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For the longest time, the OptiFine mod was one of the only ways for Minecraft players to be able to zoom in on something in the distance. However, since the 1.17 update, the first part of Caves and Cliffs, Mojang has decided to provide a convenient in-game way of zooming into the horizon and inspecting things from afar easily.

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The spyglass is a brand-new item that can be made with a bunch of new resources also introduced in the first half of the update. It can be pretty hard to figure out naturally how to make a spyglass, since it doesn't actually involve any glass blocks or glass panes. If you're looking to go adventuring and would like to craft the spyglass as soon as possible, look no further.

Crafting Ingredients Needed For A Spyglass

Minecraft Amethyst Shard And Copper Ingots

You'll need to gather two crucial ingredients in order to craft a spyglass, and they're not both necessarily that easy to find either.

  • 1 x Amethyst Shard
  • 2 x Copper Ingot

Where To Find Copper In Minecraft 1.17

Minecraft Copper Ore

To get copper ingots, you first need to mine some raw copper. Thankfully, raw copper is in abundance in Minecraft's caves nowadays and should be as easy to find as coal or iron ore. One block of copper ore can drop multiple pieces of raw copper.

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Copper ore generates just about at any height, between levels zero and 96, so there's a big chance of finding copper in just about any cave or mountain biome you happen to stumble upon. Once you've mined the copper ore and received your raw copper, smelt it in a furnace or blast furnace to receive your copper ingots.

Where To Find Amethyst Shards In Minecraft 1.17

Minecraft Inside Amethyst Geode

Amethyst is a bit trickier to find. First, you'll need to find yourself an Amethyst Geode, which is a round, circular dark block-shaped area from the outside which sort of resembles an egg.

They can be spotted easily with a Night Vision potion underwater at the bottom of oceans for instance.

Minecraft Amethyst Geode In Ocean

The best elevation to find any geodes is between bedrock and Y=70.

You can randomly come across one just by mining around solid stone, but if you're close to a large ocean it's absolutely worth it to grab a boat and look around for one at the bottom of the sea.

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Minecraft Amethyst

Once you find a geode, break into it with a pickaxe. Inside the geode, you should be able to find a bunch of purple blocks, on some of which amethyst clusters are growing.

Make sure you find a cluster that is fully grown and as large as possible. Mine it with a regular iron pickaxe or higher to collect some amethyst shards.

How To Craft A Spyglass In Minecraft 1.17

Minecraft Crafting A Spyglass

Once you have all your ingredients gathered and prepared, you can craft the spyglass easily by combining vertically on the three by three crafting table grid the needed ingredients.

The amethyst shard goes on top, followed by the two copper ingots below.

How To Use A Spyglass

Minecraft Player With Spyglass

Hover over the spyglass on your toolbar and right-click on your mouse. This should open up the spyglass view, which allows you to zoom in on objects and the environment around you.

Unfortunately, there's a vignette around the view, so you'll either need to press F1 to see properly or look around.

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Minecraft Advancement Unlocked When Looking At Parrot

Fun fact: looking at specific things through the spyglass will unlock advancements for you in the Java Edition of the game.

  • Is It A Bird? Unlocked when you look at a parrot.
  • Is It A Balloon? Unlocked when you look at a Ghast.
  • Is It A Plane? Unlocked when you look at the Ender Dragon.

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