I can’t find any Nether fortress: what should I do?

Updated to 1.20

Sooner or later, a trip in the Nether is necessary in every Minecraft run. Otherwise it would be impossible to brew potions, to go to the End and much much more. Nether Fortresses are one of the main attractions there, and sometimes it can be frustrting to spend hours in the Nether without finding one.

But don’t worry, in the Nether there are always plenty of Fortresses, we just need to follow a couple of “guidelines”. Let’s see them all.

cant find nether fortress

Where not to look

First and foremost, keep in mind that Nether Fortress cannot spawn where a Bastion Remnant is. So if you see a Bastion Remnant, you may want to look somewhere else.

remnant bastion
This is how a Remnant Bastion looks like

Increase render distance

The first tip that you should follow is increasing you render distance. This way you will be able to see farther away and you will not need to have a Nether Fortress one inch from your nose in order to be able to see it.

To increase the render distance, go to the Option menu. Then go to Video Settings and put the render distance to its maximum value of 32.

minecraft render distance

Potion of Night Vision

The Nether is very dark and by using the Potion of Night Vision you will be able, once again, to see better.

If you don’t know how to brew potions, you can check the article Everything about Underwater Breathing Potion. In this article the brewing process is described step by step. You will just need to use a different recipe.

To brew a Nightvision Potion you will need to put together an Awkward Potion and a Golden Carrot (instead of the Pufferfish needed for the Underwater Breathing Potion).

To craft a Golden Carrot you will need 1 Gold Ingot and 1 Carrot. First you need to turn the Golden Ingot into 9 Golden Nuggets.

golden nugget recipe

Then Put 8 Golden Nuggets with the Carrot in the Crafting Table.

golden carrot recipe

Then you can use the Golden Carrot to brew the potion.

minecraft potion of night vision

Head towards positive X-axis

Many players noted how Nether Fortresses tend to spawn in long segments aligned with the Z axis (north/south). This means that if you are moving in that direction, it will be more difficult to find one.

If you move along the X axis (East/West) you will have more chances to run into Nether Fortresses.

x axis nether

To see on which axis you are moving, you just need to press F3. This way, you will be able to see your coordinates on the left of the screen. All you have to do then is to move in a way that makes the X value change.

minecraft coordinates

If you already found one Nether Fortress

If you already are in a Nether Fortress and you want to find another one, then your best bet is to move on the Z axis. That’s because Nether Fortresses spawn in line, aligned on the Z axis.

nether z axis

Bridge over lava ocean

Whenever you find yourself in front of a Lava ocean, try to look up. If there is a bridge over this ocean it will be very easy to see.

minecraft bridge over lava ocean

Commands

If you tried all the above and still can’t find one, your last chance is to use the commands (if you have the Cheats turned on). You just need to open the commands and type:

/locate structure fortress

And you’ll see a message appearing with the coordinates ot the closest Fortress.

Now what you have to do to get there is just closing the gap between your coordinates and the coordinates of this Fortress you want to go to.


Conclusions

This is all you need to know to find a Nether Fortress. Follow all the tips shared here, particularly the one about the X axis, and you will find plenty of them. Thank you very much for reading the article this far and I hope I’ll see you again around here. See you and take care!

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