Surviving Your First Night

When you first spawn into your world, take a moment to look around and see what the terrain is like. If you don't see any trees, you should choose a direction and walk that way until you find trees. To start, walk toward the nearest tree and break its logs to collect them. In your crafting interface, break the logs down into planks and craft a crafting table, then put it down in the world. Interact with it and craft some sticks and a wooden pickaxe, then break and pick up the crafting table.

Next up, find some stone. Mine three blocks of it, and collect the cobblestone it drops. Use this to craft a stone pickaxe, then collect at least 20 more blocks of cobblestone, which will be enough to craft a full set of stone tools and a furnace. You will no longer need the wooden pickaxe. You can either use it as furnace fuel or keep it as a memento of your first day.

Craft a stone axe and take down some more trees. Wood is a vital resource throughout your Minecraft career, and you will need as much of it as you can get. Once you finish, try to kill some mobs, especially sheep, to get food.

If you have collected three wool from killing sheep, you should craft a bed (all three blocks of wool will have to be the same color). If you sleep in a bed while it is night, the game will skip the night, meaning that no hostile mobs will spawn. It will also set your respawn point and ward off phantoms for three days. You can also use it to skip thunderstorms.

While you're exploring, you should look out for stone with black or tan flecks in them. This is coal ore and iron ore. Mining coal ore will drop coal, which can be used as furnace fuel or to craft torches. Iron ore will drop raw iron, which can be smelted in a furnace to give you iron ingots. Iron ingots can be crafted into a variety of useful things, including shields, armor, and better tools. All the other sorts of ores can only be successfully mined with an iron pickaxe, so ignore them for now.

Coal ore.

Iron ore.

You should try to make a shelter before night falls, especially if you haven't managed to craft a bed yet. A good idea for a temporary shelter would be a cave. All you'd need to do would be to block off the entrance. If you haven't found a cave, just build a hut out of cobblestone or wood.

On your second day, you should try to start a garden. First of all, break tall grass to collect seeds. Then craft a hoe and find some water. Using a hoe on dirt or grass will convert it to farmland. Make sure it is within 4 blocks of water, otherwise it will revert back to dirt. Once you've made some farmland, plant the seeds in them. They will take a while to grow, but once they're full grown, you can harvest them to get wheat and more seeds, which you can replant. Wheat can be used to breed sheep and cows, and three wheat can be crafted into a loaf of bread. Sheep and cows will follow a player who is holding wheat, meaning you can lure them into a pen and breed them to start a mob farm.

Once you eventually acquire diamond gear, the options are endless in Minecraft. You can visit the Nether and the End, and once you acquire elytra from End cities, you can explore more of your world, tackle massive building projects, and basically do anything you want! But all this depends on a good start. Hopefully your first night goes well!