How to make candles in Minecraft 1.18

Candles are a new light source added to Minecraft as part of the Caves and Cliffs update. It was released in early 2021 as the first part of the update and quickly became popular amongst players. This is a new light source apart from torches, lanterns, and others that players can use.

With the addition of these items, players can now create moody lighting and a cozier ambiance. These were initially slated to be added with the Deep Dark biome, but they were released early as the new biome was pushed forward to the next update.

Players will need certain types of items to craft candles, or they can directly obtain them from certain places in the game. Here's how players can do that.

Ways to make candles in Minecraft 1.18

Items to have and crafting recipe

Although players can easily make light sources like torches with just sticks and coal, candles are slightly tricky to craft, especially for new players. To make them, players will need strings and honeycombs. Strings can be found in tripwires in several structures or from killing spiders, while honeycomb can be obtained from beehives. However, this will anger the bees, and they will become hostile toward the player.

Once players have both of these items, they can simply use the crafting table and put string on top of honeycomb to obtain a normal version of a candle. This will be light yellowish in color due to the honeycomb. Players can further combine candles with different dyes to craft colored versions of them. As there are 16 types of dyes in the game, players can make 16 different candles, plus one normal version.

Natural generation in future updates

As of now, these items can only be obtained by crafting them manually. However, in the upcoming The Wild Update, they will naturally generate in the new Ancient Cities structures in the Deep Dark Biome. It will be one of the biggest structures ever to be introduced in the game and will mostly be lit with soul lanterns and candles.

How to light and use them

A single stick can be placed on a cake (Image via Minecraft)

Once the item is crafted, it can be placed on any flat block and used. Each block can accommodate four candles, and their arrangements will change accordingly. A single candle emits a light level of three, meaning four of them will emit a light level of 12 if placed on a single block. A single candle can even be placed on a cake.

They can be lit with flint and steel (Image via Minecraft)

Players can light them using flint and steel, firecharges, flaming arrows, etc. In Bedrock Edition, players can even light it with the fire aspect enchanted sword. They can be extinguished with water.