Armor Trims in Minecraft: All 18 Templates and Where to Find Them

There are 18 armor trims in Minecraft. Each one comes from a smithing template, and each template comes from one place in the world. This guide lists all 18, with the exact chance to find each one.

You will also get the duplication block for every template and all 11 trim materials. We also cover the mistakes that waste rare templates. Everything here was checked against the Minecraft Wiki for Java 26.3 and Bedrock 26.52.

Quick answer: Minecraft has 18 armor trim smithing templates. Most come from chests in structures. Examples are pillager outposts, jungle temples, shipwrecks, and ancient cities. Tide drops from elder guardians. Four more come from brushing suspicious gravel in trail ruins. Trims are cosmetic only.

Armor Trims at a Glance

Question	Answer
How many trim templates?	18
How many trim materials?	11
What does a trim do?	Changes how armor looks. Nothing else.
Where do you apply a trim?	At a smithing table
Is the template used up?	Yes, one template per trim
How do you copy a template?	7 diamonds + the template + 1 matching block
Rarest template?	Silence (1.25% per ancient city chest)

Every Armor Trim and Where to Find It

This table lists every trim, the structure it comes from, and the chance from the wiki. The chances are the same in Java and Bedrock.

Trim	Where to find it	Chance
Sentry	Pillager outpost chest	25% (2 templates)
Vex	Woodland mansion chest	50%
Wild	Jungle temple chest	33.3% (2 templates)
Coast	Shipwreck chests	16.7% (2 templates)
Dune	Desert pyramid chest	14.3% (2 templates)
Wayfinder	Trail ruins, rare suspicious gravel	8.3%
Raiser	Trail ruins, rare suspicious gravel	8.3%
Shaper	Trail ruins, rare suspicious gravel	8.3%
Host	Trail ruins, rare suspicious gravel	8.3%
Ward	Ancient city chest	5%
Silence	Ancient city chest	1.25%
Tide	Dropped by elder guardians	20%
Snout	Bastion remnant chests	8.3%
Rib	Nether fortress chest	6.7%
Eye	Stronghold altar chest	10%
Spire	End city chest	6.7%
Flow	Trial chamber ominous vault	22.5%
Bolt	Trial chamber vault and reward chest	6.3%

A few notes on the table:

• Sentry, Wild, Coast, and Dune always come as a pair. That means you can use one and keep one.
• Coast can appear in the shipwreck treasure, map, and supply chests.
• Snout can appear in the bridge, treasure, hoglin stable, and generic chests in a bastion.
• Every stronghold library chest holds an Eye template. The altar chest has the 10% chance listed above.
• In woodland mansions, only the chests with random loot can hold Vex. The fixed-loot rooms never do.
• Tide is not a chest drop. An elder guardian has a 20% chance to drop it. Looting does not change that, and a player does not need to land the kill.

The wiki also marks some templates as rarer than others. Silence is epic. Ward, Eye, Vex, and Spire are rare. All the others are uncommon.

Which Armor Trims Are Easiest to Get?

Start with the structures you can reach early. Then work toward the ones that need gear or luck. This order saves the most time.

Early game (no special gear):

• Sentry. Pillager outposts. The chest is at the top of the tower. Pillagers guard it, so go in with armor and a weapon.
• Wild. Jungle temples. The 33.3% chance is the best of the early-game trims. There are two chests, and one is hidden, so check both.
• Coast. Shipwrecks. Check all three chest types.
• Dune. Desert pyramids. Four chests are hidden under the floor. A pressure plate there is wired to TNT, so do not step on it.

Mid game:

• Rib. Nether fortresses. Chests appear only at some corridor turns, so you may need more than one fortress. Our guide on finding a nether fortress helps here.
• Snout. Bastion remnants. Four chest types can hold it. You open about 12 chests on average to find one.
• Eye. Strongholds. The library chest always has one.
• Vex. Woodland mansions. The 50% chance is high, but mansions are dangerous.
• Tide. Elder guardians, which live in ocean monuments. The drop chance is 20% per kill.

Late game:

• Spire. End cities.
• Ward. Ancient cities. The chance is 5% per chest, or about one in every 20.
• Flow and Bolt. Trial chambers. Flow comes from the ominous vault. Bolt comes from a regular vault or reward chest. Our trial chambers guide covers the vaults, and you can learn how to find trial chambers here.
• Wayfinder, Raiser, Shaper, and Host. Trail ruins. Brush the suspicious gravel and look for the rare drops.

How Hard Is the Silence Trim?

Silence is the hardest trim by a wide margin. The chance is 1.25% per ancient city chest. That is about one template for every 80 chests.

Because it is so rare, duplicate it as soon as you get it. Our Silence trim guide covers the route in more detail.

Silence also looks different from the rest. Most trims cover a small part of the armor. Silence lets the trim color cover most of the armor.

How to Duplicate Armor Trim Templates

Templates are used up when you apply them. So copy any rare template before you use it.

The recipe is the same for every template. Put 7 diamonds, the template you want to copy, and one matching block in a crafting table. You get 2 templates back. If you need diamonds, our Y level guide shows where to dig.

The block you need depends on the template:

Template	Matching block (Java)
Sentry, Vex, Coast	Cobblestone
Wild	Mossy cobblestone
Dune	Sandstone
Wayfinder, Raiser, Shaper, Host	Terracotta
Ward, Silence	Cobbled deepslate
Tide	Prismarine
Snout	Blackstone
Rib	Netherrack
Eye	End stone
Spire	Purpur block
Flow	Breeze rod
Bolt	Block of copper (waxed also works)

Flow is the odd one out. It is the only template that uses an item and not a block.

Bedrock accepts a few extra blocks for some templates. Tide, dune, and spire can use more block types there. These include prismarine bricks, dark prismarine, other sandstone types, and purpur pillars. Java is stricter, so stick to the table if you play Java.

All 11 Armor Trim Materials

The template sets the pattern. The material sets the color. You need one material for each trim.

Material	Color
Iron ingot	Light gray
Copper ingot	Orange-brown
Gold ingot	Yellow
Lapis lazuli	Blue
Emerald	Green
Diamond	Cyan
Netherite ingot	Dark gray
Redstone dust	Dark red
Amethyst shard	Purple
Nether quartz	Cream white
Resin brick	Bright orange

With 18 patterns and 11 colors, you can make 198 different trims.

If the armor and the trim material match, the game uses a slightly darker color for the trim. For example, a copper trim on copper armor is darker than a copper trim on iron armor. Pick a different material if you want the pattern to pop.

Two materials were added later. Resin brick came in Java 1.21.4. Copper armor, which can also be trimmed, came in Java 1.21.9. Older guides list only 10 materials, so they are out of date.

How to Apply an Armor Trim

You need a smithing table, one trim template, one armor piece, and one trim material.

1. Open the smithing table.
2. Put the trim template in the first slot.
3. Put the armor piece in the second slot. A helmet, chestplate, leggings, or boots all work.
4. Put the trim material in the third slot.
5. Take the trimmed armor from the result slot.

Leather armor can be trimmed too.

For a longer walkthrough with screenshots, read our guide to applying armor trims.

Common Mistakes With Armor Trims

A few small rules cause most of the wasted templates.

One trim per piece. If you trim armor that already has a trim, the new trim replaces the old one. A piece of armor cannot hold two trims at once. Make sure you want the new look first.

The template is gone after one use. There is no refund. Duplicate rare templates before you apply them.

Netherite trim material does not protect your armor. Trims never change stats. A diamond chestplate with a netherite trim still burns if you drop it in lava.

A gold trim does not make armor gold to piglins. Piglins do not pick up gold-trimmed armor. They also stay hostile if you wear it, unless the armor itself is gold.

The netherite upgrade is not a trim. It is a smithing template too, but it upgrades diamond gear into netherite gear. It is not one of the 18 trims. When you upgrade, your trims stay on the armor. Our guides on getting netherite and making a netherite armor set show the full process.

Which Trim and Material Look Best?

This part is taste, so there is no single answer. A dark base like netherite makes bright materials stand out. A bright base like diamond looks better with a color that contrasts.

For ready-made ideas, see our guide to the best armor trim combinations.

What Changed Over Time

The trim list has grown since 1.20. Here is a short timeline.

• 1.20: Trims launched, and the 16 original templates came with the update.
• 1.21: Flow and Bolt were added, which made 18.
• Java 1.21.4: Resin brick became a trim material.
• Java 1.21.9: Copper armor was added, and it can be trimmed.

If a guide lists 11 or 16 trims, it is out of date.

Frequently Asked Questions

Trims are the best way to make strong armor look like your own. Collect the easy templates first. Duplicate the rare ones. Then pick a material that stands out on your armor.