Minecraft's Final Drop of 2026: Ice Caves, the Frostbite, Jukebox Playlists and Brittle Ice

Minecraft
The Winter Drop

Author:

Watty
Category:

Minecraft
Date:

Nov 2, 2026

A frozen Minecraft castle built from new ice and snow blocks at sunset

Mojang has confirmed that the ice caves teased at Minecraft Live are part of the final game drop of 2026, and most of it can already be tested in Java snapshots and Bedrock previews. Here is everything in testing so far.

Ice caves and the frostbite

The headline is a new cave full of ice crystals and icicles. The crystals glow, and the icicles are sharp and fragile. The caves also have a new resident: the frozen zombie variant shown at Minecraft Live now has a name, the frostbite, and it throws ice balls. Mojang mentions a Freezing potion for when things go wrong, and shows lava and ice sitting side by side in the caves.

Jukebox playlists, brittle ice and crevasses

Put a chest over a jukebox, fill it with music discs and you get a jukebox playlist that keeps playing. Brittle ice cracks once you stand on it and keeps cracking until it breaks. You can craft it by adding water to blue ice, but in the wild it usually covers a crevasse, a frozen ravine that winds down into the ice caves.

New ways to build with ice and snow

An ice block over water, surrounded by other ice and with open air above, now makes an ambient sound, and so do ice crystals. There is a full set of packed ice building blocks (bricks, slabs, stairs, walls and chiseled blocks) and a full set of snow bricks. And feeding blue ice to sulfur cubes turns them into instant water freezers: any water they touch freezes.

"A zombie that throws ice balls and ice that cracks under your feet. Winter in Minecraft just got a lot less cosy."

The Exiles

How to try it

On Java, enable snapshots in the Installations tab of the Minecraft Launcher. On Bedrock, the features are in the preview on Xbox, Windows and iOS and in the beta on Android, and Realms subscribers can make a free testing Realm. Mojang's usual warning applies: testing versions can corrupt worlds, so back up first. There is no release date yet beyond "the final game drop of 2026".

Further reading: Minecraft.net: Everything you can test from the upcoming game drop