Channeling

What Channeling does

Book cost is the anvil cost of putting that book on a fresh item. However, already-used items add their prior work penalty: work it out in the calculator.

How Channeling works

During a thunderstorm, a thrown Channeling trident calls a lightning bolt onto the mob it hits. The mob must be under open sky, with no blocks above it. In clear weather or normal rain nothing happens.

The trident also calls lightning when it hits a lightning rod during a storm. So you can strike lightning exactly where you want it, even with no mob there.

What lightning changes

Lightning does more than damage. It changes some mobs into new ones:

• A creeper becomes a charged creeper. Its explosion is much bigger, and mobs it kills drop their heads.
• A pig becomes a zombified piglin.
• A villager becomes a witch.
• A mooshroom switches between red and brown.

Lightning also strips the oxidation off copper blocks and lightning rods it hits. Use that to clean up an old copper build.

Head farming with charged creepers

Mob heads are rare, and charged creepers are the main way to get most of them. Lure a creeper near the mob you want, such as a zombie, skeleton, piglin or another creeper. Charge the creeper with Channeling, then let it explode next to the target. The killed mob drops its head.

Channeling with Loyalty

Channeling works with Loyalty. Throw, strike, and the trident comes back for the next throw. Together with Impaling, Unbreaking III and Mending that is the standard throwing trident. Channeling excludes Riptide, though, so a travel trident can't call lightning.

Getting a thunderstorm

Thunderstorms are rare and short. So plan Channeling jobs around them: keep your creepers, pigs or villagers ready near a lightning rod. When a storm starts, you can act at once. Sleeping in a bed during a thunderstorm skips it, so stay awake while you work.

Channeling and lightning rods

A lightning rod pulls natural lightning toward itself during storms. A Channeling trident lets you trigger it on demand. Build the rod well away from wood and wool, because lightning can start fires on nearby blocks.

Is Channeling worth it?

For most players it is a tool, not a weapon. You use it a few times to charge creepers, make witch farms or clean copper. Since it costs only 4 levels and fits next to Loyalty, there is little reason to leave it off a throwing trident.

Common mistakes

• Trying it in normal rain. Channeling only works in a thunderstorm.
• Hitting mobs under trees or roofs. The target needs open sky above it.
• Charging a creeper near your base. A charged creeper's blast is huge.
• Striking villagers by accident. They turn into witches.

Which items take Channeling

Channeling goes on 1 kind of gear in the calculator: trident. An enchanting table can roll it on the trident.

It can't share an item with Riptide. If an item already has one of those, the anvil skips the Channeling book. Java still charges 1 level for it.

Channeling from the enchanting table

The level you can roll depends on the item's enchantability. A material with a higher value reaches higher levels from the same level 30 enchant. This table shows the best Channeling each trident can get from a level 30 enchant with 15 bookshelves.

Anything higher has to come from a book instead. Then the enchanting table calculator shows the exact chance for every level.

Anvil cost of Channeling

Channeling has an anvil multiplier of 8 from another item and 4 from a book. So the book costs 4 levels on a fresh item. That is one of the most expensive books. So put it on early, while the prior work penalty is still low.

Java charges the full resulting level every time, even when the item already has a lower level of it. Every step also adds the prior work penalty of both items. The enchantment calculator finds the cheapest order for your whole set of books.

Builds, questions and guides

Channeling is part of the max build for 1 item: best trident enchantments. To put it on in the cheapest order, see the trident enchant order.

More reading: Getting books from librarians, How to enchant in Minecraft, Every max enchantment level. You can make a Channeling book with the command generator. The librarian price list shows what villagers charge for it.

How to get Channeling

• Enchanting table It can appear when you enchant a supported item at an enchanting table. However, higher levels need more bookshelves and a level 30 enchant.
• Librarian villagers Librarians can sell it as an enchanted book. Level I costs 5–19 emeralds plus a book.
• Trial chamber vaults This loot table names it directly, so it is one of the most reliable places to look.
• Random enchanted books It is also in the pool for the random enchanted books and gear in many chests and in fishing loot.

Channeling is a very rare roll at the enchanting table, but tridents have few enchantments, so it still appears. Librarians sell it, and trial chamber vaults can give it. It is a ×4 book, so it costs 4 levels on a fresh trident.

Tips

• Use it to make charged creepers, witches from villagers and zombified piglins from pigs.
• It works with Loyalty but not with Riptide.

Commands

Give yourself a Channeling book or enchant the item in your hand. These work in Java 26.3 once cheats are on.

Versions

Channeling is in every Java version from 1.21 (when enchantments became data files) up to 26.3.

Its costs, levels and items have not changed in that time.

Also see the update log for every change, and how this data is checked. Bedrock player? See Channeling on Bedrock.

Goes well with

• Curse of Vanishing
• Impaling
• Loyalty
• Mending
• Unbreaking