Key Takeaway
To make a Recovery Compass, completely surround a regular Compass with eight Echo Shards on a Crafting Table.
Death can really set you back in Minecraft. Not only does it stop you from building or mining, but it can also cause you to lose important items. Thankfully, you can use a Recovery Compass to find where you died.
Table Of Contents
What You Need to Make a Recovery Compass
You’ll need one regular Compass and eight Echo Shards to make a Recovery Compass. On a Crafting Table, place the Compass in the centermost slot. Afterward, fill every other slot with the eight Echo Shards. This recipe will yield one Recovery Compass.
How to Get a Compass
One of the easiest ways to get a regular Compass is to make one. To do so, place one Redstone Dust on the middle slot of a Crafting Table. Then, place four Iron Ingots around it—one above, one below, one to the right, and one to the left.
Alternatively, you can potentially find a Compass in the Chests of a few naturally generated structures such as Ancient Cities, Shipwrecks, Strongholds, and even Villages. In the latter type of structure, a Compass can be found in Cartographer Chests.
Speaking of Villages, Librarian Villagers can possibly sell you a Compass as well. In the Java Edition of the game, expert-level Librarian Villages have a 50% chance to sell one compass for 4 emeralds. And, in the Bedrock Edition, expert-level Librarian Villagers have about a 33% chance to sell one compass for 4 emeralds.
How to Get Echo Shards
Unlike regular Compasses, Echo Shards will be far harder to obtain. The only place you can find them is in the Chests of Ancient Cities. One to Three Echo Shards can be found in such Chests. However, the chance of them appearing in Ancient City Chests is about 30%.
How to Use a Recovery Compass
A Recovery Compass works much like a regular Compass in that its needle will point to a specific location. With regular Compasses, the needle normally points to where you spawned into your current world. The needle of a Recovery Compass will instead point to where you died.
You should keep in mind that it won’t help you if you die in a different dimension. For example, if you die in the Nether, using a Recovery Compass in the Overworld will only cause the needle to spin around aimlessly.
The Recovery Compass only tracks your most recent death. You cannot find previous sites of death by using this item. Also, if you have this item on your person when you die, it will drop like everything else, so you shouldn’t explore with a Recovery Compass on you.
The only viable way you can use this special device is if you die but have Echo Shards stored in a Chest in your home—or a similar circumstance. Alternatively, having an emergency Recovery Compass near your respawn point would also be a suitable backup plan for if you die.
