What you need to know
- Minecraft Preview is the program through which Mojang Studios tests upcoming changes and additions to Minecraft: Bedrock Edition.
- On Wednesday, the studio began releasing Minecraft Preview 1.19.40.21 to interested players.
- The pre-release build doesn't include any new features, but does boast of plenty of bug fixes and general improvements.
Minecraft is still being built on 1.19 "The Wild Update," the last major content update that brought new biomes, mobs, and blocks to the long-running survival crafting game. Mojang Studios continues to improve that update with post-release patch updates and fixes, all of which are tested beforehand in Minecraft Previews and snapshots.
On Wednesday, Mojang Studios released Minecraft Preview 1.19.40.21, the latest build that is now available to interested players and testers on Xbox, PC, and iOS (and Android through the old beta program). The build isn't the most exciting and lacks major feature additions, but does improve vanilla parity, the experimental Spectator Mode, and more elements of Minecraft.
Minecraft has constantly been changing for well over a decade now, and is scarcely the same game it was all those years before. These updates have allowed Minecraft to remain in the conversation as one of the best Xbox games, and that's not changing any time soon.
In case you missed it, Mojang Studios has announced that Minecraft Live is returning on Oct. 15, 2022, when players will be able to hear about the next major Minecraft update, the upcoming Minecraft Legends game, participate in a new mob vote, and much more.
The full changelog for Minecraft Preview 1.19.40.21 includes:
Features & bug fixes
Blocks
- Dirt Path and Farmland block collisions are now one texel lower
- Players now sink in Soul Sand and Mud blocks
- Players swimming above Mud will not have their screen covered
- Projectiles landing on Mud will not repeatedly shake
- Amphibious mobs no longer have trouble pathfinding around Mud Blocks
Gameplay
- Fixed fall damage accumulating while the player is in a Trapdoor block at the top of a bubble column
Mobs
- Fixed a bug where mobs with a long hit range could hit players through walls
- Ravager now can be hurt by Evoker Fangs
- Increased Ravager collision box size to match Java Edition
- Increased Ravager speed to match Java
User interface
- Fixed a bug in Pocket UI where items could be dropped in the dark-grey areas around the item grid in the Crafting Table screen
- Fixed a bug in Pocket UI where items could be dropped in the dark-grey areas around the item grid in the inventories for the Horse, Mule, Donkey, and Llama
- Fixed a bug where the death screen message was visible when the showdeathmessage gamerule was set to false
Vanilla parity
- Sweet Berries can now be planted on Farmland
- Changed bubble column strength to match Java Edition
Technical updates
Commands
- Added new overload to the `/summon` command that adds rotation arguments
- New overload is `/summon [ spawnPos : x y z] [yRot: float] [xRot: float] [spawnEvent: string] [nametag: string]`
- Previous overload `/summon [ spawnPos : x y z] [spawnEvent: string] [nametag: string]`
Stability & performance
- Fixed a crash that could occur when using the `hasItem` selector and specifying a negative value for the item's data
Experimental features
General
- Added flag `is_hidden_in_commands` in `menu_category` to control whether or not a block can be used in commands
Commands
- Implemented the `/execute facing` and `/execute facing entity` commands
- Implemented the `/execute align` command
Data driven blocks
- `minecraft:direction` is no longer exposed as a data-driven `blockProperty`. Blocks throw a content error when the "minecraft" namespace is used
GameTest Framework
- Removed built-in GameTest Behavior Packs
Spectator Mode
- Water fog is no longer removed for players in Spectator Mode
