Modified March 27, 2023 10:17 AM IST

Minecraft players eagerly awaiting the arrival of version 1.20 can get a taste of the upcoming version thanks to the Java and Bedrock Edition betas made available to the community. One notable addition is a new item called the Paintbrush, which serves as a central tool for the game’s archaeology.

Using the brush, players can gently clean certain blocks to reveal ancient items such as pottery shards or snuffle eggs. Mojang will likely add more items to the archeology system in the future, so players should familiarize themselves with this tool before the official release of Minecraft 1.20.

Luckily, the brush in Minecraft is easy to craft and use, so players should have very little trouble figuring it out.

Everything you ever needed to know about the brush in Minecraft 1.20

What we know about the brush for now can be gleaned from recent Java snapshots and Bedrock previews, which added some Minecraft 1.20 features to experiment with. By participating in these betas, players will be able to craft their own brush by combining a feather, copper ingot, and stick on the grid of a crafting table. The feather should be placed in the top center slot, the ingot under it, and the staff under the ingot to complete the crafting recipe.

Once Minecraft fans have a brush, they can put it in their hands like any other item, block, or tool. While in the brush’s hand, the player can use it (right-click on PC or use the item button on console) to brush blocks.

Brushing doesn’t harm most of the blocks in the game, but if players brush the elusive suspect sand or gravel blocks, they can obtain archeological items like the aforementioned pottery shards or sniffing eggs, depending on where the suspect blocks are found. Brushing these blocks can also lead to you getting other standard items and resources unrelated to archeology, like bricks, emeralds, and diamonds.

When a player grazes a block, they are slowed until they stop. Additionally, brushing reduces the durability of a brush until it breaks. Luckily, Minecraft players can repair their brush by combining two brushes of different durability in the crafting grid. Brushes can also be enchanted with three enchantments at the moment, including Unbreaking, Mending, and Curse of Vanishing. The curse enchantment is obviously not worth using, but both Unbreaking and Mending should ensure players get even more out of their brush before it needs repairing.

In version 1.20 and later, there may be even more uses for brushes. However, the information currently provided is from the betas of the update and may not represent all brush features or functionality. Mojang seems determined to flesh out the long-awaited Archeology feature in the 1.20 Trails & Tales update, so more brushed content or gameplay is likely to arrive in the near future.