How to Turn a Dungeon Spawner into an XP Farm

A dungeon spawner is the fastest route to a working XP farm in a new world. You do not need the End, a fortress, or an ocean monument — just a spawner, some blocks, and about an hour. It is the natural first farm on this list.

Finding a spawner

Spawners sit in dungeons: small cobblestone-and-mossy-cobblestone rooms with one or two chests, found underground at any depth. The spawner is the cage-like block in the centre with a tiny spinning mob inside, which tells you what it produces.

You will also find spawners in mineshafts (cave spider) and other structures, but dungeon zombie and skeleton spawners are the ones you want.

Look for them while mining. Listening helps — a cluster of mob sounds behind a wall usually means a dungeon. Our Y-level guide covers where you will be digging anyway.

Which spawner is best

• Skeleton — the best all-round choice. Bones for bone meal, arrows in bulk, and good XP. Bone meal alone is worth it for crop farming.
• Zombie — good XP, rotten flesh which Cleric villagers buy for emeralds, and occasional iron and armour.
• Spider — awkward. Spiders climb walls, which breaks most simple designs. Skip it unless you specifically want string.
• Cave spider (mineshafts) — high XP rates but they are poisonous and fit through small gaps. Not a first project.

How spawners work

A spawner produces mobs when a player is within 16 blocks of it. That is the single most important number in this build, because it sets where you have to stand.

It also requires darkness and space for the mob to appear. Which means two things follow immediately:

• Light stops it. Never light the spawner room itself, or nothing spawns.
• Your AFK spot must be within 16 blocks of the spawner, while your kill point can be further along.

The build

1. 1.Secure the dungeon. Light the corridors around it so you can work safely, and place a torch on the spawner itself temporarily to stop spawns while you build. Remove it at the end.
2. 2.Hollow out the room. Clear a space around the spawner — roughly 9x9 with the spawner at the centre, and a few blocks of headroom — so mobs have somewhere to appear.
3. 3.Build water channels. Water source blocks at the outer corners flowing toward a central point. Mobs spawn, get pushed by the flow, and collect in one place. This is the Overworld, so unlike a gold farm you have water available — use it.
4. 4.Drop them. Channel the flow into a shaft. A drop of around 22 blocks leaves most mobs at low health without killing them, so you get the XP from finishing them yourself.
5. 5.Build the kill slot. A one-block gap at the bottom you can strike through while they cannot reach you.
6. 6.Hoppers into a chest for bones, arrows and flesh.
7. 7.Remove the torch from the spawner.

Standing in the right place

This trips people up. You must be within 16 blocks of the spawner for it to produce mobs, but you want to be safe at the kill point. In practice this means the drop shaft should be short enough that the bottom is still inside that radius — or you build the kill slot to one side rather than far below.

If mobs stop spawning while you stand at the kill point, you are too far away. Move the kill chamber closer.

What you get

• Experience for enchanting and anvil work. Our anvil and Mending guide explains how to spend levels efficiently.
• Bones from skeletons, which make bone meal — the fastest way to grow crops and trees.
• Arrows in quantity from skeletons.
• Rotten flesh from zombies, which Cleric villagers buy.
• Occasional armour and tools, sometimes enchanted.

Where it sits among the farms

A spawner farm is the best XP-per-effort farm in the early game and it stays useful indefinitely. It is slower than an enderman farm or a guardian farm, but those require reaching the End or clearing an ocean monument, which are much later projects.

Build this first. Use the levels to enchant proper gear. Then take that gear and build the bigger farms.

A note on safety while building

You are working next to an active mob spawner in a dark room. Put a torch on the spawner before you start digging — it stops production entirely while you build, and removing it at the end switches the farm on. Bring a shield and a decent sword anyway; dungeons are rarely empty when you find them.