How to make and use maps in Minecraft

A map shows the land from above, with you as a white marker. Craft an Empty Map, use it and walk around to fill it in, then zoom, copy and lock it at a Cartography Table. This guide covers Java Edition 26.3; Bedrock Edition has extra map recipes.

Put 8 Paper around a Compass in a crafting table. You need:

• 9 Sugar Cane for 9 Paper (3 Sugar Cane give 3 Paper);
• 4 Iron Ingots and 1 Redstone Dust for the Compass.

No Compass yet? A Cartographer villager sells an Empty Map for 7 Emeralds at the Novice level, and buys 24 Paper for 1 Emerald.

Hold the Empty Map and use it. It becomes a Map at level 0, Scaling at 1:1: 128 by 128 blocks, 1 pixel per block. The map is not centered on you. The world is split into a fixed grid of map squares, and you get the square you stand in.

The land fills in while you hold the map, in either hand, and walk around. A map only updates in the dimension where it was made. Find the grid square that holds your position, at every zoom level:

Craft a Cartography Table from 2 Paper above 4 Planks of any wood. Put the map in the top slot and a Paper in the bottom slot, then take the zoomed map.

Each zoom gives a new, blank map that covers the old area and more: what you drew before is not carried over. Zoom first, then explore. A crafting table also zooms a map surrounded by 8 Paper, but uses 7 more Paper per level. Level 4 is the maximum.

• Copy: at the Cartography Table, a map and an Empty Map give 2 identical maps. In a crafting table, one map with 1 to 8 Empty Maps gives that many copies plus the original. Copies keep the same ID number and update together: give one to each teammate.
• Lock: a map and a Glass Pane give a locked copy, marked Locked. It never changes again. Lock a copy before you change an area, or to protect map art.

• Banners: place a banner inside the mapped area and use the map on it. A marker in the banner's color appears. Rename the banner on an Anvil first and its name shows on the map. Use the map on the banner again to remove the marker.
• Item Frames: a map placed in an Item Frame shows the frame's position as a green marker on that map.
• Map walls: maps of neighbouring grid squares, at the same level, line up exactly when you place them in Item Frames side by side.
• Off the map: when you leave the mapped area, your marker becomes a dot on the edge.

An explorer map shows the way to one structure, marked with its icon or a red X. A Cartographer sells them for Emeralds plus a Compass:

Cartographer level	Possible maps	Price
Apprentice	Village maps, Jungle Pyramid Map, Swamp Hut Map	8 Emeralds + Compass
Journeyman	Buried Trial Chambers Map	12 Emeralds + Compass
Journeyman	Ocean Monument Map	13 Emeralds + Compass
Master	Woodland Mansion Map	14 Emeralds + Compass

At each level a Cartographer offers 2 of the trades of that level, so you will not see every map on one villager. Village maps always lead to another village type than the Cartographer's own. Leveling up a villager is explained in villager trading.

Chests hold more maps:

• Buried Treasure Maps in the map chest of shipwrecks and in ocean ruins (see Buried Treasure);
• Abandoned Camp Maps, leading to another camp, in the chests of an Abandoned Camp;
• in the hidden chest of an abandoned camp: maps to an ancient city, a mineshaft, trial chambers, a desert or jungle pyramid, warm ocean ruins or a woodland mansion.

Explorer maps can be copied but not zoomed.