/recipe

Gives or takes recipe knowledge from players. Affects which recipes appear in the recipe book.

Overview

Gives or takes recipe knowledge from players. Affects which recipes appear in the recipe book. In vanilla Minecraft Java Edition it is one of the data commands and has been available since version 1.12.

It is invoked as /recipe and accepts 3 required arguments (, , and ).

Recipes are unlocked in the recipe book UI. Players can still craft items without unlocking recipes by placing items in the crafting grid manually.

This only toggles entries in the recipe book; it never places items in the inventory, and players can still craft manually without the recipe unlocked.

Syntax & Arguments

/recipe <give|take> <targets> <recipe|*>

The full syntax is /recipe . Angle brackets < > mark required arguments and square brackets [ ] mark optional ones; a vertical bar | between words means you pick exactly one of those literals. You must always supply , , and .

action: Required, of type a literal. give or take.
targets: Required, of type an entity. The player(s) to affect.
recipe: Required, of type a resource. The recipe ID to grant/revoke, or * for all recipes.

Parameters

Name	Type	Required	Description
action	literal	Required	give or take.
targets	entity	Required	The player(s) to affect.
recipe	resource	Required	The recipe ID to grant/revoke, or * for all recipes.

Examples

The 3 examples below are ready to copy and adapt. For instance, /recipe give @s * unlocks all recipes in the recipe book for yourself. Each example varies the arguments to show a different real use of /recipe; read the note under every snippet to see exactly what changes.

/recipe give @s *

Unlocks all recipes in the recipe book for yourself.

/recipe take @a *

Removes all recipe knowledge from all players.

/recipe give @p minecraft:diamond_sword

Unlocks the diamond sword recipe for the nearest player.

Permission Level & Requirements

/recipe sits at permission Level 2 - Game Master / Cheats, which means it needs permission level 2, the level cheats grant to single-player worlds and that operators hold by default.

In a single-player world you must have "Allow Cheats" turned on (or open the world to LAN with cheats) before it will run; on a multiplayer server the player needs to be an operator at the matching level.

This reference describes the Java Edition 1.21 form of the command; Bedrock Edition may use slightly different argument formats.

Common Mistakes

Confusing recipe unlock with item giving, /recipe only affects the recipe book, not the player's inventory.
Using the item name instead of the recipe ID, some items have multiple recipes with different IDs.

Notes

Recipes are unlocked in the recipe book UI. Players can still craft items without unlocking recipes by placing items in the crafting grid manually.

Related Commands

If /recipe is part of your toolkit, the commands below are the ones you will most often reach for alongside it: /advancement, /give, and /clear. They cover closely related tasks, so the links above jump straight to each one.

/advancement

/give

/clear

Frequently Asked Questions about /recipe

What does the /recipe command do in Minecraft?

Gives or takes recipe knowledge from players. Affects which recipes appear in the recipe book. It belongs to the data command group and was added in Java Edition 1.12.

What is the correct syntax for /recipe?

/recipe . The required arguments are action, targets, and recipe.

What permission level does /recipe need?

It requires permission Level 2 - Game Master / Cheats. On a server the player must be an operator at that level, or have cheats enabled in single-player.

What is a common mistake when using /recipe?

Confusing recipe unlock with item giving, /recipe only affects the recipe book, not the player's inventory.

Can you give an example of /recipe in use?

Yes. /recipe take @a * — removes all recipe knowledge from all players.

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