How to Get Elytra in Minecraft: End City Guide, Repair & Flying Tips
The elytra is the single biggest upgrade in Minecraft survival: a pair of wings that turns a twenty-minute walk into a one-minute glide. Learning how to get elytra in minecraft means accepting one thing up front — this is endgame loot. There is no shortcut, no trade and no lucky chest in the Overworld. You have to reach the End, beat the Ender Dragon, and raid a floating ship guarded by shulkers.
This guide walks the whole journey step by step: the trip to the outer End islands, how to find an End city that actually has a ship, how to grab the elytra without losing it to the void, and then how flying, firework boosting, repair and enchantments work once the wings are yours. Everything below works on Bedrock (phone, console, Windows) and Java, with Bedrock differences flagged where they matter.
First, the Honest Part: Elytra Cannot Be Crafted
Say it plainly, because a lot of fake “recipes” float around online: there is no crafting recipe for elytra, and there never has been. You cannot make them from phantom membranes, leather, feathers or anything else. Villagers don’t sell them, they don’t drop from any mob, and no chest in the Overworld or Nether contains them.
In survival, elytra generate in exactly one place: an item frame inside the treasure room of an End ship, in the outer islands of the End. The good news buried in that bad news? Every End ship that generates contains one elytra in that frame — it is guaranteed, not a lucky roll. Your whole job is finding a ship.
What to Bring on the Trip
The outer End is unforgiving: one wrong step is the void. Pack like it matters.
| Item | Why you need it |
|---|---|
| Diamond or netherite armor and weapons | Shulkers and the dragon fight come first |
| 2+ stacks of cheap blocks (cobblestone, netherrack) | Bridging between outer islands |
| Ender pearls (a stack or more) | Using End gateways and emergency teleports |
| A good bow and arrows | Killing shulkers from range |
| Slow falling potions (optional) | Shulker levitation becomes harmless |
| An ender chest | Bank the elytra safely the moment you grab it |
| Plenty of food | The search can take a long while |
If you are still early in your world’s progression, work up to this properly — our first night survival guide covers the basics that everything else builds on.
Step 1: Reach the End and Beat the Ender Dragon
Elytra live beyond the dragon fight, so step one is getting to the End and winning it. Find a stronghold with eyes of ender, activate the End portal, and go through prepared for a real boss fight: destroy the End crystals on the obsidian pillars first, then wear the dragon down when it perches on the exit portal.
If you have never built or used the game’s portals before, our complete portals guide covers the End portal, Nether portals and the gateway portals you are about to use, step by step.
The moment the dragon dies, two things appear on the main island: the exit portal back home, and a small End gateway — a floating ring of bedrock with a beam of light — somewhere near the edge of the island. That gateway is your road to elytra country. Each time you kill the dragon again, a new gateway generates, up to twenty in total.
Step 2: Use the End Gateway to Reach the Outer Islands
The gateway portal block sits inside a bedrock frame with only a one-block gap, so you can’t walk or swim through it. The standard method is to throw an ender pearl straight into the glowing portal block. You teleport instantly to the outer islands, roughly a thousand blocks from the main island, and a matching return gateway generates near where you land — that is your way back, so note its location.
Two alternatives worth knowing:
- The chorus fruit trick. Chorus fruit, harvested from the purple chorus plants all over the outer islands, teleports you up to 8 blocks in a random direction when eaten — through solid blocks, unlike a pearl. Press yourself against the gateway’s bedrock frame and eat fruit until a teleport pops you through the gap. It is random, so bring several fruit, and never rely on it near a cliff edge: it will not drop you into the void or into lava, but it can put you somewhere awkward.
- Bridging. You can simply build a bridge from the main island toward the outer islands — but that is around a thousand blocks over the void, eating your entire block supply and your nerve. The gateway exists for a reason. Use it.
Step 3: Find an End City That Has a Ship
The outer islands are endless, and End cities generate across them without limit — but cities are scattered, and only some End cities generate with an End ship. There is no map, compass or eye-of-ender equivalent for finding them; this part is honest exploration. Travel in a straight line, mark your path, and scan the horizon for tall purpur towers. When you find a city with no ship attached, loot it if you like (the chests carry strong gear) and keep moving — the elytra is only ever on a ship.
When a ship does generate, it floats beside the city, connected by a short bridge from one of the towers. Inside, the ship holds:
- The elytra, in an item frame in the treasure room — guaranteed, one per ship.
- A dragon head mounted on the bow, a pure trophy block.
- Two loot chests, often holding diamonds and enchanted gear.
- One shulker guarding the treasure room.
Step 4: Grab the Elytra Without Losing It
That guarding shulker is more dangerous than it looks. Its homing bullets inflict Levitation, which floats you helplessly upward — and when the effect ends over a ship deck floating above nothing, you fall. Kill the shulker with a bow from the bridge before you step inside, or carry slow falling potions so a hit becomes a gentle drift instead of a death sentence.
Once it’s dead, punch the item frame, pick up the elytra, and put it straight into your ender chest. Players have lost their first elytra to a stray enderman, a misclick and the void. Banked in an ender chest, it survives even if you don’t.
To get home, return to the gateway you arrived through and pearl through it again — you’ll land back at the main island, where the exit portal returns you to your spawn point.
How Flying Actually Works
Equip the elytra in your chestplate slot — remember you are trading away your chestplate’s protection while you wear it, because elytra give zero armor. To start gliding, run off an edge and press jump again while falling (on Bedrock, tap jump mid-fall; touching water or pressing jump again cancels the glide).
Flight is controlled by where you look:
- Look down to dive and gain speed; look level for the best glide distance — roughly 10 blocks forward for every block of height, so a launch from a high tower covers serious ground.
- Look up to climb briefly, but pitch too steeply (around 30° or more) and you stall, dropping fast enough to hurt.
- Land gently. Coming in steep or slamming into a wall at speed causes “kinetic energy” damage. Flare upward just before touchdown to bleed off speed.
Firework Boosting — and the One Safety Rule
Gliding is free, but firework rockets turn the elytra into real flight: use a rocket while gliding and you surge in the direction you’re facing at about 33.5 blocks per second, climbing included. Rockets don’t even cost durability — the elytra only drains from gliding time itself.
The one safety rule, which every experienced player learns exactly once the hard way: only boost with plain rockets — paper and gunpowder, no firework star. A rocket crafted with a firework star explodes at the end of its flight and damages everything nearby, including you, mid-air, at speed. Plain rockets cannot explode at all. Flight-duration-1 rockets (one gunpowder) also give you the most total boost per gunpowder, so craft those for flying and save the fancy star rockets for shows. Our tips and tricks page collects more of these small rules that save big headaches.
Durability, Repair and Phantom Membranes
An elytra has 432 points of durability on Java and 433 on Bedrock, and it loses exactly one point per second of gliding — about 7 minutes and 12 seconds of flight per full repair. When durability reaches 1, the wings take on a tattered texture and stop working — but crucially, they never break or disappear. An elytra can always be repaired, forever.
Your repair options:
| Method | How it works | Keeps enchantments? |
|---|---|---|
| Anvil + phantom membranes | Each membrane restores 25% durability (108 points); 4 membranes = full repair | Yes |
| Anvil + second elytra | Combines both pairs’ durability | Yes |
| Crafting grid / grindstone + second elytra | Adds both durabilities together, plus a 21-point bonus | No — use the anvil instead |
Phantom membranes come from phantoms, the flying mobs that spawn at night over players who haven’t slept or died for three in-game days. They hunt in groups of one to four, drop 0–1 membrane each (more with Looting), and burn in daylight like other undead mobs. Deliberately skipping sleep for a few nights near your base — with a roof nearby and a sword ready — is the standard membrane farm. A tamed cat helps: phantoms keep their distance from cats.
The Two Enchantments That Matter: Mending and Unbreaking
Elytra can’t go on an enchanting table. Instead, apply enchanted books on an anvil — and only two enchantments really matter:
- Unbreaking III gives every durability point a chance to last four times as long on average, stretching a full repair to roughly 28 minutes 48 seconds of gliding.
- Mending spends the XP you collect to repair the wings as you play. With Mending, membrane runs become an occasional top-up instead of a routine.
Get both on one pair and durability basically stops being a concern. Librarian villagers are the most reliable Mending source — our enchanting table guide explains how enchanting and book trading fit together. (Elytra can also receive the two curses, Vanishing and Binding — you don’t want either.)
Troubleshooting: Common Elytra Problems
- “I found three cities and no ship.” Normal. Ships are the exception, not the rule — keep traveling in one direction and checking each city. Your elytra exists; it’s a distance problem, not a luck problem.
- “My wings stopped working mid-flight.” Durability hit 1. You won’t fall out of the sky instantly — you stop gliding and drop, so fly with a durability buffer and land before empty.
- “I keep taking damage when I land.” You’re coming in too steep or too fast. Approach shallow, flare up at the last moment, and never aim directly at a wall.
- “I died in the End with my elytra.” If you banked it in an ender chest, it’s safe. If not, your items sit where you died — the return gateway makes recovery possible, so go back quickly and carefully.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can you craft an elytra in Minecraft?
No. There is no crafting recipe for elytra in any edition, and no villager trade or mob drop gives one. In survival, the only source is the item frame in an End ship’s treasure room, in the outer islands of the End — one guaranteed elytra per ship.
Do you have to kill the Ender Dragon to get elytra?
Effectively, yes. The End gateways that teleport you to the outer islands only generate after a dragon kill (one per kill, up to twenty). Technically you could bridge roughly a thousand blocks of void from the main island without fighting, but it is slow and dangerous — beating the dragon is the intended and far easier route.
How do you repair an elytra without another elytra?
On an anvil, using phantom membranes. Each membrane restores 25% of the elytra’s durability (108 points), so four membranes fully repair a completely worn pair, and anvil repairs preserve your enchantments. Get membranes by killing phantoms, which spawn at night after three in-game days without sleep.
Does using firework rockets damage the elytra?
No. Firework boosting costs no durability at all — elytra durability drains only from gliding time, one point per second. The real rocket danger is different: rockets made with a firework star explode and damage you. Fly only with plain paper-and-gunpowder rockets.
What happens when elytra durability runs out?
At 1 durability the elytra become tattered and stop gliding, but they are never destroyed. The item stays in your inventory, fully repairable with phantom membranes on an anvil — an elytra is a permanent item once you own one.
Conclusion
Getting an elytra is a journey with a guaranteed prize: beat the dragon, pearl through a gateway, explore until a city with a ship appears, kill one shulker, and the wings are yours — then bank them in an ender chest before you do anything else. Keep them repaired with phantom membranes, add Mending and Unbreaking III when you can, boost only with plain rockets, and the whole map shrinks to minutes. For the full, verified details on any mechanic above, the Minecraft Wiki’s elytra page is the reference this guide follows.
