How to change villager professions in Minecraft

Minecraft villagers have their own professions, but these positions aren't necessarily permanent. Players can make their villagers take up a different job. Villager professions are attached to their job site blocks, so they remain unemployed without access to these blocks.

Removing a job site block will also remove its connected villager's profession. However, if another job site block is within roughly 48 blocks of the newly unemployed villager, they will attempt to claim it and find new employment.

---

Minecraft: Changing villager professions and knowing job site blocks

With so many villager job site blocks, having job variety can help create a thriving village economy (Image via Mojang).

As of Minecraft 1.17.1, the following blocks assign specific professions to unemployed villagers:

• Unemployed - None
• Nitwit - None
• Armorer - Blast Furnace blocks
• Butcher - Smoker Blocks
• Cartographer - Cartography Table blocks
• Cleric - Brewing stands
• Farmer - Composter blocks
• Fisherman - Barrel blocks
• Fletcher - Fletching table blocks
• Leatherworker - Cauldron blocks
• Librarian - Lecterns
• Mason/Stone Masion - Stonecutters
• Shepherd - Loom blocks
• Toolsmith - Smithing table blocks
• Weaponsmith - Grindstones

It is important to note that Nitwit villagers, who wear green tops, are unable to trade, gather around bells, or acquire any professions.

For Minecraft players who want to change a villager's profession, they simply have to destroy their job site block. The villager won't be pleased with it initially, but they will then search out another nearby block. This means all players have to do is place a new job site block where the villager can access it.

It should be noted that players should also remove the job site blocks at a specific time of day; otherwise, the villagers may keep their profession. Specifically, villagers must remove their job site blocks between 8 am (2,000 game ticks after the start of a day) and 3 pm (9,000 ticks) since this is the villagers' scheduled workday timeframe.

As long as the unemployed villager claims the block before others, their profession will change successfully. This can be repeated as many times as the player wants.

It's worth noting, however, that a villager's progress in a given profession is preserved when it changes. In other words, players cannot change the profession of a villager once the two parties have engaged in trading. Novice-level or unemployed villagers are the only ones who can have their profession altered.