World

A world or level is an individual Minecraft "universe" which encompasses all blocks and entities in each dimension. Worlds can be accessed and edited through the world selection menu from the main menu and can be created with the "Create New World" button.

Worlds are split into three dimensions, which are in turn composed of blocks of various sizes, usually either cubic or composed of one or more cuboids, or of flat plane images, all of which are arranged in a Euclidean grid. Fluids, entities and particles also exist within these worlds, and certain locations of the world can possess biomes and different levels of light. Blocks and entities can possess other attributes such as items, effects and, by extension, enchantments. The terrain of world is procedurally generated before players can modify blocks and entities within. Various structures and features can also generate inside worlds, sometimes containing chests with loot inside.

A player can manage settings for gameplay and world generation before world creation in the Create New World screen, and after creation through game rules and the edit world screen.‌^{[BE only]} Worlds can be generated with several world types, and there are generation options for the world seed and the bonus chest. From the world options, the player can manage the world file, including duplicating, deleting, exporting (to transfer the world or upload to a server),‌^{[BE only]} and uploading to Realms. Worlds can be modified using resource packs, data packs,‌^{[JE only]} behavior packs,‌^{[BE only]} and experiments. World content can be created efficiently using projects in Bedrock Editor.

Minecraft Realms allows server-hosting and world storage online. Each Realm can store three worlds in slots and automatical backups or manual cloud saves,‌^{[BE only]} which can be accessed from any device by the Realm owner.

Each world is saved in its own separate folder in the .minecraft/saves folder. Files relating to chunks in the Overworld are stored in the dimensions/minecraft/overworld folder, Nether files are stored in the dimensions/minecraft/the_nether folder, and End files are stored in dimensions/minecraft/the_end. Each dimension has its own data, poi, and region folders that is stored in its directory.

Each world is saved in its own separate folder in the com.mojang/minecraftWorlds folder. This world folder can be compressed into a .zip file, which can be changed into a .mcworld file to tranfer the world. Exporting worlds on Windows devices automatically zips the world in a .mcworld file, which can be imported on non-console devices by opening the file with the Minecraft app, or using the import world feature in the Play screen.

Worlds can be managed in-game from the storage settings. Here, the player can select worlds to delete. It also shows unlisted worlds, which are not playable due to corruption or an error.

An average Bedrock Edition world, where the player explored around one thousand blocks in some directions, takes up around 100MB of storage. It increases when the player explores more chunks and when chunk updates are executed there; chunks that are generated for the render distance but stayed outside the simulation distance will be deleted after the session. When the device's storage is almost full, the player gets kicked from a world and can no longer play local worlds until storage is freed up.

Worlds can be synchronized with the Xbox cloud. There are three types of cloud storage in Minecraft:

• Realms Saves: All owners and administrators have access to storage on Realms. Worlds can be saved from the active slot to Saves, restored, or downloaded to local storage. Each Plus Realm has 10GB of storage, each Core Realm has 5GB.
  • In addition to this, the cloud stores the three world slots with each a limited amount of automatic backups.
• On Xbox consoles, game data can be synced with the Xbox cloud, the maximum storage depends on Game Pass subscriptions. Minecraft occasionally tries to synchronize all user data in com.mojang with the cloud.
• Currently in Minecraft Preview for Windows devices, worlds can be synced with the Xbox cloud as well. The player can select in the storage settings which worlds are synchronized with the cloud, and remove this at any time. Each player has a maximum storage of 4GB.
  • New worlds are synced automatically.

A world file can be converted to a world template to easily modify its contents, such as add-ons and additional languages for the world name, in order to let a player create a new world with data stored in the template.^[1] A world template uses the same directory structure as regular world files, with a few additional JSON files.

Issues relating to "World" are maintained on the bug tracker. Issues should be reported and viewed there.

• 👁 The world selection screen in Java Edition.
  
  The world selection screen in Java Edition.
• 👁 The world creation screen in Java Edition.
  
  The world creation screen in Java Edition.

• 👁 The "Worlds" tab of the "Play" menu
  
  The "Worlds" tab of the "Play" menu
• 👁 The "Create New World" screen
  
  The "Create New World" screen
• 👁 World selection on Realms
  
  World selection on Realms

• 👁 Default world thumbnail for new worlds and missing thumbnails in Ore UI
  
  Default world thumbnail for new worlds and missing thumbnails in Ore UI
• 👁 World thumbnail for cloud-saved worlds
  
  World thumbnail for cloud-saved worlds
• 👁 Default world thumbnail for new worlds and missing thumbnails in classic UI
  
  Default world thumbnail for new worlds and missing thumbnails in classic UI
• 👁 World thumbnail for unlisted worlds in the classic UI
  
  World thumbnail for unlisted worlds in the classic UI
• 👁 World thumbnail for new worlds in the Editor
  
  World thumbnail for new worlds in the Editor
• 👁 World thumbnail for flat worlds in the Editor
  
  World thumbnail for flat worlds in the Editor
• 👁 World thumbnail for void worlds in the Editor
  
  World thumbnail for void worlds in the Editor

• Anvil file format
• World type
• World size
• World border
• World boundary
• World generation
• Autosave