How To Repair A Bow In Minecraft [Explained]

Learning how to repair a bow in Minecraft, or any piece of equipment really, is an extremely important part of this game. It may not seem like a particularly necessary feature during your first few hours in the world, but as you go through the game and acquire or craft more powerful gear, you’ll start to understand its importance. So with this ‘How To Repair A Bow In Minecraft‘ guide, we’ll show players how to restore their Bows and other items to full durability.

How To Repair A Bow In Minecraft Guide

Now there are two main methods through which you can repair your gear in Minecraft.

One is extremely straightforward and only requires the use of the Crafting Table. This is literally one of the most crucial items in the entire experience, and you are not able to progress through the game without it.

The other method is a bit more complicated since it necessitates the use of an Anvil. This is a completely avoidable item that requires a significant amount of resources to craft, but the benefits speak for themselves.

We’ll go over both of these in detail below.

How to Repair Bow with Grindstone 

Repairing your Bow with Grindstone is another convenient method. In order to use this method, you must have a grindstone in your inventory. If you don’t have one, you can simply craft it through the crafting table as well. 

For this method, you need to have two same bows as Grindstone will combine both the damaged bows into one stronger piece. Once you have access to the Grindstone, you can put your damaged Bow in the top allocation and the other one inside the bottom box. Once you place both the damaged bows in boxes, you will receive the repaired Bow inside the right box. 

From there, you can grab it and put it in your inventory. One thing you should remember is that if you repair an enchanted bow with the Grindstone method, the enchantments will be removed.

The Crafting Table Method

The most basic way of repairing damaged gear is to place two similar items on a Crafting Table at the same time. This allows you to combine their durability, as well as gain a slight bonus to it in the final combined product.

So for example, let’s say that you have two extremely damaged Bows. Both of these are low in durability and you want to repair them to extend their life cycle. If you place both of these items next to each other in a Crafting Table, you’ll get the option to combine them into one singular Bow.

This repaired Bow will not be completely new, but it will now have the combined durability of the old items, as well as a little extra on top of that. For those interested in the exact figure, this ‘Repair Bonus’ amounts to exactly 5% of the original item’s maximum uses.

A downside to this method is that enchantments held by the damaged items are not carried over to the repaired item. And you know this is painful because many enchantments in the game are either really hard to come by, or plain expensive to apply by yourself. So if you have a lot of powerful buffs, try out the second method explained below.

The Anvil Method

This method does allow us to carry forward enchantments, but you have to acquire an Anvil first. You can craft one of these by yourself with 3x Blocks of Iron and 4x Iron Ingots. However, this is quite an ask if you’re short on Iron.

You can alternatively also take one of these from any village on the map. You can find them inside some of the homes there, and you can pick one up by mining it with an Iron Pickaxe. Also, don’t worry, villagers don’t turn hostile if you take their items.

Once you have an Anvil in your possession, place it in your base and get ready to start repairing. Now there are two distinct ways you can repair items with this crafting station,

1. Repairing with Materials.
2. Repairing with a Duplicate.

The first of these requires raw materials from the relevant class. We’ll list all of these in the table below:

Putting a damaged item in the Anvil with one unit of its compatible repair material, allows you to restore 25% of its overall durability. So for an item that is almost gone, that comes to a total of around four units of materials.

Sometimes this can be more than, or equal to, the original cost of crafting the actual item. So assess your situation, and make sure that repairing is worth the loss of materials. Sometimes it’s better to simply move on and craft something new.

You might also have to hunt animals like Llamas for resources like Leather, so make sure to check out our guide on that particular animal here.

The second way of repairing an item with an Anvil is to add another of the exact same type within it in the crafting station. This works almost exactly like the Crafting Table method, except you actually get to carry over enchantments now.

This is especially useful in the late game when most of your gear is likely to have incredibly powerful buffs that you don’t want to lose. And what’s even better about this is that not only do enchantments carry over, you can actually combine them as well.

So for example, let’s say you have two enchanted Bows. One of them has the Flame buff and the other has the Power buff. If you place both of these together in an Anvil, the result will be a bow that possesses both of these enchantments together.

Let’s also take another example. Sometimes while exploring the world, you may come across structures with treasure chests hidden inside of them. You never really know what you’ll find inside them, but there is a chance that they might contain Enchanted gear. If the abilities on display are not to your liking, you can combine them with other subpar enchanted items to create a combination that is actually effective. There are literally no downsides to the Anvil method.

Conclusion

This was eXputer’s ‘How To Repair A Bow In Minecraft’ guide. Repairing a bow is simple, but it might be a bit confusing if you are a beginner. If you want to repair an ordinary bow, then a crafting table is a better option. However, if you want to repair a broken enchanted bow, you should use the Anvil. While you’re here, why not also check out our article on How To Tame A Parrot In Minecraft?