Kodeclik Blog
How to show hitboxes in Minecraft
Hitboxes are an extremely useful hidden Minecraft feature. Many players use them if they want to locate entities that are hard to see on the screen, or make precise attacks. This blog post will highlight the many uses of hitboxes as well as how to show them.
How do I view hitboxes?
Hitboxes are a Minecraft Java Edition only feature. To view them, simply press F3+b. To turn them off, press F3+b again. The chat box will confirm that hitboxes are enabled or disabled with a debug output in the chat.
What do hitboxes show?
Hitboxes display a lot of information. Many Minecraft mobs have non-block shapes, but Minecraft hitboxes are all blocks. This means that a mob’s hitbox might not completely cover their whole body, or might cover outside regions (for example, a bat). Hitboxes also show the direction a mob is facing.
What do hitboxes denote?
Fundamentally, hitboxes determine the areas where you can damage a mob. They also determine the collisions for a mob as it hits against a block or another mob. For example, if you hit the area right next to a mob, but the mob takes damage, this is because you have hit the mob’s hitbox.
When are hitboxes useful?
People take advantage of hitboxes in several different ways. Speedrunners use hitboxes to detect kelp on the ocean surface and determine if there is a magma ravine below. Regular players use hitboxes to precisely break a boat that is holding a mob (they need to be careful to not hit the mob, and only the boat).
If you liked learning about hitboxes, learn how to open iron doors in Minecraft!
If you are interested in more Minecraft content, checkout our Minecraft glossary, what horses eat in Minecraft, how to get scutes,
how to get a barrier block, making pumpkin pie, villagers opening doors, getting Acacia wood, and our blogpost on how to kill mobs in Minecraft. You might also like our blogpost on Minecraft Player-vs-Player mode of gameplay. Also checkout and participate in Kodeclik's Minecraft Settlement Creation contest. Also learn about Minecraft MLG.
Want to learn Minecraft modding? Checkout Kodeclik's 1:1 and small group classes.
