Enchantments are added to weapons in Minecraft with the purpose of making them more powerful and useful in some way. This could mean giving it a higher damage output, allowing it to do certain things it usually wouldn’t or even making it more durable.
Some enchantments give flat damage increases against certain types of mobs or just a general damage increase. One such enchantment is Smite. To learn more about this enchantment, keep reading.
How to obtain the Smite enchantment in Minecraft
You should remember that Smite is a primary enchantment for swords and axes in Minecraft Bedrock Edition and a secondary enchantment for Java Edition.
It can be obtained using the same process as any other enchantments in the game. You can either find an item that has already been enchanted in the wild or enchant an existing weapon using anvils or enchantment tables.
Smite is incompatible with Sharpness, Cleaving, and Bane of Arthropods. This means that you can’t have two or more of these enchantments on the same weapon.
What does the Smite enchantment do in Minecraft
Minecraft Smite gives bonus damage against a group of mobs called undead mobs. This category includes skeletons, zombies, zombie villagers, withers, wither skeletons, zombified piglins, skeleton horses, zombie horses, strays, husks, phantoms, drowned, and zoglins.
Specifically, the enchantment adds 2.5 damage per level to both swords and axes. The damage output increases with level, with the max level being Smite 5. With a netherite sword enchanted with Smite 5, you could do 20.5 damage per hit, with the value of critical damage being 24.5
Where can you use the Smite enchantment
Smite is the most useful situational damage-boosting enchantment since most of the mobs in Minecraft that are hostile are undead mobs. Therefore, it is a good idea to run it in most situations, especially in underground exploration, where you would expect there to be lots of undead mobs. You can also find it useful when you fight the Wither, considering that it’s also considered undead.
However, the damage boost is sometimes too specific, even though it is large. Sharpness may be a better option when you don’t know what kind of enemies you’ll be fighting, and Bane of Arthropods may be the better choice when you know you’ll fight spiders.
It is effectively useless in PVP.
Key Takeaways
Here’s a list of things to remember when talking about the Smite enchantment:
- It is an enchantment for swords and axes, but in Java Edition, it is primarily for swords.
- It is not compatible with the Sharpness, Bane of Arthropods, and Cleaving enchantments. You cannot add two or more of these enchantments on the same item.
- It adds 2.5 extra damage to undead mobs. These are: skeletons, zombies, zombie villagers, withers, wither skeletons, zombified piglins, skeleton horses, zombie horses, strays, husks, phantoms, drowned, and zoglins.
- Smite is completely useless for PVP, but useful in PVE situations where you expect to fight a lot of undead, such as underground or in the Wither boss fight.