Lava

For other Magma related objects found in *Minecraft*, see Magma (Disambiguation).
**Lava** is a source block that burns a player or most mobs when they come in contact with it, causing the unfortunate being to seek out a form of water to extinguish the flames.

## Mechanics

Lava tends to be slow-flowing and thick in the Overworld, so most players can escape in time. In peaceful mode, lava is one of the main causes of death to a player, along with fall damage. Lava deals 4 (File:Heart.pngFile:Heart.png) per half-second to any flammable mob caught in it. The mob will also be set on fire for a while afterward. Death from lava is one of the worst deaths a player can experience besides plummeting into the void, because their inventory items will burn, and a player will not be able to retrieve them. The same can happen to the experience a player had gained before death. Even if a player or mob succeeds in escaping the lava, they will still be on fire, which will often kill them anyway.

All items that come in contact with lava will burn and be destroyed, except for Netherite items and Ancient Debris. Lava gives off a very large amount of light. Lava within a certain distance of combustible blocks, such as wool or any wood block, can ignite them starting a fire unless fire spreads have been turned off.

In the Nether, lava flows as rapidly as water does in the Overworld, and can reach seven blocks across a flat surface in whichever direction it is flowing. In the overworld, lava will only travel three blocks in any direction across a flat surface. Lava in the overworld flows much slower than water. Lava's texture is a mixture of orange, red, and yellow colors.

It is possible to swim through lava after consuming a potion of fire resistance, but compared to water, lava is a very viscous fluid to be swimming in. Entities move an average of 1 block every 3 seconds. This means that the player can only go across a 20-block lava pool in the Nether with a 3:00 Fire Resistance potion.

## Natural Occurrence

Lava appears underground in the form of lava pools. These pools may also appear on the surface, albeit uncommon for them to do so. In the Nether, lava appears in vast oceans that are much more common than the water oceans of the overworld; lava also generates as single blocks encased in Netherrack in the biome. For generated structures, lava can spawn in:

* Villages blacksmiths, yielding two blocks near the entrance.
* Stronghold portal rooms, yielding 15 blocks on the sides and beneath the portal.
* Nether Fortresses, yielding one block in the room connected the interior and exterior paths.
* Woodland mansions, encasing a diamond block.

 File:Lava.jpeg
 File:LDUWater-HV.png
## Uses

When Lava and Water are exposed to each other, they can make many different materials, such as stone, cobblestone, and obsidian. When flowing water hits a source of lava, it turns into obsidian. When flowing lava hits still water, it turns into Stone. When flowing lava hits flowing water, and vice versa, it turns into cobblestone.

Lava is a very useful fuel and can smelt up to one hundred items per bucket (or 1000 seconds). While this is a nice large number, only 64 items can be smelted at a time, making lava buckets slightly impractical for smelting items without the aid of hoppers or unless a player watches the furnace carefully. As of the Adventure Update, players can now retrieve the bucket that they used to hold the lava.

## Trivia

* It's ironic that if you throw a bucket of lava into a lava pool, it will be incinerated like almost any other items.
* Although lodestones are made from netherite, it will still burn in lava.
* Shulker boxes with netherite inside will still have the netherite destroyed if it is thrown in lava.
* Strangely, lava can be contained using ice as a border until the ice melts from the light emitted.
* If a player dies in lava, a public message is displayed, stating: "*<player> tried to swim in lava.*"
* If an Enderman touches lava (or water or fire), it will teleport away until it stops burning (or gets out of the water, should that be what it fell into).
* Magma cubes are often found in Nether lava. They don't spawn there, but they find it difficult to escape.
* After the 1.5 redstone update, the texture of lava was changed.
* If a pig, cow, or chicken is killed by lava, they will drop cooked food instead of raw food (e.g. cow drops steak instead of raw beef) if the item manages to avoid getting burnt.
* In *Minecraft: Bedrock Edition*, there's a 0.5% chance that lava can spawn by pools.
* On *Pocket Edition*, the texture of lava changed after version 0.7.0.
* Zombie pigmen, blazes, wither skeletons, and ghasts are invulnerable to damage caused by lava, so they will not catch on fire by swimming in it.
* As with water, if lava is above a solid block, droplets can be seen dripping from the bottom of the block. These droplets cannot harm a player and serve as a good indicator of the presence of lava above the player.
* Lava is one of the common causes of death in mining.
* Players can now place lava on cauldrons, but it will not deal the same damage unlike its uncontained counterpart and will only deal as much damage as if a player is standing on fire.
* When a player is standing on a soul sand block adjacent to lava, the player may catch on fire.

## Gallery

 File:LavaCurrent.png