7 interesting ways to use Minecraft villagers other than trading

One of the most powerful systems Minecraft survival mode players have access to is villager trading. The best enchantments in the game, such as mending, are locked behind trading, and players can get unlimited access to many resources, including diamond tools and armor, via this system. However, there are many other uses for villagers in the title.

This article lists seven interesting ways to use villagers in the game other than trading.

Note: This list is subjective and solely reflects the opinions of the writer

---

7 other beneficial ways to use Minecraft villagers

1) Storage

Villagers trading crops (Image via Mojang)

While a less useful means of item storage than shulker boxes, ender chests, or even barrels, it is interesting that villagers in Minecraft can be used as a means for storing excess items.

Players can throw crops and seeds at a villager, and they will pick them up, adding the items to their inventory. Then, if a second villager is nearby, the storage villager will attempt to give the items away. Players can intercept the items to get them back, treating villagers as crop storage.

---

2) Warning system

A villager running away from a zombie (Image via Mojang)

This use makes the list it is both useful and easy to incorporate. Players can use villagers as a means of determining if their base is currently safe. They can do so by checking to see if any villagers are panicking.

If all villagers are calm, there are no mobs nearby. This means the base is safe.

---

3) Base protection

A villager-spawned iron golem protecting a village (Image via Mojang)

This is a more practical and defensive version of using villagers as a warning system.

Players could use a series of villagers as an outer perimeter, with hostile mobs causing iron golems to spawn. This will then protect players' Minecraft survival bases. These iron golems will persist, meaning that defensive measures should remain constant.

---

4) Automatic crop farm

Another interesting use for villagers is to automate crop farming. If players place a composter next to a carrot, potato, wheat, or beet farm, the farmer villager will begin taking care of the field. This means they will harvest fully grown crops and replant the seeds.

Once the farmer's inventory is full, they will want to give the surplus food to others so that those villagers can enter love mode, allowing players to get more Minecraft villagers. However, with clever block placement, players can drop this surplus food into hoppers instead, where it can be collected for their use.

---

5) Entity launcher

Cow Elytra Catapult! byu/SimonFranke inMinecraft

This interesting use is not technically exclusive to villagers. However, villagers are a good option for it.

If players end up with a surplus of villagers while breeding for their Minecraft villager trading setup, the extra villagers can be pushed into a one-by-one hole in the ground that is two blocks deep. With enough entities, an effective cannon can be made. This can launch players into elytra flight.

---

6) Raid farm

This is the first major alternate use of villagers and a good potential first attempt at an expert-level Minecraft farm.

Players can use a combination of villagers and pillagers to create a farm that is in a perpetual state of raid. This allows players to farm massive numbers of items, such as emeralds and totems of undying while AFK.

---

7) Iron farms

The final evolution of using villagers as a warning system or base protection system is the Minecraft iron golem farm. These farms take full advantage of the villagers' ability to summon these metal goliaths when scared by hostile mobs to spawn iron golems into kill chambers. Then, the iron ingots dropped are collected into an output chest for players.

The fact that iron is such a useful material for building many late-game items and setting up advanced farms means this is by far the best alternate use of villagers in Minecraft.

---

While Minecraft villagers are most known for and most useful in trading villages, there are plenty of other uses for them. The ones listed above are the most useful of these additional uses, but players should be sure to experiment and see if they can discover any more.