between these two blocks is the type of status that they provide.

conduit

Conduits generate a field that bestows the Conduit Power status. This status gives the player water breathing abilities, as well as mining speed underwater. Other effects include underwater night vision and haste while under the status effect. You likely realize by now that these effects are all meant to make underwater mining much easier and faster.

There are several potencies of Conduit Power which will be equivalent to the same potency of Haste. However, these conduit potencies are only accessible through commands.

Activating a Conduit Block

First, let’s look at how to activate a conduit block. If you don’t know how to craft a conduit block in the first place, you can scroll down for instructions on which components you’ll need and how to get them.

Once you have your conduit block, you’ll need some water. The conduit can only be activated underwater—specifically, in at least a 3x3x3 block of water. More water isn’t necessary but you will need a 5x5x5 space to place the rings necessary to activate it.

The rings around the conduit must be made of any type of Prismarine blocks. Arrange these blocks in a 1-block wide, 5×5 ring around the conduit. When you’ve placed these 16 blocks, and as long as it is underwater, the Conduit Block will activate. This first ring is the minimum required to activate the conduit and will produce the Conduit Power status in a 32 block sphere from the conduit.

You can increase the sphere of influence of the conduit by 16 blocks for every seven Prismarine blocks that you add to the structure. Thus, you can increase the potency with additional half-rings added to the primary ring.

The maximum potency is reached at 46 blocks, for a total influence range of 96 blocks. When the conduit formation is fully completed in this way, it will also deal 4 damage to mobs in an 8x8x8 block around it.

That’s how you activate the block, so let’s move on to how you can make one.

How to Make a Conduit Block

Like any other crafted block, you’ll start with the components. In this case, you’ll need a Heart of the Sea and Nautilus Shells. The Heart will likely be more difficult to find but the shells might take more time. Hearts of the Sea can be found in buried treasure, the maps for which you will find in shipwrecks.

When you find a treasure map and examine it, it will show a red X that you can navigate to. When you reach the X, dig around until you find the chest (bring a good shovel to make this faster). The buried treasure is guaranteed to have at least one Heart of the Sea. On rare occasions, you can also find these Hearts in the chests you find on shipwrecks.

You can get Nautilus Shells mainly as a random drop from fishing. Fishing for these will take a long time but it’s probably the best way to get them. Drowned mobs will also spawn with a Nautilus Shell in their off-hand so you can get them there too. Finally, you can get them from the Wandering Trader for a cost of 5 emeralds each. You will need nine Nautilus Shells.

Once you have your components, place the Heart of the Sea in the middle of the crafting table and surround it with Nautilus Shells to craft the conduit block. Remember that you’ll also need the Prismarine blocks to activate it, which you can mine from ocean monuments.

You Con-DO IT!

Conduits are pretty useful, especially in survival mode, so they’re well worth the effort. Activating them simply requires some Prismarine blocks in a ring around the conduit block. However, crafting the block is a little labor-intensive.

What is your favorite part of Update Aquatic? Let us know about it in the comments below.