You’re staring at a massive underwater temple or a flooded basement in your latest survival base, and honestly, the thought of placing thousands of sand blocks just to clear out the water makes you want to quit the game. We’ve all been there. It’s tedious. It’s slow. It’s arguably the worst part of Minecraft ocean projects. That’s why you need sponges. But here is the thing: you can't actually "make" a sponge in the traditional sense. You won't find a crafting recipe in your table for this.
Minecraft is weirdly specific about certain items, and the sponge is one of those "trophy" blocks that you have to earn through combat or exploration. If you came here looking for a recipe involving yellow wool and some gold ingots, I'm sorry to break it to you, but that doesn't exist in the vanilla game. To get your hands on them, you’re going to have to dive deep. Literally.
The Brutal Reality of How to Make Sponge Minecraft Accessible
Since you can't craft them, "making" a sponge usable is a two-part process of hunting and drying. You find them in Elder Guardians or room caches within Ocean Monuments. These structures are massive, terrifying, and filled with lasers. If you manage to kill an Elder Guardian, it drops exactly one wet sponge. That’s it. One. Considering a single Elder Guardian is a "boss" level mob, that’s a lot of work for a single block.
The better way? Find a "Sponge Room." Not every monument has one, which is frustratingly random. If you’re lucky, you’ll stumble into a room where the ceiling is just covered in wet sponges—usually about 30 or so. This is the jackpot. Once you mine them with any tool (though hoes are technically the fastest), you have a pile of Wet Sponges.
But a wet sponge is useless. It doesn't soak up water. It just sits there, looking soggy and sad. To actually make the sponge functional, you have to dry it out.
The Smelting Method (The Classic Way)
The most common way to dry a sponge is using a furnace. You toss the Wet Sponge in the top slot, add some fuel (coal, wood, whatever), and wait.
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- Place the Wet Sponge in the furnace.
- Use a bucket of lava as fuel if you have a lot to do; it lasts a long time.
- Grab the dry sponge.
- Pro tip: If you use a glass bucket in the fuel slot while the sponge is drying, the bucket will actually fill with water. It’s a neat little mechanic most people ignore because, honestly, who needs that much water in a bucket?
The Nether Method (The Professional Way)
If you’re doing a massive drainage project, the furnace is too slow. It’s a bottleneck. Instead, take your stack of wet sponges into the Nether. The second you place a Wet Sponge on the ground in the Nether, it instantly turns into a dry sponge with a satisfying "hiss" sound. You can place them and break them instantly. It is infinitely faster than waiting for a furnace to cook through 64 blocks.
Just be careful. The Nether is dangerous, and losing a stack of sponges to a Ghast fireball or a lava lake is a tragedy you don't want to explain to your friends on the server.
Why You Actually Want These Blocks
Sponges are a literal godsend for terraforming. When you place a dry sponge, it checks a 7x7x7 area around itself. It will soak up any water blocks (up to 65 blocks total) and immediately turn into a Wet Sponge.
The physics are a bit "kinda" funky. If there is a source block right next to where the water was just removed, the water will try to flow back in. This is why pros usually section off their areas into 5x5 grids using sand or gravel before they start sponging. If you don't section it off, you're just fighting a losing battle against Minecraft's infinite water source mechanics.
The Elder Guardian Problem
Let's talk about the Elder Guardians for a second. These are the three beefy, grey-colored versions of the standard Guardian that reside in the monument. One is usually in the top room, and the other two are in the side "wings."
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They inflict Mining Fatigue III.
This is a nightmare. It makes mining blocks feel like you're trying to punch through solid steel while underwater. If you're trying to get sponges from a sponge room while under the effect of Mining Fatigue, it will take you ages to break a single block.
- Bring Milk: Drinking milk clears the Mining Fatigue effect.
- Kill them first: Don't even try to mine the sponges until all three Elder Guardians are dead.
- Doors are life: Placing a door underwater creates a 2-block high air pocket. You can stand there to breathe and reset your breath meter.
Technical Limitations and Misconceptions
People often ask if you can find sponges in shipwrecks or buried treasure.
The answer is no.
According to the official Minecraft Wiki and technical data from Mojang, sponges are strictly limited to Ocean Monuments. There was a brief period in the very early days of Minecraft (we’re talking Classic/Indev versions) where sponges were available in the creative menu and behaved differently, but in modern Survival Minecraft (Java or Bedrock), the monument is your only hope.
Another misconception is that sponges work on lava.
They don't.
If you try to "sponge" a lava lake in the Nether or the Overworld, nothing happens. The sponge stays dry, the lava stays hot, and you probably end up catching on fire because you're standing too close. Sponges are strictly for water.
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Maximizing Your Sponge Efficiency
If you have a limited number of sponges, you need to be smart.
Don't just go to the top of the ocean and start clicking.
Start from the top down.
Build a perimeter.
Use gravity-affected blocks like gravel to create "cells."
When you drop a sponge into a 5x5 cell of water, it will usually clear the whole thing from top to bottom if you're clever with placement.
If you are playing on a multiplayer server, sponges are often a high-value trade item. Because they are non-renewable (unless you find a new monument), people will pay a lot of diamonds for a stack of dry sponges. If you find a monument and clear out two or three sponge rooms, you’re basically the richest person on the server for a week.
Final Steps for Your Underwater Project
Once you've secured your sponges and dried them out—either through the furnace or the Nether hiss—you are ready to dominate the ocean.
To clear a large area effectively:
- Drop sand walls every 5 blocks to create manageable columns.
- Work from the top layer of water downwards.
- Carry a stack of torches or ladders to create quick air pockets if your Respiration III helmet isn't cutting it.
- Keep a furnace nearby or a Nether portal linked so you can recycle your sponges as soon as they get wet.
Stop wasting time with the "fill it all with dirt and dig it back out" method. It's 2026; we have better ways to build. Go find an Ocean Monument, kill the big fish, and take their sponges. It’s the only way to build an underwater base without losing your mind.