How to Make a Shulker Box in Minecraft

Guide Java Bedrock

Quick answer: Craft a shulker box with 2 shulker shells and 1 chest in a vertical line: shell on top, chest in the middle, shell on the bottom. It keeps all 27 item stacks inside when you break it, so it is a backpack you can mine.

What you need

2 shulker shells (from shulkers in End cities)
1 chest (8 planks)

Step by step

Find an End city on the outer End islands (after beating the dragon).
Kill shulkers until you have 2 shulker shells (they drop about half the time, more with Looting).
Craft a chest from 8 planks.
Open the crafting table.
Place 1 shulker shell in the top-center slot.
Place the chest in the center and the second shell in the bottom-center.
Take the shulker box. Fill it, break it with a pickaxe, and everything stays inside for transport.

Java vs Bedrock

The shulker box recipe is the same in Java and Bedrock. A shulker box holds 27 stacks and keeps its contents when broken, making it the core of every endgame inventory system; craft it together with a dye to recolor it, and hoppers can fill and empty placed boxes for automatic storage. In Java, you can see its contents preview by hovering with Shift in the inventory tooltip. Boxes cannot go inside other shulker boxes.

Versions: javabedrock

Frequently asked questions

What does a shulker box do in Minecraft?

It is a portable chest: 27 slots of storage that stays inside the box when you break and carry it. Builders and miners carry several color-coded boxes as expandable inventory.

How do you get shulker shells?

Shulkers in End cities drop 0-1 shell when killed (50% chance, higher with Looting III). Shulkers also duplicate when a bullet hits another shulker, so farms can breed them.

Can you dye a shulker box?

Yes. Craft a shulker box together with any dye to recolor it. Dyed boxes are the standard way to color-code storage systems.

Can you put a shulker box inside another shulker box?

No, shulker boxes cannot nest inside each other, in your inventory or via hoppers. Ender chests are the way to carry boxed storage compactly: fill an ender chest with filled shulker boxes.