How to download Minecraft 21W06A Caves snapshot

Minecraft Java Edition's snapshots are a great way to gauge just what the game has in store for players later down the like.

Snapshots are essentially a testing-version of planned updates in Minecraft Java Edition that the developers use as a way to address and gather feedback directly from the community.

Games like Minecraft, which are continuously evolving with the times, rely heavily on community feedback in order to craft better features and functionality for the game. Snapshots are a great way to garner community feedback as well as provide players with exciting new content.

The latest snapshot, 21W06A, seeks to add a few neat elements to Minecraft and round out the "caves" aspect of the "Caves and Cliffs" update for the game.

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Downloading Minecraft 21W06A Caves snapshot

To download the latest snapshot, simply follow these steps:

1. Open the Minecraft Launcher.
2. Select the "Installations" tab.
3. Toggle "Enable Snapshots."

Here are some of the new additions as part of the Minecraft 21W06A snapshot in the Java Edition:

New features in 21W06A

• Added noise caves and aquifers

Noise Caves and Aquifers

• Noise caves are a new way of generating caves, providing more natural variety. They can get really huge sometimes.
• Noise caves come in two flavors:
• Cheese caves. Like the holes in swiss cheese. These often form caverns of various sizes.
• Spaghetti caves. Long squiggly tunnels, sometimes wide like tagliatelle.
• No, they aren’t loud. The “noise” part of noise caves is a technical term and has nothing to do with sound.
• The old cave carvers and canyons still generate, combining with the noise caves to form interesting cave systems.
• As with carvers, when noise caves intersect the surface, they form cave entrances.
• An aquifer is an area with a local water level, independent of sea level. Aquifers are used during world generation to generate bodies of water inside noise caves. This sometimes results in large underground lakes.
• For now, aquifers are only used below y31. This means all noise caves between y31 and sea level (y63) will be flooded with water, and noise cave entrances will essentially be lakes. This will be fixed later.
• Magma sometimes generates at the bottom of underground bodies of water.
• Underwater cave carvers and underwater canyons have been removed since aquifers are used to generate water in caves instead.

For a full list of changes, head to Minecraft's official website for complete patch notes (link here).