Minecraft EnchantMechanic
Enchantment Costs: Minecraft Guide | Minecraft Enchant
Enchantment weight, book transfer cost, and prior-work penalties in Java 26.2. Data, usage, and compatibility for Java 26.2. Practical guidance and sources included.
- Operation limit
- Up to 39 levels in Survival
- Source
- Vanilla datapack
- Prior-work penalty
- 0, 1, 3, 7, 15…
- Optimization
- Balanced book combining
Enchantment cost
Each enchantment has an anvil_cost. Book transfer uses half, rounded down with a minimum of 1, multiplied by level.
Prior-work penalty
After operations, the prior-work penalty grows as 0, 1, 3, 7, 15, 31, and so on.
Book order
Applying every book directly grows the item penalty too quickly; a balanced merge tree is usually cheaper.
Too Expensive
An operation costing 40 levels or more is blocked in ordinary Survival even if the player has enough levels.
Source: https://minecraft.wiki/w/Anvil_mechanics
Updated: 19.07.2026