You're standing over a pool of lava. It’s glowing, orange, and frankly, a massive pain to move. You’ve got a diamond pickaxe, but you’re tired of the grind. You want that Nether portal, or maybe you're building a massive wither-proof vault, but the thought of trekking back to the mantle of the earth for more buckets makes you want to alt-f4. Here is the thing: you don't actually have to mine it the old-fashioned way. Learning how to make infinite obsidian is basically a rite of passage for any player moving from the "surviving the night" phase to the "industrial revolution" phase of the game.
Most people think obsidian is a non-renewable resource. They see a lake, they dump water, they mine. When the lake is gone, they move on. That’s a rookie mistake. Minecraft’s mechanics are actually quite broken in the best way possible. If you understand how the game handles "snapshots" of blocks during portal generation or how certain entity interactions work, you can basically print obsidian like it's paper.
The Nether Portal Glitch That Still Works
The most reliable way to handle this involves the way the game generates portals. When you step into a Nether portal, the game checks if there’s a corresponding portal on the other side. If it doesn't find one within a certain range, it creates one. It literally spawns 14 blocks of obsidian out of thin air. This is the foundation of the simplest "infinite" farm.
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It’s kinda funny how many people ignore this. You build a portal in the Overworld. You go through. Then, you have a friend (or a second account) break that portal in the Nether while you're still in it. When you head back through a different exit or respawn and come back, the game sees no portal and generates a brand new one. Free blocks.
But that's slow. If you’re playing solo, you want something automated. To really master how to make infinite obsidian, you need to look at the End.
The End Platform: Your New Best Friend
If you've ever fought the Ender Dragon, you know about the 5x5 obsidian platform you spawn on. This is the holy grail of resource gathering. Every single time an entity—any entity, even a dropped item or a snowball—goes through the End portal in the Overworld, the game resets that 5x5 platform. It replaces whatever is there with fresh obsidian.
Think about the math. A 5x5 platform is 25 blocks. If you can automate a system that sends an item through the portal, mines the blocks, and repeats, you're looking at thousands of blocks per hour.
Why the End Platform is Better Than Lava Mining
Lava is finite. Even in the massive caves of 1.20 and beyond, you eventually run out of nearby pools. Plus, mining underwater or over lava is dangerous. One wrong move and your "Efficiency V" pickaxe is toasted. The End platform is safe. There’s no lava. There’s just the void, and if you build a simple floor under the platform, even that’s not a threat.
It’s honestly the most consistent method. You don’t need to find new chunks. You don’t need to wait for lava to flow. You just need to keep that portal "ticked" and refreshed.
Building the "Wither Rose" Industrial Farm
If you want to go truly hardcore, you don't mine the obsidian yourself. That’s what Withers are for. This is where things get a bit technical, but stay with me. You can actually trap a Wither underneath the return portal in the End. Because the Wither’s "blue skull" attacks and its "dash" move can break almost any block—including obsidian—you can set up a system where the Wither does the manual labor for you.
You use a chunk loader to keep the Overworld side active. You drop items into the End portal. This regenerates the 25 obsidian blocks. The Wither, sensing a "target" (like a snow golem tucked safely behind bedrock), tries to attack. In its path is the newly spawned obsidian. The Wither breaks it, the blocks drop as items, and you collect them with a hopper minecart system running underneath.
It sounds like a mad scientist project. It kinda is. But it's how technical players on servers like SciCraft manage to build entire cities out of the stuff.
Redstone and the "Lava to Obsidian" Myth
Let’s address a common misconception. You’ll see old videos claiming you can use redstone dust to turn water into obsidian. This was a "feature" (bug) in much older versions of Minecraft where placing redstone next to lava and then hitting it with water would trigger a block update that resulted in obsidian instead of cobblestone.
That’s gone. It’s been patched for years.
Don't waste your time trying to find a "glitch" that uses redstone. If you see a tutorial telling you to use string or redstone to "dupe" obsidian, check the upload date. It’s probably from 2014. In 2026, the game is much more stable regarding fluid interactions. Modern Minecraft is all about entity-based regeneration.
Piglin Bartering: The Lazy Man's Method
Maybe you don't need millions of blocks. Maybe you just need a few stacks for an enchantment room. If you don't want to build a massive Wither-powered death machine, just use gold.
Piglin bartering is a legitimate way to get obsidian. It's not "creating" it in the same sense as the End platform, but it's infinite because gold is infinite (thanks to zombie pigman farms).
- Piglins have about an 8.71% chance to drop 1 unit of obsidian.
- They also drop "Crying Obsidian," which looks cool but isn't as useful for building.
- You can set up a gold farm in the Nether roof.
- The gold nuggets turn into ingots.
- The ingots get fed to trapped Piglins.
- Hoppers collect the output.
It’s passive. You can go AFK, grab a coffee, and come back to a chest full of purple-black rocks. It's much slower than the End platform method, but it requires zero risk of a Wither escaping and destroying your base.
The Technical Reality of Block Updates
The reason how to make infinite obsidian works so well in the End is because of the onEntityCollidedWithBlock check. Minecraft’s code is a giant stack of "if/then" statements. If "Entity X" enters "Portal Y," then "Generate Platform Z."
The game doesn't check if the platform is already there. It doesn't check if you've been there in the last five seconds. It just executes the command to place those 25 blocks. This is why the platform method is the king of all obsidian generation. You're not "glitching" the game; you're just using the world's own rules against it.
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Efficiency Tips for the Serious Builder
If you’re going to mine the End platform manually, use a Beacon. Haste II is non-negotiable. Obsidian takes 9.4 seconds to mine with a diamond pickaxe without enchantments. With Efficiency V and Haste II, that drops to about 1.45 seconds.
That’s a massive difference. Over 25 blocks, you’re looking at nearly four minutes of holding down the left-click button without a beacon, versus about 35 seconds with one. If you’re doing this for hours, the beacon pays for itself in the first ten minutes.
Also, bring an Ender Chest. It’s made of obsidian anyway, so it fits the theme. Fill it with shulker boxes. There’s no point in having an infinite source if you don't have the inventory space to carry it back to your build site.
Actionable Next Steps for Your World
Start small. Don't try to build the Wither-powered mega-farm on day one.
First, get yourself to the End and clear out the area around the obsidian spawn platform. Mark the coordinates. Build a small collection area with some chests.
Second, set up a simple "trash dropper" in the Overworld at the End portal. Use a hopper and a dropper on a clock circuit to throw one useless item (like seeds or dirt) into the portal every 10 seconds.
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Third, head into the End and mine the platform. By the time you’ve finished mining the 25 blocks, the dropper in the Overworld will have sent another item through, and the platform will have respawned.
You’ll have a double chest of obsidian faster than you think. It's a game-changer for anyone who wants to stop playing "mining simulator" and start playing "master builder." Once you have the obsidian, your next move is usually a gold farm to fuel the bartering side of things, creating a closed-loop economy where you never have to touch a cave again.
Summary of the Best Infinite Methods
For those who want the quick breakdown: the End Platform is the highest yield, Piglin Bartering is the easiest to automate passively, and Nether Portal "Resetting" is the best for early-game players who haven't reached the dragon yet. Just stay away from the old redstone "glitch" videos—they’ll only waste your time and your lava.