How to make ores glow in Minecraft

Ore blocks in Minecraft are crucial for collecting materials to use in your builds. However, finding certain blocks underground can be slightly difficult due to the low light level.

Fortunately, there are different ways to improve the visibility of ore blocks in Minecraft by making them glow. Typically, this is achieved through the use of texture packs and/or shaders. Players can download these in various ways, but some are much easier to install than others. One good example is through the use of a shader-compatible frontend like Optifine.

With Optifine and a set of shaders, you can install several compatible texture packs to make your ores far more recognizable, even from a distance.

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Installing Optifine and a Glowing Ore texture pack in Minecraft

The Emissive Ores texture pack for Minecraft 1.19.2 (Image via Xoddie/Planet Minecraft)

Before players start downloading texture packs for their ores, they'll first want to install Optifine or a similar shader first. Shaders ensure that the textures installed by texture packs give off the necessary glow when activated, and it may not work correctly otherwise.

Fortunately, installing shaders and texture packs in Minecraft is easier than it has ever been, and you'll have exactly what you need to make glowing ores in a short period of time.

Installing Optifine in Version 1.19

1. Head to Optifine's official site and select its download tab. Here, you'll want to search for the game version that's compatible with your current version. Typically, this would mean version 1.19 and above.
2. Download the .jar file in a location that you can access easily like your Downloads folder or Desktop. Once it completes, open the .jar file. This should boot up an installation wizard that will attempt to find your root .minecraft folder.
3. Ensure that the file path in the installer is correct, and then press the install button.
4. Once the installation is complete, you can open your game option and select Optifine's build on the left side of the Play button. However, without a texture pack installed, you won't have glowing ores just yet.

Installing a Glow Texture Pack in Version 1.19

1. Search online for a texture pack that suits the ore appearance you're looking for. Some good examples include Visible Ores on Planet Minecraft or Glowing Ores on CurseForge.
2. Download the texture pack you prefer. It should appear as a .zip file once it's downloaded.
3. Open the game, select options, then resource packs, and then "open resource pack folder."
4. With your resource pack folder open, click/drag or cut/paste the texture pack's .zip file into the resource pack folder.
5. Click on the 'Done' button, and then return to the resource packs screen.
6. Your new texture pack should appear in the left-hand window. Hover over the pack and click on the arrow pointing to the right. It should now load into the game when you start it off. Select the 'Done' button and return to the main menu.

From there, you should be able to open the game in either singleplayer or multiplayer and enjoy your new texture pack with glowing ores. However, if you notice any framerate drops, you may need to open your in-game settings and tweak Optifine's settings to reduce the resource load on your CPU and GPU.