Minecraft: Depth Strider Enchantment Explained

Exploring the immense biome diversity in Minecraft makes you eventually search for all sorts of different equipment. Be it more effective weapons or tools that can gather certain types of ores, your arsenal always needs some innovation. Enchantments are some of the best upgrades you can get, and Depth Strider is one of them.

As you may get from its name, this enchantment is focused on exploring the bottom of the sea without facing all penalties directly. Here’s exactly what it does and why you should get at least a pair of boots or two enchanted with it in Minecraft.

How Does the Depth Strider Enchantment Work in Minecraft?

Introduced in the 1.8 updates, the Depth Strider enchantment can be added to boots and increases your movement speed while underwater. As you’ve probably noticed by now, you can’t walk underwater at the same speed you usually do on the surface, but this enchantment makes things a little bit more equal on both terrains.

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Each enchantment level will remove one-third of the move speed penalty underwater, so +3 Depth Strider boots let you traverse through the seas at the same speed you walk on the lands. Since there’s no real benefit from further enchantments past three, don’t bother with trying that.

How to Get the Depth Strider Enchantment

You can apply Depth Strider to your boots by heading into an Enchantment Table just like you would do with other regular enchantments. Alternatively, Anvils can also do the job, as well as a librarian villager NPC, if you happen to find one of these. Make sure to bring some Lapis Lazuli (or Emeralds if using the NPC) as they’re your “payment” currency for the enchantment, as well as some Experience Points.

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Depth Strider cannot be applied alongside Frost Walker (having both is quite counterintuitive too) but can be combined with the Dolphin’s Grace if you happen to swim nearby one of them. This is probably the fastest underwater speed you can get, so don’t miss that chance. You can’t be late for trying out all of the new features introduced in this patch, such as the Sniffers.