Minecraftcan be whatever players want it to be. It can be a survival experience. It can be an explorative journey. But no matter what, one constant tends to exist: players will be building something sooner or later. Whether it’s a simple shelter to an extravagant house, players will likely want somewhere to live eventually.
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Luckily,Minecraftoffers a wide variety of blocks that players can choose from to help make their home just the way they want. While the exact blocks each player uses are up to them, there are some blocks that just seem to work well with every single build.
Updated by Chris Birsner on August 09, 2025:Minecraftcontinues to change as more updates are implemented to the game on an almost annual basis. But the core objectives that players tend to follow still remain in place from surviving long enough to kill the Ender Dragon to building the house of their dreams. The latter is still a big part of the game, with new building blocks introduced all the time to help broaden what can be used on any given home. The list ofMinecraft building blocksgrows longer, so it’s worth looking back and throwing in some additional blocks that are worth checking out to enhance any shelter.
15Bookshelves
If playing survival mode, it is likely that players will want to obtain an enchantment table. In order to enhance enchantments, players need to surround it with Bookshelves. But even without an enchantment table, bookshelves bring out a nice indoor, cozy vibe to a room.
To acquire Bookshelves, players will need to craft them usingsix wooden planks and three books. While books can be crafted with three pieces of paper and one piece of leather, players can also mine up bookshelves they find in structuressuch as villages, strongholds, and mansions.
14Signs
There have since been many ways for players to display words in the world, but the original method of getting a message across to others has been through signs. These rectangular, flat surfaces helpconvey whatever information a player wants to saysuch as a name for a home or just a message about themselves.
These signs can be both placed as individual stands and also hung up on the side of blocks. They can also be used as accents to makeshift furniture items, like attaching signs to a stair to make it look like a seat. All the player needs for a sign is to craft them withsix wooden plants and one stick.
13Sea Lantern
When building anything inMinecraft, the most important thing to consider is lighting. This is important from an aesthetic point of view but is also vital also toprevent hostile mobs from spawning inside the house.Out of all the lighting sources, the Sea Lantern may be the best light to use for its neutral look. This light doesn’t stand out, which means players can disguise it a lot more easily compared to others.
Players will need to visit anocean monumentto mine up some sea lanterns. They can also be crafted withocean monument materials:four Prismarine shards and five Prismarine crystals.
12Stone & Blackstone Bricks
Once again, it’s important to note that everyone is going to have a different vision for theirMinecrafthome. Those looking for a more regal build may want to invest in stone bricks. If players want to keep that regal vibe but add a sinister layer, they should try out Blackstone Bricks.
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Stone Bricks can be made by crafting them withfour pieces of stone,or by taking one stone piece and putting it through the stonecutter. Blackstone can be crafted usingfour polished Blackstone pieces. Stone is found in the overworld, whileBlackstone is foundin the Nether.
11Wooden Planks
On the other side of the home design spectrum, if players are looking for something that is a bit more representative of the cottagecore aesthetic, they should invest in chopping lots of trees. Out of all the wooden blocks that can be used on a build, wooden planks seem like the best blocks to use and easiest to obtain.
Each log of wood players have can be put into a crafting bench, which can producefour wooden planks.There are eight different wooden plank types: Oak, Birch, Spruce, Jungle, Acacia, Dark Spruce,Warped, and Crimson.
10Slabs
MostMinecraftbuilding blocks are about the same size to make it easier for players to build structures with. That said, there isn’t a ton of shapes that players can form their buildings into when all the best blocks are the same size. That is where slabs come in handy.
Slabs can be made with a variety of different blocks, from wooden plants to stone bricks. Whatever block players want to make a slab with, they must go to a crafting table andplace three blocks along a rowto create six slabs or those three blocks cut in half. It’s a good building block inMinecraftfor its ability to really make builds more realistic instead of just being normal blocks.
9Terracotta
There are plenty of blocks that stand out incredibly well as a primary part of a build. Sometimes, though, it’s nice to keep in mind the blocks out there that can provide a nice compliment and blend in with the build.
Terracotta blocks,found mostly in the Badlands, have a nice muted color palette that doesn’t overwhelm but works well with other colorful blocks.Smelting a full block of clay in a furnacewill give players the default terracotta block. To dye terracotta, put eight pieces of the default block in a crafting bench and put a piece of dye in the middle.
8Stained Glass
Glass has never been the best block in the game as even its upside of being transparent was tainted by having some non-transparent aspects until recent texture changes made it a little better. But despite these improvements, normal glass can be boring on its own. That is where Stained Glass comes in.
This decorative item can be used to add extra color to the home by dyeing the glass a specific color. To do this, players must grabeight glass blocksand put them in every box on the crafting table except the middle. Then, players should fill the middle space withwhatever dye color they want. This will return eight pieces of Stained Glass.
7Glazed Terracotta
Not many blocks are made to stand out on their own. Glazed Terracotta, however, has a very unique design that works well in small bunches and can add a burst of color to a room. There are 16 distinct designs for Glazed Terracotta, with each one associated with a specific dye color.
To get these blocks, players mustget the specific colored terracotta that matches the glazed terracotta they want and put it into the furnace. Once cooked, they will have the glazed versions to place around.
6Leaves
Some of the best blocks for building in the game are the ones that look the most natural. There is no block in this game that looks more natural than the leaves. There are a wide variety of these leaves as they come from various trees across aMinecraftworld.
Unfortunately, leaves aren’t the easiest to harvest as they can’t be broken with an empty hand or many tools. The best way to collect leaves from any tree is by crafting shears, which requiretwo iron ingotsin a diagonal direction on the crafting table. Players can keep growing trees to help get as many leaves as possible.
