Iron is most common at Y 16 (and in mountains). Enter your seed and this Iron Finder maps iron ore at 91% accuracy on Java 26.2 and 85% on Bedrock 1.26.40 — best Y level, spawn range and where to find iron, on a visual map.
Also called: iron ore finder · iron ore tracker · iron locator
Quick answer: Iron is most common at Y 16 (and again near mountain peaks); it spawns from Y 320 down to Y −64. This Iron Finder marks iron ore from your seed on a visual map at 91% accuracy on Java 26.2 and 85% on Bedrock 1.26.40.
| Edition | Version | Best Y level | Spawn range | Finder accuracy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bedrock | 1.18 – 26.40 (current) | Y 16 | Y 320 to −64 | 85% |
| Java | 1.20.2 – 26.2 (current) | Y 16 | Y 320 to −64 | 91% |
Accuracy is the share of marked hotspots that really contain the ore in your world, shown as a plain number.
Iron generates almost everywhere from Y 320 down to Y −64, in two ways: small ore blobs at every level, plus large iron veins inside mountain and badlands biomes. Density is highest around Y 16 and again high up in the mountains. Enter your seed and the finder marks the chunks where iron is most likely exposed.
The best Y level for iron is Y 16 for underground branch mining — the low-altitude peak of its spawn curve. In mountain biomes the upper slopes (around Y 128–232) hold huge iron veins, so mining an exposed mountainside there can be even faster.
Bedrock uses the same Y range and the same Y 16 sweet spot as Java. The finder supports Bedrock 1.26.40 at 85% accuracy — the badge by the page title shows both editions' figures.
Giant iron veins generate at Y −8 to −60 — tuff-and-ore formations far larger than the ordinary iron blobs that peak at Y 16, with blocks of raw iron scattered through them. Both Java and Bedrock generate them, from the same seed, and the full seed map draws them as their own layer. One vein can run for dozens of blocks, so reaching one beats a long branch mine.
Y-levels, drop rates, smelting and recipes for Iron — straight from our Minecraft catalog, in both editions.
The Ore Finder reproduces Minecraft's own ore-placement maths from your world seed, entirely in your browser. It runs the same ore-distribution and cave-carving steps the game uses, then marks the chunks where diamonds, netherite and other ores are most likely to be exposed. Nothing is uploaded – your seed never leaves your device.
Where an ore ends up depends on the exact terrain and caves Minecraft carves around it, and no in-browser tool can rebuild every block the game places. We reproduce that terrain very closely, so a hotspot marked with a high percentage really contains the ore in your world around 85–91% of the time on Java, and 70–93% on Bedrock — the per-ore figure for the edition you picked is on the badge and in the table above. A few spots may have been carved away by a cave or shifted slightly, so treat the markers as very strong leads rather than a guarantee.
In the Overworld it finds diamond, iron, copper, gold, redstone, lapis lazuli and coal, and in the Nether it finds ancient debris (netherite). You search one ore at a time and can optionally limit the search to a specific Y level.
Diamonds get more common the deeper you dig, peaking around Y -59 in current versions (they generate between Y -64 and Y 16). The finder defaults to each ore's full spawn range, and you can tick 'limit to a specific Y level' to focus on the richest band – for diamonds, around Y -59 to -54.
It works on both Java and Bedrock Edition. On Java it covers modern versions, including 1.21 and the 26.x releases, which share the same ore-generation rules. Bedrock Edition is now supported as well – on 1.18 and newer it finds the Overworld ores (diamond, iron, copper, gold, redstone and lapis lazuli). The two editions use different world generators, so make sure you pick the edition your world was created in.
That is up to how you like to play. In single-player it is just a faster version of strip-mining for a diamond start. On multiplayer servers, check the rules first – some servers don't allow seed-based tools.
Diamond finder
Ancient Debris (Netherite) finder
Gold finder
Redstone finder
Copper finder
Lapis Lazuli finder
Coal finder