You won’t need much to make a Lever in Minecraft. A couple of simple resources are enough to give you this versatile item. You can use Levers to turn your Redstone mechanisms on and off with little effort.
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What You Need to Make a Lever
All you’ll need to make a Lever is 1 Stick and 1 Cobblestone. On any kind of crafting grid, place the Cobblestone anywhere except the top row and then place the Stick above the Cobblestone. This crafting recipe will give you 1 Lever, which you can use in a ton of different ways.
In addition to being able to craft Levers easily, you can also potentially find them in naturally-generated structures. You can find placed Levers in Jungle Temples and Woodland Mansions. Though they are often connected to traps, so be wary if you see a Lever in these locations. When you spot one, you can break it with any tool or your hand to get it as a drop.
How to Get Sticks and Cobblestone
These 2 resources are some of the most basic in the game, so you’ll likely be able to gather lots of each. Sticks, in addition to dropping from Leaf blocks that despawn, can be crafted from placing Wood Planks on top of each other on any kind of crafting grid. Cobblestone is what you get when you mine regular Stone blocks, which, alongside Dirt, is one of the most common blocks in Minecraft.
How to Use a Lever
There are many ways you can use a Lever with your Redstone circuits. Firstly, you should know that Levers can be placed in pretty much any orientation. You can place them on the ground, on walls, and even on ceilings. This makes them more versatile than other items that create Redstone signals, such as Redstone Torches. Since Redstone Torches cannot be placed on ceilings, they are bound to ground circuitry.
What a Lever Does
Initially, when you place a Lever, it will do nothing as it spawns in the “off” position. However, when you interact with it, you will flip the stick portion into the “on” position. When this happens, a Redstone signal at power level 15 will be emitted. If you want to turn the signal off, just flip the Lever back to the “off” position.
Whatever block the Lever is attached to will receive this signal, as will blocks and items nearby that can be activated from a live signal. Since a level of 15 is the strongest kind of Redstone signal, you can reliably use a Lever to power even the more demanding Redstone mechanisms. Just keep in mind that Levers can only be attached to solid blocks that are opaque. As such, you cannot place a Lever on non-solid blocks like Signs and transparent blocks like Glass.
When to Use a Lever Instead of Another Power Source
The ideal way to use a Lever is to power devices that you want to turn on and off at will. For example, if you’re making a TV or other bits of complex furniture, you can use a Lever to simulate having to turn your TV on and off manually.
Interesting Facts About Using Levers
- If you break or move a block that a Lever is attached to, the Lever will also break and be dropped as an item
- Pistons will break a Lever if they push it
- Flowing water and flowing lava break Levers on contact in the Java Edition of Minecraft
- In the Bedrock Edition, Levers can be placed on Fences, Stone Walls, Hoppers, and even underwater
