A horse is the fastest everyday way to cross the Overworld, but no two horses are equal. Every horse rolls its own speed, jump and health when it spawns, and the gap is huge: the slowest horses barely beat walking pace, the best run at three times your walking speed and clear almost six blocks in a jump. Picking a good one, and breeding better ones, is most of the game.
Quick answers
- How do you tame a horse? Mount it with an empty hand, repeatedly. Each time it bucks you off its temper goes up, and feeding it raises temper faster. Hearts mean it is yours.
- How do you ride it? Put a saddle on it. Saddles are craftable now: 3 leather and 1 iron ingot.
- How do you breed horses? Feed two tamed horses a golden carrot or golden apple each.
- Best horse armor? Netherite: 19 armor points, upgraded from diamond horse armor at a smithing table.
Image: SyntaxMine, made from Minecraft's own textures.
Horse stats: what the numbers mean
| Stat |
Worst |
Average |
Best |
| Health |
15 HP (7.5 hearts) |
22.5 HP |
30 HP (15 hearts) |
| Speed |
about 4.9 blocks/s |
about 9.7 blocks/s |
about 14.6 blocks/s |
| Jump |
about 1.15 blocks |
about 3.1 blocks |
about 5.9 blocks |
For scale, you walk at about 4.3 blocks per second. A bad horse is barely an upgrade; a great one triples your pace and jumps over walls.
Reading stats without mods
Vanilla does not show a horse's numbers, but you can read them well enough:
- Health: the hearts above your hotbar while riding. Odd values hide the last half-heart.
- Jump: hold jump while riding and watch how high a full charge takes you against a wall you know the height of.
- Speed: time a ride between two markers, or watch the horse before taming. A wild horse's casual walking speed hints at its real speed, so a horse that wanders quickly is worth a closer look.
Taming a horse
- Walk up to a wild horse with an empty hand and mount it.
- It will usually throw you off. Each failed attempt raises its temper by 5 (out of 100).
- Keep remounting. When its temper beats a random roll, hearts appear: it is tamed.
Feeding speeds this up. Food raises temper on top of healing the horse:
| Food |
Heals |
Temper |
Grows a foal by |
| Sugar |
1 HP |
+3 |
30 s |
| Wheat |
2 HP |
+3 |
20 s |
| Apple |
3 HP |
+3 |
1 min |
| Carrot |
4 HP |
+5 |
1 min |
| Golden carrot |
4 HP |
+5 |
1 min |
| Golden apple |
10 HP |
+10 |
4 min |
| Hay bale |
20 HP |
none |
3 min |
A stack of wheat or apples while you keep remounting usually gets the job done in a few tries.
Saddles: craft one now
Since Java 1.21.6 a saddle is a simple craft: three leather and one iron ingot. Before that update saddles were loot only, so older guides that send you treasure hunting are out of date.
You can still find them in nether fortress chests, abandoned camps, end cities, bastion hoglin stables and village chests (tannery, weaponsmith, savanna houses), buy one from a master leatherworker for 6 emeralds, or catch one fishing. Ravagers always drop theirs.
Put the saddle on by using it on the tamed horse or by opening the horse's inventory (sneak and use while riding). Shears take equipment back off: the first use removes the armor, the second the saddle.
Breeding a faster horse
Feed two tamed adult horses a golden carrot or golden apple each and they make a foal. Every stat of the foal is rolled around the average of the two parents, with some random spread either way.
That rule, in place since Java 1.19.4, is what makes breeding work: two good parents give a foal near their level, sometimes better. The practical method:
- Tame several horses and keep the two best at each stat.
- Breed them. Keep any foal that beats a parent.
- Replace the weaker parent with the better foal and repeat.
Over a few generations the average creeps up toward the maximum. Golden carrots are the cheaper breeding food: grow carrots and wrap each in gold nuggets. Unfed foals take about 20 minutes to grow up; feeding them speeds it up.
Breeding a horse with a donkey gives a mule. Mules cannot breed, but like donkeys they can carry a chest.
Horse armor
Horse armor goes in the armor slot of a tamed horse's inventory. It is mostly found in chests, not crafted:
| Armor |
Protection |
How to get it |
| Leather |
3 |
Craft from 7 leather (dyeable), or buy from a leatherworker |
| Copper |
4 |
Chests (dungeons, desert pyramids, fortresses and more) |
| Iron |
5 |
Chests |
| Golden |
7 |
Chests, often nether fortresses |
| Diamond |
11 (+2 toughness) |
Chests, best odds in ancient cities |
| Netherite |
19 (+3 toughness, knockback resistance) |
Smithing table: diamond horse armor, netherite upgrade template, netherite ingot |
Netherite horse armor, added in 1.21.11, more than doubles diamond's protection. It costs a netherite ingot and an upgrade template, so plan a netherite run before you start.
Riding tips
- A saddled horse walks up one-block steps on its own.
- Horses take no fall damage from up to 7 blocks, less than you might think when jumping off cliffs.
- You need about 2.75 blocks of headroom to ride under something.
- Since 1.21.11, horses no longer sink when ridden in water.
- Horses follow you when you hold a golden carrot or golden apple, which is the easy way to walk one home on foot. A lead works on any horse, even a wild one.
Frequently asked questions
How do you tame a horse in Minecraft?
Mount it with an empty hand. It will buck you off at first, but every attempt raises its temper by 5, and feeding it sugar, wheat, apples or carrots raises it further. When hearts appear, it is tamed.
How do you make a saddle in Minecraft?
Since Java 1.21.6 you can craft a saddle from three leather and one iron ingot. You can also find saddles in chests, buy one from a master leatherworker or get one from a ravager.
What is the fastest horse speed in Minecraft?
The best possible horse runs at about 14.6 blocks per second, more than three times walking speed. The slowest horses manage about 4.9 blocks per second.
How do you breed a fast horse?
Breed your two fastest tamed horses with golden carrots or golden apples. The foal's speed is rolled around the parents' average, so keep any foal that beats a parent and breed it again.
What is the best horse armor?
Netherite horse armor, with 19 armor points, 3 toughness and knockback resistance. You make it at a smithing table from diamond horse armor, a netherite ingot and a netherite upgrade template.
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