Can villagers breed underground in Minecraft?

Minecraft players can increase their count of villagers by breeding them, but doing so has some interesting requirements.

For starters, Minecraft villagers require a sufficient amount of food and available unclaimed beds to breed. These beds require at least two blocks of space above them.

Villagers also breed depending on the time of day, which leads to a particular question: Is it possible to breed villagers underground? The answer is a little complicated, as villagers need access to the sky to breed correctly.

However, the community has found a way to work around this restriction without punching holes in their caves or underground villages roofs.

---

Minecraft: How a villager breeder can allow villagers to breed and live underground

Villagers can't breed underground directly, but there are ways to amend this issue (Image via Mojang)

Put plainly, Minecraft villagers aren't intended to breed underground. They're primarily intended for above-ground locations such as villages or player-built structures.

However, Minecraft gamers in the community have addressed this through the use of a villager breeder. How does this work exactly? Essentially, the breeder breeds the villagers above ground before pushing the villagers through a tunneling mechanism and placing them underground so that players can utilize them.

This machine can also work in reverse, creating villagers partially underground and pushing the offspring to the surface.

This design may not be ideal for Minecraft users imposing a strict "no above-ground" policy, likely due to a challenge. However, they can also circumvent the villager breeding issue by placing sizable holes above the doors and beds of the villagers that find themselves underground.

The larger the holes that allow the sky and sun to shine through, the more doors they can place and the more villagers they can potentially breed underground. However, for essentially closed-off underground environments, the village breeder is likely the best bet.

If players are using the hole/skylight method, they'll still need to increase the hidden "willingness" stat of their villagers. This can be accomplished by creating a small farm underground, complete with a composting block.

Any unemployed villager will attempt to claim the block and become a farmer. Once users have a farmer underground, the villager will accrue and share food with their fellow villagers.

Once villagers have enough food in their personal inventory, they'll become willing to breed and do so as long as there are enough unclaimed beds. These beds (and the doors near them) will need skylights/holes to ensure that the offspring has a place to go once it spawns.