What do horses eat in Minecraft?

Like tamed wolves in Minecraft, horses are companion mobs that players can take with them to explore this title's vast and blocky world. To restore their health and farm them, it is important to know what these mobs eat. Unlike other farm animals such as cows or pigs, horses are fed for both health revival and for breeding.

Here’s everything you need to know about feeding the horses in the game.

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What do horses eat in Minecraft?

Horses in Minecraft eat a range of different food items. They consume wheat, bale, golden carrots, golden apples, normal apples, and even sugar. All these food items can be used to revive a horse’s health if it has taken damage.

While the mob can be fed any of these consumables, each has a different degree of effect on it. Some items can be used to feed and breed horses, while others can only regenerate their health. Let’s start with a basic food item for horses and make our way to the best one in Minecraft:

Sugar: This is the simplest food item for horses, and you can feed it to them using your hands. It gives the creature 1 health point and increases the temper to 3 points. The latter improves your chances of taming a horse. Sugar cannot be used to breed this mob but speeds up the growth of baby horses by 30 seconds.

Wheat: It can be grown in abundance and is a great food item for horses. Wheat increases their health by 2 health points and temper by 3. This item cannot be used to breed them and speeds up a baby horse’s growth by 20 seconds.

Apples: Apples increase the horse’s health point by 3 and temper by 3 as well. They speed up the baby horse’s growth by a full minute. Apples cannot be used to breed horses.

All the food items horses can eat in Minecraft (Image via Mojang Studios)

Golden carrots: Horses can only be fed golden carrots. Golden carrots increase their health by 4 points and temper by 5 points. They also speed up a baby horse’s growth by one minute, but unlike apples, golden carrots can be used to breed horses. Giving two horses golden carrots will produce a baby horse.

Golden apples: Like golden carrots, golden apples can also be used to breed horses, and it increases their health by a massive 10 points. Golden apples also speed up a baby horse’s growth by 4 minutes.

Hay bale blocks: The final food item that can be fed to a horse is the hay bale block. However, unlike the other items, the hay bale block cannot be directly fed to the horses. Players need to keep the hay bales in the horse stable. Horses automatically feed on it over time. Hay bales add a staggering 20 health points to the horses and increase the growth speed of baby horses by three minutes.