Minecraft 1.18 update: Experimental snapshots released so far

There are several new features that are set to arrive in Minecraft with the Caves & Cliffs Update Part 2. Players have been eagerly waiting for the update since the announcement of the new biomes and the Warden at Minecon 2020.

To make sure that a Minecraft update is stable, Mojang releases snapshots of the update so that interested players can test out new features and report any issues.

By installing beta versions, Bedrock Edition players can also try out upcoming features and report glitches and bugs.

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Experimental snapshots released for Minecraft 1.18 update

What are experimental snapshots?

Experimental snapshots are game versions that come out before a normal snapshot, and Mojang has released three of them for Minecraft version 1.18.

Players cannot install them directly from the Minecraft launcher. Interested players can learn how to install the latest experimental snapshot here.

To see Minecraft Skindex, click here.

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List of all experimental snapshots released for Minecraft 1.18 so far

Experimental Snapshot 1

Dripstone cave (Image via Minecraft)

This was the first-ever experimental snapshot that Mojang released for Minecraft 1.18. It has the following features and changes:

• Increased world height and depth to Y level 384 and -64, respectively.
• Added five new mountain sub biomes: lofty peaks, snowcapped peaks, grove, meadow, and snowy slopes.
• Added new cave biomes: Lush caves and Dripstone caves.
• Added new cave generations: Cheese, Spaghetti, and noodles.
• Added new ore distribution with larger veins.
• Natural variation in terrain shape and elevation, independently from biomes.
• Monsters now spawn in complete darkness only.
• Mountain, caves, and cave entrances have been integrated.

View the Minecraftwiki here.

Experimental Snapshot 2

Lush cave in Experimental Snapshot 2 (Image via Minecraft)

The second experimental snapshot for Minecraft 1.18 boasts the following features and changes:

• Biome placement was made less noisy and a bit larger. Microbiomes dotting the terrain are fewer in number.
• Cloud heights were increased from 128 to 192.
• Renamed: Mountains to extreme hills and gravelly mountains to gravelly hills.
• Beaches were made wider.
• Sheep can spawn in the meadows biome. The spawn rate for donkeys was decreased. The spawn rate for rabbits was increased.
• Blue orchids no longer generate in meadows.
• Swamps no longer generate in weird places.
• Added ice spikes and eroded badland biomes that were missing in the previous snapshot.
• Underground biomes will interfere less with surface biomes.
• Some peaks can rarely reach Y levels of 220-260.
• Large areas with flat terrains generate more often.
• Monsters can spawn in the new biome.
• Players can find emeralds and other infested stones in the new mountain biomes.
• Ores generate more frequently and in slightly larger veins.
• Most structures show up in the correct biome.
• The megacave entrances have been toned down a little bit and are less likely to go all the way down to the deepslate level.
• Cheese caves are less likely to intersect the surface as they have been made smaller.
• Sand and gravel generations have been changed so that the chances of these blocks falling right after the world generates are lower.
• Spawners can spawn zombies, skeletons, spiders, and cave spiders in light levels of 11.

Click here for Minecraft Beginners Guide.

Experimental Snapshot 3

This Minecraft snapshot was released on August 10. It had the following features and changes:

• To reduce temperature clashes, biome placement has been tweaked. They have also been tweaked to allow for more noisiness and diversity.
• Changes have been made to badlands to bring back red sand.
• Peak and meadows biomes are less likely to generate in flat, low-elevation areas.
• Cliffs in shattered terrain have been smoothed out.
• Stony peaks mountain biome has been added.
• Structures have been added to some of the mountain biomes. Villages can generate in meadows now.
• Beaches have been tweaked.
• Inland low-elevation areas are less likely to have flooded caves all over the place.
• Aquifers can go deeper and are more likely to connect with cave systems further down.
• Goat spawning has been fixed.
• Swamp biomes are less likely to overlap with cold or dry biomes.
• More variations of aquifers have been added.
• Grass will no longer generate underwater.
• Desert temples will spawn on the surface and not a fixed Y level.
• Spawn rates of mobs have been changed.
• Reduced the risk of river biome generating in dry mountain gorges.