Where is the iron ore level in Minecraft 1.19 update?

Iron ore is one of the more plentiful ores in Minecraft, but that doesn't mean it can't be tricky to locate at times. Despite being more widespread than other ores, iron still has specific areas where it can be found at higher concentrations than others.

After Minecraft's huge 1.18 Caves & Cliffs update, ores were redistributed to accommodate for the change in maximum height levels. This saw iron ore more widespread and located at high concentrations at certain elevations.

This hasn't changed since the 1.19 update, so players can still find large amounts of iron in the same locations. Players can find a detailed guide to these elevations below.

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Minecraft: The best height levels to find iron as of The Wild Update

Standard and deepslate iron ore in Minecraft (Image via Mojang)

As of Minecraft 1.19, iron ore can appear in two different iterations: A standard variant and also a deepslate variant that is slightly more difficult to break. Naturally, these can be found at varied locations depending on the elevation.

When broken, both variants still drop raw iron ore. However, there is an exception since players who break the blocks with a Silk Touch pickaxe will receive the ore block itself instead. Both the ore block and the raw ore can be smelted into iron ingots. This gives players a few options if they need to collect iron ore in a certain form.

After Minecraft 1.18's ore distribution, iron ore is concentrated at a few height levels. These ores generate in three "batches" with multiple "blobs" of the ore block clustered together.

In Java Edition, iron ore blobs are concentrated between height levels 128 and 320 for the first batch, most commonly appearing at Y=255. The second batch generates between levels -24 and 54, being the most prevalent around Y=15. The third batch is more widely scattered and found between height levels -63 and 64, with each level distributed evenly.

Bedrock Edition iron ore has a slightly different distribution. The first batch of ore can still be found from levels 128 to 320 but appears most often at Y=232. The second batch can be found at levels -24 to 56, being the most common at Y=16.

The third batch generates evenly between levels -63 and 72, so players should be able to find a few blobs of iron ore throughout this entire range, albeit not in as large quantities as previous batches.

When searching for iron ore, players can start by heading to the height levels with the highest ore concentrations and slowly working their way outwards. This should maximize the potential iron ore a player can collect from the mining process, as the first two batches of iron ore in both Java and Bedrock decline in concentration as players move away from the layer where the ore is most common.

Once those avenues have been exhausted, players can work on the third batch's even distribution if they need additional iron ore.