What changed?

Attacking

• Attacks require 100% charge. An input made between 80% and 100% is queued for one tick after the attack becomes ready.
• Hold attack to swing automatically. Each automatic attack is one tick (0.05 seconds) slower than perfectly timed clicks.
• Charge can build to 200%. Above 195%, attacks gain one block of reach without increasing their damage. Crouching prevents the reach bonus.
• A missed attack recovers in 0.2 seconds, or 0.25 seconds when holding attack, regardless of the weapon.
• Fast weapons shorten a target's damage immunity so their next hit can connect.
• Switching items keeps your attack charge. Attacking resets it, and mining repeatedly resets it while you break the block.
• The attack indicator shows the extra charge from 130% to 200%. Swing animations linger longer, and the weapon starts rising again at 120% charge.
• Sprinting and critical hits can happen together. Attacks also apply upward knockback to targets already in the air.

Weapons and reach

• Swords attack faster, while stone, iron, diamond, and netherite swords deal less damage.
• Axes attack faster and deal one more damage than the sword of the same material. They use one durability per hit instead of two.
• Tridents attack faster, deal 7 damage instead of 9, and reach 3.5 blocks instead of 3.
• Hoes gain damage and reach. Their attack speed depends on the material.
• Pickaxes attack faster; wooden and golden pickaxes also gain damage. Shovels attack faster but deal less damage.
• Unarmed attacks deal 2 damage instead of 1 and have a slower attack speed.
• Reach is 3 blocks for swords, 3.5 for hoes and tridents, and 2.5 for other tools and unarmed attacks. Creative mode no longer adds extra reach.
• Item tooltips show reach when it differs from the 2.5-block default.
• Sweeps require Sweeping Edge and more than 195% charge. A swing can sweep nearby targets even when it misses the main target.

Shields and Cleaving

• Shields raise instantly, removing the old quarter-second delay.
• A normal shield absorbs up to 5 melee damage. A banner shield absorbs up to 10; this was a way to test stronger shields.
• A successful block absorbs projectile and explosion damage in full.
• Blocking adds 50% knockback resistance, or 80% with a banner shield. Shield knockback calculations are corrected.
• The protection arc is narrower, so attacks from the side are harder to block.
• Crouching with an offhand shield lets you block and attack at the same time. It prevents the charged reach bonus and stops working while jumping.
• Crouch blocking is enabled by default and can be switched off in accessibility settings. It does not work with a shield in the main hand.
• Axes disable a blocked shield for 1.6 seconds. Cleaving adds 0.5 seconds per level.
• An optional shield indicator shows when an offhand shield is raised or disabled. Choose Crosshair or Hotbar in video settings; the crosshair version replaces the attack indicator.

Bows and projectiles

• Bows and crossbows have less random arrow spread.
• Holding a bow drawn for more than three seconds increases its spread and removes its critical charge. The bow shakes more as fatigue increases.
• Arrows no longer give a target damage immunity. All three arrows from Multishot can damage the same target.
• Instant effects on tipped arrows use one eighth of the potion's strength, matching the reduction already applied to effect duration.
• A player's vertical movement no longer changes the flight path of arrows, eggs, or snowballs.
• Eggs and snowballs knock players back without giving them damage immunity. Both have a 0.2-second throwing cooldown.
• Snowballs stack to 64 instead of 16.
• Dispensers can launch tridents.

Food and healing

• A hit from a player or mob interrupts and resets eating or drinking. Other kinds of damage do not.
• Stews, honey, milk, and drinkable potions take one second to consume instead of 1.6 seconds.
• Saturation delays hunger loss and no longer powers fast healing. The hunger bar starts draining after saturation runs out.
• Food no longer adds saturation on top of what you have. It replaces your saturation only if the food's value is higher. Saturation is no longer capped by your current hunger level.
• Natural regeneration heals 1 HP every two seconds while you have at least 7 food points (3.5 drumsticks).
• Each point healed has a 50% chance to consume one food point, even when you still have saturation.
• Starvation damage happens every two seconds.

Enchantments

• Cleaving is a new axe enchantment with three levels. It adds 2, 3, or 4 damage and extends shield disable time by 0.5 seconds per level.
• Cleaving comes from enchanting tables and books. It cannot share an axe with Sharpness, Smite, or Bane of Arthropods.
• Axes can receive Fire Aspect, Looting, Knockback, and Sweeping Edge through an anvil.
• Sweeping Edge adds 25%, 33%, or 37.5% sweep damage at levels I, II, and III, down from 50%, 66%, and 75%.
• Sharpness, Smite, Bane of Arthropods, and Impaling damage is included before critical hits and potion effects multiply the hit.
• Impaling also affects any mob in water or rain. Aquatic mobs still take its extra damage, but the two conditions do not stack.
• Loyalty retrieves tridents that fall into the void.

Potions and effects

• Drinkable potions stack to 16. Splash and lingering potions keep their usual stack size.
• Instant Health heals 6 HP at level I and 12 HP at level II, up from 4 and 8 HP. Instant Damage keeps its usual 6 and 12 HP.
• Strength increases melee damage by 20% per level instead of adding a fixed 3 HP.
• Weakness reduces melee damage by 20% per level instead of subtracting a fixed 4 HP. A hit reduced to zero damage still causes knockback.
• The Hunger effect's drain increases with its level: one saturation point roughly every 40 seconds at level I, 6.7 seconds at level II, and 1.9 seconds at level III.

Targeting

• You can hit entities through short grass, vines, and similar blocks without breaking those blocks.
• Small entities are easier to hit. For targeting, a hitbox whose largest dimension is below 0.9 blocks is enlarged until that dimension reaches 0.9.

Mob damage

The weapon changes also affect mobs carrying those weapons. These are their damage values in 8c.