How to duplicate sulfur cubes in Minecraft is something every player asks after catching their first one from the sulfur caves. You cannot breed them like animals. Instead, duplication works through a split-and-grow cycle that turns one large cube into two, then four, then eight. This guide walks you through every step clearly.
- Sulfur cubes cannot be bred — there is no pairing mechanic.
- Kill a large sulfur cube and it splits into two small cubes.
- Small cubes grow into large ones after 20 minutes.
- Feed small cubes slimeballs to shorten the growth timer.
- Feed a small cube a golden dandelion to freeze it small permanently.
- A cube with an absorbed block is immune to most damage — remove the block with shears before killing it.
- Small cubes drop no loot — only kill large ones during your cycle.
Can You Breed Sulfur Cubes in Minecraft?
No. There is no breeding mechanic for sulfur cubes. You cannot feed two adult cubes a special item to produce a baby the way you can with most animals in Minecraft. The only way to increase your sulfur cube population is through splitting.
When you kill a large sulfur cube, it splits into two small sulfur cubes. Those small cubes grow into large ones on their own over time. Kill those large cubes, get four small ones, wait again, and so on. This is the entire duplication system — one large cube becomes two, which become four, which become eight.
How to Duplicate Sulfur Cubes Step by Step
Step 1 — Get a Large Sulfur Cube Without a Block Inside
You need a large sulfur cube that has not absorbed a block. Once a cube absorbs a block, it becomes immune to most types of damage and will not split when hit. If your cube already has a block inside it, use shears to remove it first. Right-click the cube with shears and the absorbed block drops as an item. The cube is now vulnerable again and ready to be killed.
If you do not have a sulfur cube yet, head to the sulfur caves biome. Look for sulfur springs on the surface — small patches of yellow and red blocks with noxious gas bubbling up. Dig down beneath one and you will find sulfur caves at around Y-level -32 or lower. Catch a large cube using an empty bucket.
Step 2 — Kill the Large Sulfur Cube
Hit the large cube until it dies. A large sulfur cube has 8 hearts of health on Java Edition and 9 hearts on Bedrock. Any weapon works. When it dies, it splits into two small sulfur cubes. These small cubes have 4 hearts each and bounce around erratically.
Do not worry about them escaping if you are inside a walled pen. For full pen setup instructions, see the sulfur cube farm guide.
One important rule: do not kill small cubes. Small sulfur cubes drop nothing at all — no loot, no experience, no blocks. They exist only to grow. Leave them alone and let the timer run.
Step 3 — Wait 20 Minutes for Small Cubes to Grow
Each small sulfur cube takes 20 minutes of real time to grow into a large cube. This is the same timer used by baby mobs in Minecraft. The timer only counts down while the chunk is loaded, so stay close to your pen or keep the area in render distance.
Once both small cubes reach full size, you now have two large cubes instead of one. Kill one, let the two offspring grow, and you have three large cubes. Kill two, grow four small ones, and your population doubles every cycle.
Step 4 — Repeat the Cycle
That is the entire loop. Kill large cubes, collect small offspring, wait for them to grow, kill again. You never need to go back to the sulfur caves to catch more cubes once you have your starter population penned at base.
How to Speed Up Sulfur Cube Growth With Slimeballs
The 20-minute wait is the slowest part of the duplication cycle. You can shorten it by feeding small sulfur cubes slimeballs. Hold slimeballs in your hand and right-click a small cube to feed it. Each slimeball reduces the remaining growth time. Feed several in a row to cut the wait significantly.
Slimeballs also attract small sulfur cubes — they will hop toward you when you hold them. This makes herding them inside a pen much easier. Build a mob farm targeting swamp slimes to keep a steady supply of slimeballs coming in. A regular slime farm gives you more than enough slimeballs to keep every small cube on an accelerated growth schedule.
How to Stop a Sulfur Cube From Growing
If you want a small cube to stay small permanently, feed it a golden dandelion. This freezes the growth timer completely. The cube will never grow into a large one unless you want it to.
This is useful if you want a decorative pen of small cubes, need compact cubes for a tight build, or simply want to collect a small cube without it outgrowing its container. A bucketed cube also pauses its growth timer — it will not grow while stored in a bucket and resumes the timer when placed back down.
What Happens When a Cube With an Absorbed Block Is Killed?
If you kill a large cube that already holds an absorbed block, the block drops as an item and the cube still splits into two small cubes as normal. However, this is a waste unless you intended to recover the block. Those two small cubes will not have any absorbed block inside them — they start clean.
There is one dangerous exception. Do not kill a cube holding TNT that has already been ignited. An ignited TNT cube will explode and die without splitting, leaving no offspring and potentially destroying your pen. Shears cannot remove an active TNT fuse. Keep TNT cubes completely separate from your duplication area.
For the full list of every block a sulfur cube can absorb and what each one does, see the block absorption guide.
How to Prevent Your Sulfur Cubes From Despawning
Sulfur cubes despawn like other passive mobs if you move too far away from them. If your starter cube or your grown population despawns before you get the cycle going, you will need to return to the caves. Two methods prevent this:
- Name tag — apply a name tag at an anvil and right-click the cube with it. Named cubes never despawn, even after being bucketed and placed back down. This is the best option for your starter cube and any cube you want to keep long-term.
- Bucket storage — a cube stored in a bucket does not count toward the mob cap and does not despawn. Store spare large cubes in buckets when not actively running the duplication cycle. The bucket tooltip shows the name of any block the cube has absorbed.
Always name your very first large cube before you start the duplication process. Losing the starter to despawn when you step away is the most common mistake new players make with this mob.
How Many Cubes Can You Have?
Sulfur cubes count toward the passive mob cap. Once enough passive mobs exist near the player, no new ones will naturally spawn. This does not stop your cubes from growing — the growth timer runs independently of the mob cap — but it may affect other passive animals spawning in your world.
Keep your pen population at a practical size. You rarely need more than 8 to 10 large cubes at once. Bucket any extras to remove them from the mob cap while keeping them safe for later use.
Duplication vs Natural Spawning — Which Is Better?
Natural spawning only works inside sulfur caves at light level 0. You cannot build an artificial spawn room for sulfur cubes the way you can for slimes using slime chunks. They will not spawn in player-built structures, even if you replicate the cave conditions.
This means the split-and-grow duplication method is the only reliable way to build a population at your base. Natural cave spawns are useful for catching your first cube, but everything after that runs through the duplication cycle.
For a full pen build with walls, lighting, and dispenser automation, see the complete sulfur cube farm guide. For the full sulfur cube mob overview including spawn conditions and bucket behavior, see the sulfur cube mob guide.
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