Minecraft 26.4 Snapshot 3 adds ice caves, Frostbite and a redesigned Friends list

Mojang Studios released Minecraft 26.4 Snapshot 3 on October 6, 2026. The snapshot gives the first public look at the game’s next drop, which Minecraft LIVE had already teased as a cold-weather update. It adds a new Ice Caves biome, the Frostbite mob, the Freezing mob effect and Ice Balls, while also reworking Friends and player-management screens.

Mojang is asking players to send feedback on the winter features through its official site. Alongside the underground additions, the studio refreshed the Friends list, added search and sorting tools, and replaced Social Interactions with a new Other Players menu.

Ice caves add a frozen underground biome

The new Ice Caves biome can generate under colder biomes in the Overworld. Mojang says it is built mainly from Packed Ice and Calcite, with Icicles hanging from the ceiling, large Icicles made of Packed Ice generating on the ground and from ceilings, and patches of Snow appearing on the floor. Ores can generate in pockets of Stone and Deepslate, while Glow Lichen does not generate in this biome.

Ice Crystals can also appear on the ground. Mojang describes them as crystal-like blocks similar to Amethyst Clusters. They break if the support block is removed, emit light and can be placed in any direction.

Icicles are the biome’s other notable block. They work like speleothem-style blocks, can be placed in any direction and have base, middle and tip variants. Naturally generated Icicles can grow up to five blocks long when pointing downward, but only in areas without nearby light sources and outside the Nether. They break if exposed to nearby light or placed in the Nether, and they deal damage when they fall or when entities land on them.

The technical notes add more detail on frozen cave generation. Mojang introduced a new ice_cave_gradient noise, along with ore placements for coal, copper, diamond, iron, gold, lapis, redstone, andesite, diorite and gravel. Those placements work like their non-ice-cave versions, except they first place a patch of stone or deepslate before the ore, and they can also replace Ice and Calcite. The biome also uses new tags for replaceable blocks, Icicle melting and large Icicle generation.

Frostbite and Freezing expand combat

Snapshot 26.4 also adds Frostbite, a zombie variant that can throw Ice Balls. Mojang says Frostbite spawns in cold and icy biomes, switches between melee and ranged combat based on target distance and whether it has Ice Balls, and uses melee attacks that apply Freezing. Its ranged attacks throw Ice Balls instead.

Frostbite is immune to freezing and does not get slowed by the Freezing effect or Powder Snow. It can stand on top of Powder Snow, drops Rotten Flesh and Ice Balls, and transforms into a Zombie if it stays underwater long enough. Zombies and Husks also transform into Frostbites when they are inside Powder Snow.

The new Freezing mob effect makes players shake and eventually take damage. It slowly freezes affected players as if they were in Powder Snow for its duration. Leather Armor protects against the damage in the same way it does with Powder Snow, but it does not stop the effect from being applied or remove it once active. Mobs take extra damage while affected, and vulnerable mobs take five times as much.

Ice Balls are the Frostbite’s projectile. Mojang says they deal 4 damage to entities they hit, scaling down with velocity, and break on impact with blocks or entities, creating a particle effect and sound. The snapshot also lets players use Ice Balls in brewing: Lingering Potion, Splash Potion and Potion of Freezing can be brewed with them, and Arrows of Freezing can be crafted by placing a Lingering Potion of Freezing in the center of the crafting table with eight Arrows around it.

Friends, Player Options and Other Players change multiplayer tools

Beyond the icy content, Mojang made a broad set of changes to social menus. The Friends list has a refreshed design, plus new search and sorting options. In the Friends tab, the profile name text box used for sending requests also works as a search box. In the requests tab, a search box appears at the top if a player has 15 or more requests.

A new sort button cycles through two modes: online friends first, and alphabetical order. Clicking a player’s icon in the Friends list now opens Player Options, and the old Remove Friend button has been removed from the list and moved into that screen. The Friends button also has a new icon, while the Visibility option has been moved from Online Options into the Friends list.

Player Options is a new screen available from both the Friends list and Other Players. It groups actions that were previously spread across Friends and Social Interactions, including sending or canceling friend requests, accepting or declining requests, muting players and reporting players. Muting hides a player’s chat messages until the next time the game starts, and blocking players is handled through Other Players.

Social Interactions itself has been replaced by Other Players. The menu is available only in worlds open to multiplayer, including singleplayer worlds opened to LAN, dedicated servers and Realms. Players can open it from the pause menu or with the default P key in game. It lists players currently online, plus players who were recently online or who recently sent chat messages. Clicking a player’s icon there also opens Player Options.

Reporting, debug tools and smaller changes

Mojang also updated player reporting. Saved report drafts no longer ask players to discard them when leaving a world if they can still be continued later. Chat reports cannot be continued, but name and skin reports can be continued if the reported player is in the Friends list. The main menu’s Quit Game button now warns players if an unsent draft report would be lost.

On the debug side, a new chunk_section_status field shows the rendering status of chunks nearby, and Mojang says it can affect performance at high view distances. The chunk load overlay has been split off from visualize_chunks_on_server into a separate chunk_load_status option. Lightmap visualization can now be configured as lightmap_texture in debug options, saved with the debug profile and shown alongside the FPS and network charts.

The snapshot also includes smaller gameplay tweaks. Snow can now be placed on Packed Ice, and Snowballs now apply knockback to players. Mojang also added a new block_sound_set registry, new tags for pathfinding and Ice Cave generation, and item tags including #frostbite_preferred_weapons, #knocks_back_players_even_with_zero_damage and #sheep_wool_dyes.

Finally, Mojang updated the Data Pack version to 123.0 and the Resource Pack version to 100.0. The announcement ends by inviting players to try the new winter features and share feedback.