Once your custom blocks are craftable and placeable in the world, the next step is making sure they behave the way players expect—especially when broken. That’s where loot tables come in.

Loot tables are data files that tell Minecraft what items should drop when a block is broken, a mob is killed, or a chest is opened. In this post, we’ll start with the most common use case for modders: block drops.

By default, if you create a custom block without a loot table, it won’t drop anything when broken—even with Silk Touch or the correct tool. That’s because Minecraft doesn’t assume any behavior unless you define it explicitly. To fix that, we’ll create a simple loot table for our bubble_gum_block so it drops itself when harvested.

Later, you can get more advanced—adding tool conditions, custom item drops, multiple outputs, or even random loot chances—but for now, we’ll stick to the basics to get your custom block behaving like a proper part of the game.

Let’s dive in!