A living cross-section of the world, drawn from the game's real worldgen odds. Drag to set your mining depth, click an ore column to inspect it.
Climb a mountain: emerald only generates in mountain biomes and gets denser with altitude, peaking around Y 232.
100%Y 232, mountain biomes only. Every figure on this page is read from the 26.3 worldgen files the game itself ships, so it reflects what actually generates rather than a community estimate.
Emeralds are the most location-dependent ore in the game. They generate in ten biomes, all of them mountain terrain: Jagged Peaks, Frozen Peaks, Stony Peaks, Snowy Slopes, Grove, Meadow, Windswept Forest, Cherry Grove and two related windswept variants. Outside those, the ore does not exist at any depth.
Inside them, the batch is a triangle from Y -16 up to Y 480 peaking at Y 232, attempting 100 veins per chunk. That count is the highest of any ore in the game, which sounds enormous until you look at the vein size: 3. Emerald veins are usually a single block.
So the honest advice is that mining emeralds is rarely worth the time. Villager trading produces them far faster than any tunnel. If you do want to mine them, get high inside a peaks biome and strip exposed stone near Y 232.
Minecraft places ore in separate batches, each with its own count, height range and vein size. A discard value above zero means the game throws away veins that would touch open air, which is what decides whether caving or tunnelling is the better approach.
| Batch | Veins/chunk | Range | Vein size | Air discard |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ore_emerald10 mountain biomes only | 100 | triangle Y -16 to 480, peak Y 232 | 3 | none |
Emerald attempts 100 veins per chunk, more than any other ore, with a vein size of 3. In practice that means scattered single blocks rather than clusters, and only inside the ten mountain biomes that place the feature at all.
The peak level differs for each ore, and a few of them share a band closely enough to mine on one trip. The full interactive chart is on the ore distribution hub.
| Ore | Best Y level |
|---|---|
| diamonds | Y -59 |
| netherite | Y 15 |
| iron | Y 16 underground, Y 232 in mountains |
| coal | Y 96, or anything above Y 136 |
| gold | Y -16, or anywhere in a badlands |
| redstone | Y -59 |
| lapis lazuli | Y 0 |
| copper | Y 48 |
| emeralds | Y 232, mountain biomes only |
| nether quartz | Any level from Y 10 to 117 |
| nether gold | Any level from Y 10 to 117 |
Y 232, inside a mountain biome. The batch runs from Y -16 to Y 480 but peaks sharply at 232.
Ten mountain biomes: Jagged Peaks, Frozen Peaks, Stony Peaks, Snowy Slopes, Grove, Meadow, Windswept Forest, Cherry Grove and the windswept variants. No other biome generates emerald ore.
The feature's vein size is 3, the smallest in the game, and the shape rarely fills completely. Single blocks are the normal result.
Usually not. Trading with villagers produces emeralds much faster than mining, even in a peaks biome at the optimal level.
Related ore levels:
