Minecraft has built up a false reputation as being easy to run. After all, it’s just a few blocks right. Okay, so when you take it at face value you might have a point but the pure computational power modern Minecraft demands far exceeds the lowest spec PCs, especially if you want to get into some of the more recent updates such as the Caves and Cliffs, or even the incredible world of Minecraft with Ray Tracing.
There are also lots of assets that can be downloaded that can make your Minecraft world look like a 4K dream, but obviously, that’s not going to be possible on low-end laptops.
So below we have a breakdown of the system requirements for the various versions of Minecraft. You can find out more about the differences between the Bedrock (normal Windows 10) and Java versions here in this article we covered previously.
Minecraft Bedrock Edition system requirements for Windows
| Minimum requirements | Recommended requirements | |
| OS | Windows 10 | Windows 10 |
| CPU | Intel Celeron J4105 | AMD FX-4100 | Intel i7-6500U | AMD A8-6600K |
| GPU | Intel HD Graphics 4000 | AMD Radeon R5 | NVIDIA GeForce 940M | AMD Radeon HD 8570D |
| RAM | 4GB | 8GB |
| DirectX | Version 11 | Version 11 |
Minecraft with Ray Tracing (RTX) System Requirements
| OS | Windows 10 64-bit |
| CPU | Intel Core i5 or equivalent |
| GPU | DirectX hardware ray tracing capable GPU like NVIDIA GeForce RTX 20 Series and higher, and AMD Radeon RX 6000 Series and higher |
| RAM | 8GB |
| Storage | – |
| Minecraft version | 1.16.200 or higher |
Please note that if your hardware does not support ray tracing, you will be unable to download ray tracing content from the Minecraft Marketplace.
You may have to update your Windows operating system and graphics drivers to experience ray tracing. You can learn more about updating Windows 10 here.
Minecraft Java Edition system requirements – Minimum and Recommended
If you’d like to have a more customizable Minecraft experience, then you might want to get the Java Edition. We have gathered the minimum and recommended system requirements in a quick table.
| Minimum requirements | Recommended requirements | |
| OS | Windows: Windows 7 and up macOS: Any 64-bit OS X using 10.9 Maverick or newer Linux: Any modern 64-bit distributions from 2014 onwards | Windows: Windows 10 64-bit macOS: macOS 10.12 Sierra Linux: Any modern distributions from 2014 onwards |
| CPU | Intel Core i3-3210 3.2 GHz / AMD A8-7600 APU 3.1 GHz or equivalent | Intel Core i5-4690 3.5GHz / AMD A10-7800 APU 3.5 GHz or equivalent |
| GPU | Integrated: Intel HD Graphics 4000 (Ivy Bridge) or AMD Radeon R5 series (Kaveri line) with OpenGL 4.4 Discrete: Nvidia GeForce 400 Series or AMD Radeon HD 7000 series with OpenGL 4.4 | GeForce 700 Series or AMD Radeon Rx 200 Series (excluding integrated chipsets) with OpenGL 4.5 |
| RAM | 4GB | 8GB |
| Storage | 1GB | 4GB SSD |
Minecraft system requirements for Mac
| Minimum requirements | |
| OS | OS X 10.9 Mavericks |
| CPU | Intel Core i3-3210 |
| GPU | Intel HD 4000 |
| RAM | 2GB |
Minecraft system requirements for Linux
| Minimum requirements | |
| OS | Any modern distributions from 2014 onwards |
| CPU | Intel Core i3-3210 |
| GPU | Intel HD 4000 |
| RAM | 2GB |
Is Minecraft free to play?
Minecraft does have a version that is free to play, and you can access it via the website classic.minecraft.net. However, this is a very original and basic version, so don’t expect any of the newer features that it is famous for. For these, you’re better off downloading one of the paid versions, which range in price between consoles.
Conclusion
To sum up, Minecraft is a relatively less demanding game, and you can run the basic version of it on your computer. However, if you want to customize your experience with the Java edition or play the game at a high resolution, then you might need a more advanced system.
