What are the uses of bookshelves in Minecraft?

Though they may be nice to look at, Minecraft's bookshelves have a few uses that may not be readily apparent.

Primarily, bookshelf blocks are used to power up the potency of enchantments for nearby enchanting tables. If a table is within two blocks of a bookshelf, it will receive magical runes that float into the enchanting table's central book, improving the enchantment quality that a tool or piece of gear can receive.

Moreover, bookshelf blocks are a requisite component when crafting a lectern block. They can also be used to fuel furnaces in a pinch, although they don't perform particularly well as fuel in Minecraft.

---

Minecraft: How villagers interact with bookshelves and lecterns

In addition to enchantment buffs for players, villagers can also interact with bookshelves (Image via Mojang)

Minecraft's librarian villagers are currently the only mob that is known to have interactions with the actual bookshelf blocks themselves. However, when used to craft a lectern, the bookshelf's uses open up considerably.

Lecterns are used in Minecraft as a job site block for librarians. They also allow players in multiplayer to read a book written by another player as well as a book & quill.

Oddly enough, lecterns can even be used to generate a redstone current. Every time a page is turned, a lectern will temporarily emit a full-strength redstone signal. This means that lecterns can, in theory, be used in redstone machinery for whatever purposes deemed necessary.

Redstone comparators can also pick up on the turning of book pages on a lectern. The signal strength is doubled in Minecraft: Bedrock Edition due to the platform's capability of displaying two book pages at once.

Much like bookshelf blocks, lecterns can be placed into a smelter as a fuel source to smelt roughly one-and-a-half items before expiring. This is obviously not an economical choice, but it may be helpful in a difficult situation where no other fuel is available. Additionally, similar to barrels, placing a lectern or bookshelf under a note block can produce a bass sound when the note block is activated.

Although bookshelves don't have as many uses as some other blocks in Minecraft, it's entirely possible that more capabilities will be added for the well-known block. Mojang updates Minecraft consistently and is always creating new blocks and reworking existing ones.

---