Minecraft commands and cheats guide: How to use commands

Since Minecraft is a sandbox game, almost everything about it can be changed. From changing the entire game's textures to adding and removing gameplay features and more, everything can be done. Though these things are usually achieved with third-party packs and mods, there are a few features of the vanilla game that can be altered using certain commands.

Commands in this game are so powerful that they can even be considered cheats. Here is everything you need to know about commands and cheats.

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A complete guide to cheats and commands for Minecraft

What are commands and cheats?

Almost any feature in Minecraft can be altered using commands and cheats. (Image via Sportskeeda)

First, you must understand what Minecraft commands and cheats actually are. In the most basic terms, commands are lines of simple code that you can feed in order to alter, add, or remove certain in-game vanilla features. It starts with the main command, followed by several other inputs to further specify the entire compilation.

For example, there are commands that allow you to generate any structure anywhere, let you teleport, kill any entity or player, and more.

Cheats are just another word for these commands, simply because they are essentially breaking the conventional survival mode rules. They are also labeled as cheats in certain settings.

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How do I enable commands and cheats?

Commands can be activated in two different ways in Minecraft. (Image via Sportskeeda)

At first, new players will usually enter a survival mode world and normally play the game. Usually, commands can be entered in the chat box, which can be opened by typing '/'. However, they will soon notice that any of the commands will simply not work. This is because commands, or in the game's language, cheats, need to be activated in that particular world in order for it to work.

There are two ways of activating cheats in a world, depending on whether that world has been created or not.

If it is an existing world in Java Edition, you must first go to the pause menu, click on the 'Open to LAN' button, and then hit 'Activate Cheats'. Though this will create a LAN world that is discoverable by everyone on the same network, it will also give you the ability to use commands in that world.

If the world is in Bedrock Edition, you can open the world settings from the main menu, and toggle the 'Activate Cheats' button.

If you are creating a new world and want to use commands in it, simply toggle on the 'Activate Cheats' button before creating it.

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A list of all the commands

Here is a list of all the Minecraft commands that you can use. The first column shows the main command that can be used, and the second column gives a brief description of what it can do:

/?	An alternative of /help. Provides help for commands.
/ability	Grants or revokes a player ability.
/advancement	Gives, removes, or checks player advancements.
/alwaysday	An alternative of /daylock. Locks and unlocks the day-night cycle.
/attribute	Queries, adds, removes or sets an entity attribute.
/ban	Adds player to ban list.
/ban-ip	Adds IP address to ban list.
/banlist	Displays ban list.
/bossbar	Creates and modifies boss bars.
/camera	Switch to custom camera perspectives and fade the screen.
/camerashake	Used to enable a camera shaking effect.
/changesetting	Changes a setting on the dedicated server while it's running.
/clear	Clears items from player inventory.
/clearspawnpoint	Remove spawn points in the world.
/clone	Copies blocks from one place to another.
/connect	An alias of /wsserver. Attempts to connect to the web socket server.
/damage	Applies damage to the specified entities.
/data	Gets, merges, modifies and removes block entity and entity NBT data.
/datapack	Controls loaded data packs.
/daylock	An alias of /alwaysday. Locks and unlocks the day-night cycle.
/debug	Starts or stops a debugging session.
/dedicatedwsserver	Attempts to connect to a web socket server.
/defaultgamemode	Sets the default game mode.
/deop	Revokes operator status from a player.
/dialogue	Opens NPC dialogue for a player.
/difficulty	Sets the difficulty level of a world
/effect	Adds or removes status effects.
/enchant	Adds an enchantment to a player's selected item.
/event	Used to trigger an event on an entity.
/execute	Executes another command.
/experience	An alias of /xp. Adds or removes player experience.
/fill	Fills a region with a specific block.
/fillbiome	Fills a region with a specific biome.
/fog	Used for managing active fog settings for players.
/forceload	Forces chunks to constantly be loaded or not.
/function	Runs a function.
/gamemode	Sets a player's game mode.
/gamerule	Sets or queries a game rule value.
/gametest	To test the Game Test features.
/give	Gives an item to a player.
/help	An alias of /?. Provides help for commands.
/immutableworld	Allows setting immutable state of a world.
/item	Manipulates items in inventories.
/jfr	Starts or stops a JFR profiling.
/kick	Kicks a player off a server.
/kill	Kills entities (players, mobs, items, etc.).
/list	Lists players on the server.
/locate	Locates closest structure, biome, or point of interest.
/loot	Drops items from an inventory slot onto the ground.
/me	Displays a message about the sender.
/mobevent	Enables/disables a specified mob event.
/msg	An alias of /tell and /w. Displays a private message to other players.
/music	Allows the player to control playing music tracks.
/op	Grants operator status to a player.
/ops	An alias of /permission. Reloads and applies permissions.
/pardon	Removes entries from the ban list.
/pardon-ip	Removes entries from the ban list.
/particle	Creates particles.
/perf	Captures info and metrics about the game for 10 seconds.
/permission	An alias of /ops. Reloads and applies permissions.
/place	Used to place a configured feature, jigsaw, template, or structure at a given location.
/playanimation	Used to run a one-off animation.
/playsound	Plays a sound.
/publish	Opens single-player world to local network.
/recipe	Gives or takes player recipes.
/reload	Reloads loot tables, advancements, and functions from disk.
/remove	Removing agent.
/replaceitem	Replaces items in inventories.
/return	Control execution flow inside functions and change their return value.
/ride	Used to make entities ride other entities, stop entities from riding, make rides evict their riders, or summon rides or riders.
/save	Prepares a backup, queries its status, or resumes.
/save-all	Saves the server to disk.
/save-off	Disables automatic server saves.
/save-on	Enables automatic server saves.
/say	Displays a message to multiple players.
/schedule	Delays the execution of a function.
/scoreboard	Manages scoreboard objectives and players.
/script	Debugging option for script within the game
/scriptevent	Starts an event within the script with a specified message ID and payload
/seed	Displays the world seed.
/setblock	Changes a block to another block.
/setidletimeout	Sets the time before idle players are kicked.
/setmaxplayers	Sets the maximum number of players allowed to join.
/setworldspawn	Sets the world spawn.
/spawnpoint	Sets the spawn point for a player.
/spectate	Make one player in spectator mode spectate an entity.
/spreadplayers	Teleports entities to random locations.
/stop	Stops a server.
/stopsound	Stops a sound.
/structure	Used to save and load structures without having to use structure blocks items in inventories.
/summon	Summons an entity.
/tag	Controls entity tags.
/team	Controls teams.
/teammsg	An alias of /tm. Specifies the message to send to team.
/teleport	An alias of /tp. Teleports entities.
/tell	An alias of /msg and /w. Displays a private message to other players.
/tellraw	Displays a JSON message to players.
/testfor	Counts entities matching specified conditions.
/testforblock	Tests whether a block is in a location.
/testforblocks	Tests whether the blocks in two regions match.
/tickingarea	Add, remove, or list ticking areas.
/time	Changes or queries the world's game time.
/title	Manages screen titles.
/titleraw	Controls screen titles with JSON messages.
/tm	An alias of /teammsg. Specifies the message to send to team.
/toggledownfall	Toggles the weather.
/tp	An alias of /teleport. Teleports entities.
/trigger	Sets a trigger to be activated.
/volumearea	Add, remove, or list volume areas.
/w	An alias of /tell and /msg. Displays a private message to other players.
/wb	An alias of /worldbuilder. Ability to edit restricted blocks.
/weather	Sets the weather.
/whitelist	Manages server whitelist.
/worldborder	Manages the world border.
/worldbuilder	An alias of /wb. Ability to edit restricted blocks.
/wsserver	An alias of /connect. Attempts to connect to the web socket server.
/xp	An alias of /experience‌[Java Edition only]. Adds or removes player experience.

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Inputs after the command

Remember, almost all the commands need more specific inputs after them to work correctly. Thankfully, the game will automatically show the next input you could enter in order to use the command correctly.

After the main command, a list will pop up, showing all the possible inputs. Hence, inputting commands in Minecraft is quite simple once you learn it and get into the groove.