Wolf armor vs horse armor: Which is stronger in Minecraft?

As an open-world sandbox game, Minecraft offers a plethora of activities, with the player's imagination being the only limiting factor. One of the most common activities, especially in the early game phase, is taming horses and wolves.

Taming either of these creatures provides unique benefits. While it's enjoyable to watch the pet mob follow the player, it also exposes them to the risk of environmental damage.

To reduce the chances of accidental death for the pet mob, players can equip them with armor. In this article, we thoroughly compare wolf and horse armor to determine which one offers greater strength.

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Comparing wolf armor to horse armor in Minecraft

Tamable wolves have been part of the game for a long time, but only recently has armor become available for wolves in Minecraft. With this new addition, players are now debating whether horse armor or wolf armor is superior.

Comparing the two is somewhat challenging because, like the player's armor items, horse armor comes in tiers. Diamond horse armor offers the highest level of protection, but it's also much more difficult to obtain compared to wolf armor, as diamond horse armor cannot be crafted directly on the crafting table.

Despite these differences, one can examine the statistics of both items. Wolf armor provides the wolf with an armor value of 11, which is equivalent to 5.5 hearts of health. This matches the armor points provided by diamond horse armor for a horse.

However, in practical terms, diamond horse armor offers better protection to the mob because it also provides two armor toughness to the equipped horse, establishing it as the better armor.

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How to get and use wolf and horse armors

Wolf armor crafting recipe (Image via Mojang)

The crafting recipe of wolf armor in Minecraft is quite simple as it requires only one ingredient. You must collect six armadillo scutes by brushing armadillos, which are commonly found in the savanna biome and its variations. Once acquired, they can be placed on the crafting table, as demonstrated in the above image.

Iron horse armor and higher tiers can only be acquired through exploration of loot chests within various naturally generated structures in Minecraft. Dungeons, trial chambers, desert pyramids, ancient cities, and nether fortresses are among the best structures to explore for horse armor in Minecraft.

While other structures may occasionally contain horse armor, the likelihood is too minimal to rely on them as a viable source. Although leather armor is not highly protective, you can still craft and utilize it if you lack better armor. To do so, you should place seven pieces of leather in an H shape on the crafting table.

A horse equipped in Minecraft with diamond armor (Image via Mojang)

Once obtained, using the wolf armor is as simple as right-clicking on a tamed wolf with the armor in hand. The horse armor can be used the same way or you can mount the horse and manually equip the armor in the horse inventory.