A furnace smelts raw materials into usable items and cooks food
A furnace in Minecraft is a block that heats materials. Put raw ore inside, and it turns into metal ingots. Put raw meat in, and it becomes cooked meat. You can also use a furnace to smelt sand into glass, cook potatoes, or turn logs into charcoal. It runs on fuel — wood, coal, or other burnable items — and the process takes a few seconds per item.
You need a furnace early in the game because many materials won't work until they're smelted. You can't use iron ore as a tool or weapon; you have to smelt it into an iron ingot first. The furnace is one of the first machines most players build, and it stays useful throughout the game.
Key Takeaways
- Craft a furnace by arranging eight cobblestone blocks in a square on a crafting table, leaving the center empty.
- Place the furnace on the ground, then right-click it to open the interface where you load materials and fuel.
- Put the item you want to smelt in the top slot, fuel in the bottom slot, and the finished product appears in the right slot.
- A furnace consumes one fuel item per stack of items smelted, so a single coal block can smelt up to 80 items.
Gather eight cobblestone blocks
You need cobblestone to craft a furnace. Cobblestone is the gray, bumpy block you get when you mine stone with a pickaxe. Stone appears almost everywhere underground and on the surface of mountains and cliffs. Mine it with any pickaxe — even a wooden one works — and it drops as cobblestone.
You need eight blocks total. If you're just starting out, dig down a few blocks or find a cliff face and mine straight into it. You'll have eight cobblestone in less than a minute. Don't worry about getting exactly eight; grab a few extra in case you need them for something else.
Craft the furnace on a crafting table
Open your crafting table and place the eight cobblestone blocks in the pattern shown below. Leave the center square empty. The arrangement matters — this is the only way the game recognizes it as a furnace recipe.
| Cobblestone | Cobblestone | Cobblestone |
| Cobblestone | Empty | Cobblestone |
| Cobblestone | Cobblestone | Cobblestone |
Click the furnace in the result box on the right side of the crafting table. It appears as a small gray block with a dark opening on one side. Drag it into your inventory. You now have a furnace block ready to place.
Place the furnace and open it
Find a spot on the ground where you want to put the furnace — usually near your base or mining area. Right-click on the ground with the furnace in your hand. The furnace appears as a solid block with a dark square on the front (the opening). Right-click on the furnace again to open its interface.
The interface shows three slots. The top slot is where you put the raw material you want to smelt. The bottom slot is for fuel. The right slot shows the finished product once smelting is done. You can also see a small flame icon that lights up when the furnace is running, and a progress bar that fills as the item cooks.
Load materials and fuel
Put the item you want to smelt in the top slot. For example, if you have raw iron ore, click the top slot and place the ore there. You can put a whole stack (up to 64 ore) in at once. The furnace will smelt them one at a time.
Put fuel in the bottom slot. Coal is the most common fuel — one coal smelts up to 8 items. Charcoal (made by smelting logs) works the same way. Wood planks, sticks, and wooden tools also work as fuel but burn faster. A lava bucket smelts 100 items but is consumed in the process. Once you add fuel, the furnace lights up and starts working.
The smelting time depends on what you're cooking. Most ores take about 10 seconds. Food takes about 10 seconds. The progress bar shows how much time is left. When it finishes, the result appears in the right slot. Click it to take it out, or it stays there until you remove it.
Understand fuel efficiency and speed
Different fuels burn for different lengths of time. Coal and charcoal each burn long enough to smelt 8 items. A coal block (made from 9 coal) burns long enough to smelt 80 items, making it much more efficient if you have the coal to spare. Wood planks burn quickly — one plank smelts only 1.5 items — so use them only when you have no better option.
The furnace always takes the same time per item no matter what fuel you use. Speed doesn't change. If you want to smelt faster, you need multiple furnaces running at the same time. Many players build a row of furnaces side by side so they can process large amounts of ore quickly.
Upgrade to a blast furnace or smoker for faster smelting
Once you have access to iron and smooth stone, you can craft a blast furnace or smoker. A blast furnace smelts ore twice as fast as a regular furnace but only works on ore, metal, and glass. A smoker cooks food twice as fast but only works on food and hay blocks. Both are crafted by surrounding a regular furnace with specific materials on a crafting table.
A blast furnace is made by placing a furnace in the center of a 3×3 grid, then filling the corners with iron ingots and the remaining sides with smooth stone. A smoker is made the same way but uses wood instead of iron and smooth stone. These upgrades are optional — a regular furnace works fine for the whole game, but they save time if you're processing large amounts of one material type.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I move a furnace after I place it?
Yes. Break the furnace with a pickaxe (any pickaxe works), and it drops as an item you can pick up and place elsewhere. Any items inside the furnace are also dropped, so grab them before you break it.
What happens if I run out of fuel mid-smelt?
The smelting stops and the progress bar resets. The raw material stays in the top slot. Add more fuel to the bottom slot and it starts again from the beginning — you don't lose the item or the fuel you already used.
Can I smelt multiple different items at once?
No. A furnace only has one input slot, so you can only smelt one type of material at a time. If you want to smelt ore and cook food at the same time, you need two furnaces.
Is charcoal as good as coal?
Yes. Charcoal and coal burn for exactly the same amount of time and smelt the same number of items. Charcoal is made by smelting logs in a furnace, so it's useful when you're far from coal deposits.
Do furnaces work in the Nether or End?
Yes. Furnaces work the same way in any dimension. They smelt at the same speed and use fuel the same way whether you're in the Overworld, Nether, or End.