Are you smelting your ingots efficiently?

Finally, you have a full stack of iron ready to be smelted into ingots. Just imagine the things you will be able to craft with it all! As you stare into the animated flames on the furnace you begin to wonder, “Is there more to life than coal? Are there other ways I can smelt my materials?” That’s where this list comes in, where we explore the benefits of several different Minecraft fuels to make your world run more efficiently

10. Sticks

Useful for more than just building tools!

Sticks may not be the most effective way to smelt your materials, but if you have some leftover from crafting torches or tools they are definitely usable. To the furnace they go!

What’s great about sticks:

• Sticks are one of the easiest materials to acquire in the game, with multiple different places to find them.
• For every stack of 64 sticks you can smelt 32 blocks.
• When you’re not using them for smelting, sticks are included in several different recipes like all essential tools, fishing rods, bows, ladders, and many more.

    How to get sticks:

• When crafting, two wooden plank blocks or two bamboo sticks on top of one another creates 4 sticks.
• Sticks can be caught while fishing.
• Witches have the chance to drop up to 6 sticks, and sometimes more depending on the player’s looting level.
• Destroying dead bushes or decaying leaves on trees have the chance of dropping sticks as well.

9. Wooden Tools

Who knew wooden tools could be useful for more than really slow mining?

Perhaps you want to get one more use out of your old wooden tools from the beginning of the game, or you’ve swapped out your wooden pickaxe for stone or iron and need to dispose of it. This is the solution for you! 

What’s great about wooden tools:

• Wooden tools smelt one block per tool, which is double what a single stick can smelt. (However, the con to this is tools can not come in a 64 stack, so you would need to refill the input consistently.)
• It doesn’t matter which kind of tool you use between the pickaxe, shovel, hoe, axe, and sword. They all smelt the same amount!
• If you’re not planning on using wooden tools for smelting they are still great for being used as, well, tools! 

How to get wooden tools:

• The easiest way to get a wooden tool of any kind is to craft it on the crafting table with sticks and wooden planks.
• Killing mobs that carry such tools may also prove to provide them.
• They can also sometimes be found in dungeons or temple chests.

8. Wooden Doors

Open the door to a more efficient fuel source

You know how annoying it is when you’re building a house that has one or two doors yet when you go to craft them you get three by default? What are you supposed to do with the third door? Use it to smelt something!

What’s great about wooden doors:

• Like wooden tools, doors only smelt one block per door. However, what makes them stand out is the ability to stack them up to 64, so there is no need to continuously refill the furnace input.
• Regardless of what type of wood the doors are made of, they all smelt the same.
• They are relatively easy to craft.

How to get wooden doors:

• Like most things, the easiest way to get a wooden door is to craft it. This is done by placing six wooden planks of the same type of wood in a rectangle on the crafting grid.
• Wooden doors can also be found in villages throughout your world via random generation. That is if you don’t mind stealing from the villagers. 
• They can also be found in shipwrecks.

7. Wooden Planks

Use the extra wooden planks from your house in your furnace!

This one is a bit self-explanatory because obviously wood burns. It’s a classic quick-fix go-to for when you don’t have coal on hand. But how efficient is it?

What's great about wooden planks:

• The best thing about wooden planks is the amount you get from crafting them out of logs. For every log you can craft 4 planks, and they are stackable up to 64.
• They can smelt one and a half blocks for each wooden plank block. This means you can smelt up to 96 blocks per stack.
• Like with wooden doors, it doesn’t matter what kind of wood it is. It’s all the same to the furnace.

How to get wooden planks:

• Wooden planks are arguably the easiest thing to craft in the entire game. All it takes is placing any amount of wooden logs in one square of your crafting interface. 
• Various kinds of wooden planks can generate all over a world in villages, woodland mansions, shipwrecks, mineshafts, and more.
• There’s also a chance of finding them in loot chests.

6. Scaffolding

Useful for building and fuel!

Scaffolding certainly makes building easier, but when you’re done building and decide it’s taking up too much space in your chest you can repurpose it as fuel! While it’s not necessarily at the top of the list for effectiveness, it is capable of getting the job done.

What’s great about scaffolding:

• While scaffolding can be rather expensive, it acts as better fuel than all the aforementioned materials. It varies with whatever version you’re playing. In Bedrock edition you get a whopping six blocks smelted per single scaffold. In the Java edition, you get two blocks smelted per scaffold.
• Even though scaffolding is not necessarily a traditional block, it is still stackable up to 64.
• When you’re not particularly in need of smelting material, scaffolding is a fantastic building tool. Rather than building up a dirt tower every time you need to fill in the roof of your building, use scaffolding to climb up and down easily. You can mine the bottom scaffold to have them all come down at once when you’re done!

 How to get scaffolding:

• Scaffolding can be acquired through crafting. The main material is six bamboo sticks on each side of the crafting interface and one piece of string in the top center space.

5. Charcoal

Not the artsy kind

Chocolate or vanilla? Coffee or tea? Charcoal or coal? These are the questions we find ourselves facing, and I feel as though it all depends on the situation we’re in. If you find yourself with no more coal in your nearby caves but an abundance of trees and wood logs, this is the kind of fuel for your furnace.

What’s great about charcoal: 

• Charcoal is just as effective as regular coal, with the ability to smelt 8 blocks per piece. This results in a total of 512 blocks smelted per stack of charcoal!
• It can be argued that charcoal is too much of a hassle, but the crafting process is one of its benefits. Because it is made entirely out of wood logs, where there are trees, there is charcoal. This is extremely helpful as a quick-fix for good fuel with no coal deposits nearby.
• Charcoal can also be used as a replacement for coal in the torch recipe and when crafting items like the campfire and fire charge.

How to get charcoal:

• Charcoal can be obtained by simply smelting wood logs.

4. Coal

One of the most abundant ores, but to be fair it is also one of the most functional

It’s iron! It’s gold! It’s… more coal. Coal is usually abundant in naturally generated worlds and a no-brainer for fuel. Especially when it feels like every cave is shoving it in your face in every tunnel you turn down.

What’s great about coal: 

• One of the best things about coal is the ability to craft coal blocks by filling the crafting grid with nine singular pieces of coal. A single coal block gives you the ability to smelt 80 blocks per fuel! 
• Coal has the ability to smelt the same amount of blocks as charcoal does, but it stands out due to the lack of wait time. When you mine coal it is ready to be used immediately in the furnace, whereas for charcoal you need to wait for the wood logs to be smelted one by one, which can hinder productivity.
• There is generally a lot of coal in one deposit, and with an iron pickaxe you could easily acquire a substantial amount of coal in a short time.

How to get coal:

• Coal is dropped when coal ore is mined.
• Wither skeletons in the Nether also have a chance of dropping pieces of coal.

3. Blaze Rods

Figures that something called a "blaze" rod would be able to smelt materials

If you care to venture into the Nether, blaze rods are surprisingly a very efficient fuel source. So, if you’re not planning on brewing any potion any time soon, this may be a perfect way to utilize those extra blaze rods collecting dust in your chests.

What’s great about blaze rods:

• They smelt 12 blocks per single rod! I did the math for you, that’s 768 smelted blocks per stack of 64.
• When it’s not being considered for fuel in your furnace, blaze rods can be used to make brewing stands and blaze powder. Blaze powder can be used to craft different potions!

How to get blaze rods:

• The best way to acquire some blaze rods is to head to the Nether and find a blaze mob. If you have the looting enchantment they are capable of dropping up to four blaze rods.

2. Dried Kelp Block

The fuel of the sea

When you’re feeling up for some scuba diving, dried kelp blocks are one of the most efficient fuel sources in the game. It is a bit of work to get them to the stage of the dried kelp block, but it’s worth it if you’re a miner collecting a lot of ore.

What’s great about dried kelp blocks:

• Singular dried kelp blocks are capable of smelting 20 blocks. 
• If you are not in need of fuel, dried kelp can be crafted back into nine dried kelp pieces. These can be used for food or be placed into a composter.
• Regardless of what you use your kelp for, dried kelp blocks are great for organizing an abundance of dried kelp and keeping it in a compact and manageable state.

How to get dried kelp blocks:

• Dried kelp blocks can be gotten through crafting. The recipe requires nine individual pieces of dried kelp, which are obtained by smelting regular kelp.
• Once placed, kelp blocks can be mined by hand or by any tool, but the most effective way is by hoe.

1. Lava Bucket

Be careful collecting this fuel source

While this means of fuel may be a little more dangerous, it is definitely one of the easiest and most effective. All you need is a bucket, a lava source, and a little bit of hope. Well, I guess the hope isn’t necessary, but you get it.

What’s great about lava buckets:

• While you may only be able to have one lava bucket per stack, it is a rather quick and simple way to get a very long-lasting fuel source. 100 blocks are smelted per bucket, and you don’t lose your bucket in the process. So as long as there’s lava around, you can have a lava bucket.
• The lava bucket fuel source allows you to save coal and reduce the need to mine as much, so there is less usage on your pickaxe. 
• In some cases, lava buckets can also be used to trade with certain villagers.

How to get a lava bucket:

• First, you need a bucket, which costs three iron ingots to craft. This is nothing in comparison to the service that the bucket will do for you. Then simply find a compatible lava source to fill it with and smelt away!

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