Minecraft: How to Find Every Ore | Ultimate Mining Guide

The 1.19 update in Minecraft has brought forth some major changes to the game. One of these changes applies to the biomes and terrain generation in the game. Due to this, ore distribution has been greatly affected as well.

As such, your usual spot for mining ores will no longer be as viable as it was back then. Don’t worry though, as I’ve created this guide to help you find every ore in the game in the latest update.

How to Find Every Ore in Minecraft

Before we start, let’s first talk about ore distribution in the game first. In case you didn’t know, the Minecraft world is divided into chunks. Each of these chunks contains 16 blocks, and each time the game world gets rendered, chunks will also be rendered one at a time.

Each chunk comes with its own ore generation system, regardless of which Minecraft version you’re playing. And the way ores are generated in these chunks is what we refer to as ore distribution.

Now, in most cases, world heights will affect this process, and the latest update changed the limits of world heights. In particular, world height can now reach 320 blocks, with the lowest point at -64 blocks.

As long as you know the exact world height for each ore, you should be able to figure out where to find ores in your game world.

But in case you don’t, then worry not as we are going to cover the ore generation rule of each ore. Let’s get started.

Diamonds

Diamonds are an endgame resource in Minecraft. You can start finding them in world heights Y=16 and below. The deeper you go, the more diamonds you can find. So using that logic, it means you can find a deepslated diamond ore more frequently in world height Y=-64.

However, this also means that you can easily come across lava with every step as well.

Iron

Iron is yet another important ore that you need to progress further in the game. This ore usually generates between heights Y=-32 and Y=256. However, you won’t really find a lot of iron at the mountaintops, so your best bet is to head over to height Y=16.

Gold

You can find a lot of gold in the Badlands biome, usually between heights Y=-64 and Y=32. There’s also a huge amount of gold in Y=-16, though if you can’t find one, then you’d best head over to the Nether dimension.

Lapis Lazuli

Lapis Lazuli is a necessary ore for enchantments. The problem is that looking for a sufficient amount can be quite hard due to how rare it is. Your best bet is to go to heights between Y=-64 and Y=64, though height Y=0 is an excellent spot as well.

Redstone

You can find a sufficient amount of redstone somewhere between heights Y=-32 and Y=-64.

Copper

Albeit not a very useful ore, looking for copper can still be challenging. That said, your best bet is to look between heights Y=112 and Y=-16. It tends to spawn in the dripstone cave biomes, so try checking out these biomes for your best chance of finding it.

Emeralds

You will need a decent amount of Emerald in order to trade with any of the villagers in the game. You can find an abundant supply of this ore somewhere between heights Y=-16 and Y=256. The higher it goes, the more emeralds you can find.

Coal

An important ore that you can use as fuel, coal can be found between heights Y=256 and Y=0. It’s common in mountains as well as inside caves.