What is a zombie horseman in Minecraft Mounts of Mayhem?

The Minecraft Live event revealed a lot about the upcoming features, including the release date for The Copper Age game drop. While fans were already excited for all the new copper items and tools, the developers have made things even better by revealing the fourth and final game drop of 2025: Mounts of Mayhem.

There are many interesting features in the Mounts of Mayhem game drop, such as a nautilus mob and a spear that brings new attack types. Another great addition is the introduction of the zombie horseman.

Here’s everything to know about the new jockey mob and how it can impact your Minecraft experience.

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Zombie horseman coming to Minecraft

Fighting a zombie horseman with a spear on a horseback will be interesting (Image via Mojang Studios)

A zombie horseman is a naturally spawning zombie riding a zombie horse. You might assume the undead horse to be a new addition, but these mobs have been a part of the blocky world since 2013. However, the only way they could be accessed was by using spawn eggs in Creative mode or using commands.

Mojang Studios has brought the zombie horse mob to Survival mode after more than a decade since its introduction. Here’s the interesting part: these mobs can spawn with a zombie holding a spear. Exploring the blocky world at night will become more dangerous, and the challenge of fighting these mobs will increase.

Another interesting aspect is that the zombie horses are not hostile, although only the zombies riding them are. Whether you can ride the zombie horses or not remains unknown. It will be interesting to see how Mojang Studios uses the zombie horse in helping players explore the world.

Since both zombies and zombie horses in Minecraft are undead mobs, they take damage in the sunlight. This means they will spawn at night, making night exploration even more difficult.

If the developers make it run faster than the player, it will introduce a new kind of threat. However, most jockey mobs in the game are not too fast, and the zombie horse will likely be very similar to them.

The addition of the zombie horseman should improve the Minecraft experience, as there is barely anything that really challenges players in the blocky world other than boss mobs, such as the Ender dragon, Wither, or the warden. Increasing the threat even for normal exploration will make players improve their combat skills and even learn to use the upcoming spear weapon.

The Copper Age update is scheduled to release on September 30, 2025, which means that the Mounts of Mayhem game drop will likely release towards the end of December this year.