Minecraft Survival vs Minecraft Hardcore: What’s the main difference?

Minecraft has many different ways to play. Survival, Hardcore, Creative, Adventure, and many more. They're all reasonably diverse, which gives the game a ton of variety.

Two of the most popular modes that the game offers are Survival and Hardcore. The vast majority of players consistently play Survival more than any other mode, but Hardcore is extremely popular, too. This article will put light on the differences between the two modes.

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The primary difference between Minecraft Hardcore and Survival is the "No Respawn" system

In Minecraft survival, death is not the end. Sometimes it's the end of the items players had with them before dying or the end of a mining trip, but generally, it's not the end of the game. Players will respawn at their bed or the spawn point for the world.

This is not the case in Hardcore mode, which is the principal difference between the two modes. In Hardcore mode, death ends the player's journey in a particular in-game world, be it from hitting the ground too hard, being slain by a zombie, or trying to swim in lava.

Players have two options when they die in Hardcore mode. The first is to spectate the world, and the second is to return to the title screen, never getting back on the world. There is no respawn option; It's over once a player dies.

That makes it significantly different than Survival. In Survival, players don't want to die because they'll lose their XP and items, whereas, in Hardcore mode, players cannot die, or it signals the end of a world they've likely spent a lot of time working on.

This makes the game a lot more challenging. The game is hard enough to thrive in, but it's much harder with danger at every turn, and every drop off a hillside might represent the end of the game.

Death is the end of the road in Hardcore mode (Image via Mojang)

Every night might bring in a hostile mob that could be the last one players face. The main difference in Hardcore is that every part of the game is significantly more dangerous.