POTION BENEFICIAL Present since 1.14 or earlier

Potion of Healing how to brew it in Minecraft

A Potion of Healing restores health instantly: 2 hearts at level I, 4 hearts at level II. It is your emergency button in a fight, and thrown as a splash potion it also becomes a weapon against undead mobs, which it hurts instead of healing.

Brew it step by step

Put Blaze Powder in the fuel slot and up to 3 bottles at the bottom, then add each ingredient at the top.

01 + → Awkward PotionNether Wart + Water Bottle
02 + → Potion of HealingGlistering Melon Slice + Awkward Potion
+ + → OptionalPotion of Healing IIGlowstone Dust · Level II, shorter · Instant
+ + → OptionalSplash PotionGunpowder · Throwable
+ + → OptionalLingering PotionDragon's Breath · Leaves a cloud, base for Tipped Arrows

// Fuel: Blaze Powder

At a glance

Effect: Instant Health
Duration: Instant
With Redstone: —
Level II: Instant
Key ingredient: Glistering Melon Slice

All variants and durations

Variant	Normal	With Redstone	Level II
Potion	Instant	—	Instant
Splash Potion	Instant	—	Instant
Lingering Potion	Instant	—	Instant
Tipped Arrow	Instant	—	Instant

■ Normal · ■ With Redstone · Lingering = ¼ of the duration, Tipped Arrow = ⅛

What Instant Health does

BeneficialInstant Health

Heals 4 health points (2 hearts) instantly, doubled at each level. It hurts undead mobs instead.

Commands

Potion/give →

/give @s minecraft:potion[potion_contents={potion:"minecraft:healing"}]

Splash Potion/give →

/give @s minecraft:splash_potion[potion_contents={potion:"minecraft:healing"}]

Lingering Potion/give →

/give @s minecraft:lingering_potion[potion_contents={potion:"minecraft:healing"}]

Healing or Regeneration?

Healing gives everything at once, which is what you want when you are about to die. A Potion of Regeneration heals more in total over its duration, but slowly, so it suits long fights better than last-second saves. Many players carry both: Regeneration before the fight, Healing when things go wrong.

Drink or throw?

Drinking takes a moment, during which you are still taking hits. A splash potion thrown at your own feet acts the instant it lands, so in a hectic fight or in PvP, splash Healing II is the faster heal. It also heals friends and pets caught in the splash, such as a Wolf in trouble.

A weapon against the undead

For undead mobs, Healing and Harming are swapped. Splash Healing deals damage to Zombies, skeletons, Phantoms and the Wither, while Harming would heal them. Against a crowd of zombies during a raid on your base, a few splash Healing II potions clear the front line.

Pitfalls

Undead mounts. A Skeleton Horse or a Zombie Horse is undead too: a splash Healing near it hurts it.
No Redstone version. An instant effect has no duration to extend. Only Glowstone (level II) makes it stronger.
It is the base for Harming. A Fermented Spider Eye added by mistake turns your healing stock into a Potion of Harming.

Getting Glistering Melon Slices

A Glistering Melon Slice is a Melon Slice surrounded by eight Gold Nuggets. Master farmer villagers sell them ready-made. The ships moored next to End Cities also hold brewing stands with Healing II potions already inside.

✓ Checked in Java Edition 26.3 · updated 1 November 2026