What cracked deepslate bricks are
Cracked deepslate bricks are a decorative variant of deepslate bricks. They share the same dark gray color and tile pattern, but the surface has visible hairline cracks running through it. The block was added in 1.17 Caves and Cliffs Part 1 alongside the rest of the deepslate brick family.
The block is purely cosmetic. It places, breaks, and stacks like regular deepslate bricks. The only practical difference is the texture, which gives builds an aged or damaged look without changing how they behave.
How to get cracked deepslate bricks
You can get cracked deepslate bricks two ways: smelt regular deepslate bricks in a furnace, or mine them out of a trial chamber. There is no crafting recipe and no stonecutter shortcut. Smelting is the only repeatable way to make them.
Smelting recipe
Place a deepslate brick in a furnace with any standard fuel. Each brick smelts into one cracked deepslate brick after about 10 seconds. Coal, charcoal, and lava buckets all work, and the recipe will fire as soon as both ingredients are present.
If you only have cobbled deepslate, the chain looks like this:
- Craft 4 cobbled deepslate into 4 polished deepslate (2×2 grid).
- Craft 4 polished deepslate into 4 deepslate bricks (2×2 grid).
- Smelt the bricks into the cracked version, one at a time.
If you have access to a stonecutter, you can skip step 1 and go straight from cobbled deepslate to bricks at a 1:1 ratio. The stonecutter does not, however, produce cracked bricks at any stage. Smelting is the final step.
Trial chambers
Trial chambers were added in the 1.21 Tricky Trials update. They generate underground and use a mix of deepslate brick variants in their walls and floors, including cracked deepslate bricks. You can mine the placed blocks to collect them, but a furnace is faster for any real volume.
One side note on chamber etiquette: the cracked bricks are not the loot. The trial spawners and vaults are. Knocking out a wall for the bricks will not ruin a chamber, but stripping the structure for stone is a poor trade. Mine what you need and leave the rest.
Block properties and mining
Cracked deepslate bricks share the same stats as the rest of the deepslate brick family.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Hardness | 3.5 |
| Blast resistance | 6.0 |
| Tool | Pickaxe (wooden or better) |
| Drop | Itself, no Silk Touch needed |
| Renewable | No |
| Stack size | 64 |
| Flammable | No |
| Catches fire from lava | No |
You need at least a wooden pickaxe for the block to drop when mined. Mining without a pickaxe destroys it and you get nothing back. The block holds up to creeper damage like the rest of the deepslate family, which is enough to take a single point-blank explosion most of the time.
Building uses
Cracked deepslate bricks are one of the better “weathered” textures in the game. The base color is dark, and the cracks read as wear rather than dirt or moss. That makes the block useful any time you want something to look old without looking grimy.
Ruins and abandoned structures
Mix cracked deepslate bricks with the regular and chiseled versions on the same wall to fake long-term wear. A 60/30/10 split (regular, cracked, chiseled) tends to look natural. Toss in a stripped log frame or a couple of mossy cobblestone patches to sell the effect.
Castles and dungeons
The deepslate family is the closest thing in vanilla to a fortress stone. Cracked bricks work well in castle floors that take heavy traffic and in dungeon walls near a spawner. The lower courses of a tall tower are another good fit. Pair with deepslate brick stairs and walls for the trim, since those exist for the regular version and not for cracked.
Streets and paving
For a city build, cracked deepslate bricks make a believable old paving. Use them as a path between regular deepslate brick blocks, and the eye reads it as a road that has been walked on for a long time. The same trick works on bridges and plaza floors.
Feature walls and pixel art
If you are doing a stone-themed feature wall, cracked deepslate bricks give you another shade of dark gray to play with. Layering all four deepslate brick variants (regular, cracked, chiseled, and the smooth deepslate brick block) on a single wall gives you visible texture without changing color or material.
Light and color
Cracked deepslate bricks read very dark in unlit areas. If you place them deep underground without any light source, the cracks barely show because the texture darkens under low light along with the rest of the block. Under a torch, the cracks pick up the warm light and the wear becomes obvious. Under a sea lantern or a soul lantern, the cool light flattens the texture a little and the block looks more uniform.
If you are showcasing a wall of cracked deepslate bricks, a torch or campfire one or two blocks away does more for the texture than direct overhead lighting.
Cracked deepslate bricks vs other cracked stones
Cracked deepslate bricks are easy to mistake for cracked stone bricks at a glance. The visual difference is the base color: stone bricks are light gray, deepslate bricks are dark gray, and that carries into the cracked versions. The cracks themselves are styled differently. Deepslate bricks show thinner, more spread-out fractures, while cracked stone bricks have shorter, deeper-looking lines.
From a building standpoint, the choice is mostly about palette. Cracked stone bricks fit better with oak or cobblestone-paired builds. Cracked deepslate bricks fit darker palettes: blackstone, dark oak, or other underground-themed materials.
The cracked nether brick variant has its own niche in red-dominant nether builds, and cracked polished blackstone bricks are the go-to for a true black palette.
What is missing: stairs and slabs
Cracked deepslate bricks have no stair, slab, or wall variants in vanilla. If you want a slab in this texture, you are stuck. The workaround most builders use is to mix regular deepslate brick stairs and slabs into a wall faced in cracked bricks. From a few blocks away, the eye blends them.
The same applies to the other cracked variants in the game: cracked stone bricks, cracked nether bricks, and cracked polished blackstone bricks all skip the stair and slab forms. If Mojang ever adds these, the cracked deepslate variants would likely follow the regular brick recipes through the stonecutter.
Java vs. Bedrock differences
There are no meaningful gameplay differences between Java and Bedrock for cracked deepslate bricks. Smelting recipe, drop behavior, hardness, and trial chamber generation all match across both editions. The only thing that occasionally trips people up is the resource pack: some custom packs only update the regular bricks and leave the cracked variant on the vanilla texture, which can make the block look out of place next to its retextured siblings.
Tips and common mistakes
- You cannot craft cracked deepslate bricks from cobbled deepslate or polished deepslate. Smelting from regular deepslate bricks is the only way.
- Smelting only works on the bricks form. Putting polished deepslate or cobbled deepslate in a furnace gives you something else (deepslate, in the case of cobbled).
- For a big build, set up a basic auto-smelter with a hopper feeding the furnace. The block stacks normally, so the standard four-furnace farm pattern works fine.
- Silk Touch is not required for the drop. Any wooden or better pickaxe will do.
- If a trial chamber is your closest source, leave the spawners and vaults alone unless you are running the trial. Stripping the chamber for stone wastes the loot.
- The cracked variant does not have a unique sound, footstep, or particle. Anything that interacts with deepslate bricks will treat the cracked block the same way.
Frequently asked questions
How do you make cracked deepslate bricks?
Smelt regular deepslate bricks in a furnace. One brick in, one cracked brick out. There is no crafting table or stonecutter recipe.
What version added cracked deepslate bricks?
1.17 Caves and Cliffs Part 1, alongside the rest of the deepslate brick family.
Where do cracked deepslate bricks spawn naturally?
Trial chambers, which generate underground and were added in 1.21 Tricky Trials. They appear mixed in with regular deepslate bricks in the chamber walls and floors.
Can you make cracked deepslate brick stairs or slabs?
No. The cracked variant has no stair, slab, or wall recipe in vanilla. If you need those shapes, use the regular deepslate brick versions and accept the small texture mismatch, or place full blocks only.
How blast resistant are cracked deepslate bricks?
The blast resistance is 6.0, the same as the rest of the deepslate brick family. That is enough to survive a creeper at point-blank range about half the time, and it holds up well against TNT in larger walls.
Do cracked deepslate bricks need Silk Touch to mine?
No. Any wooden pickaxe or better drops the block as itself. Silk Touch is not doing anything special on this block.
Are cracked deepslate bricks renewable?
No. Trial chambers do not regenerate, and there is no farm or villager trade for the block. Once you have mined or smelted what you need, that is the supply for that world.
Can you get cracked deepslate bricks in creative mode?
Yes. The block appears in the creative inventory under the natural blocks tab, next to the regular deepslate brick. The give command is /give @s minecraft:cracked_deepslate_bricks 64.
Cracked deepslate bricks have a small, specific job: making other deepslate look intentional. If your build looks too clean, swap maybe one in five regular bricks for the cracked version and walk away. The wear sells itself, and the block does the work for you.
