What is the ominous bottle in Minecraft?

What is the ominous bottle in Minecraft, where is it found, and what does it do? The 1.21 update brought an overhaul to the Bad Omen status effect, introducing the ominous bottle to induce this effect in players upon consumption. While that might sound bad at face value, the Bad Omen effect has some interesting new applications that can be utilized with the help of the ominous bottle.

Moreover, the fact that Bad Omen can only be triggered by consuming an ominous bottle gives players finer control over when to use the effect to their advantage. Read below to learn more about the ominous bottle in Minecraft.

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What do you need to know about the ominous bottle in Minecraft?

Bad Omen with its new icon after consuming an ominous bottle in Minecraft (Image via Mojang)

At one point in time, Minecraft's Bad Omen status effect was activated by killing pillager captains. While the effect was active, players who entered a village would trigger a pillager raid. This changed substantially, and Bad Omen now works differently and can be activated by consuming ominous bottles, providing the ability to choose when players incur the Bad Omen effect.

Ominous bottles can be found in two ways. Players can obtain them in trial chamber structures by using trial keys to unlock vault blocks, which can provide them as a reward item. Otherwise, fans will have to kill a pillager raid captain outside of a raid, where the mob will then drop the bottle. Once consumed, an ominous bottle will bestow the Bad Omen effect for an hour and 40 minutes.

Once Bad Omen is active, players can head to a village to trigger a raid omen, activating a pillager raid in the village after 30 seconds. Meanwhile, players with Bad Omen active who are near a trial spawner will activate a trial omen, turning trial spawners into ominous trial spawners. These spawners produce hostile mobs that wear equipment and provide greater rewards.

Ominous trial spawners in Minecraft (Image via Mojang)

The rewards included in Minecraft's ominous trial spawners include ominous trial keys. These keys can open ominous vaults, which are harder to find in trial chambers but possess better rewards than standard vault blocks.

There are five variations of ominous bottles, one for each level of the Bad Omen effect. They can be stacked up to 64 bottles in a single item slot, and when a trial omen is activated, it lasts for fifteen minutes multiplied by the Bad Omen level. When a trial omen activates, ominous trial spawners will take on a different appearance and fire out projectiles and potions in addition to spawning mobs.

Overall, ominous bottles are a way to take risks in the game for the promise of rewards. Whether that means being able to battle and loot/farm pillager raids or collect higher quality items from trial chambers, the ominous bottle puts the decision in the hands of the players.