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Editor Overview

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This overview is intended to introduce you to the parts of the Editor interface and the tools. The keyboard shortcuts, also known as keybindings, have been provided with each tool and in the table at the end of this document.

For a more in-depth experience using the tools to accomplish basic tasks, take a look at the Editor Tutorial.

There's more information about Editor on the Minecraft: Bedrock Editor GitHub site!

Important

The Editor is in early preview and we're working to add more capabilities. It will change significantly as we get feedback from creators like you. Also, the images of Editor in this document might vary a little from what you have on your screen.

In this manual, you will learn the following:

  • What the difference is between a project and a world
  • How to create a project
  • How to customize the user interface and project world settings
  • What all the parts of the UI are and where to find them
  • How to save a project
  • How to open an existing project
  • How to export a project as a world
  • How to open a world created from a project
  • Where Editor stores exported and saved files

Requirements

To get started, you need the following:

  • A Windows 10 (or higher) computer with Minecraft Bedrock Editor
  • Keyboard and mouse

Important

Editor is not available on mobile.

It's recommended that the following be completed before beginning this tutorial.

Creating an Editor Project

After you launch the Editor from the shortcut, you get a screen that says "Create New Project."

Image of the Minecraft Editor starting page

While you're creating a project, you can configure the name, export settings, and the usual settings for a Minecraft world.

Export settings will apply when you export as a playable world from the Editor (.mcworld).

Image of the Minecraft Editor configuration page

New projects load with a Welcome/Quick Start screen. If you close it and you want it open again, go to the Help menu and select Quick Start.

First Things First: UI Settings

Editor looks like your usual Minecraft game with a user interface (UI) on top of it. Before we get started, let's make sure that UI looks okay for your monitor resolution and preferences.

Go to the File menu and select UI Settings.

Editor User Interface appearance settings showing UI scale, font, and theme drop-down menus

  • UI Scale - Makes the menu bar and windows larger or smaller in relation to the project world.
  • Font - Changes the size of the text in the windows.
  • Theme - Changes the colors used in the UI.

After you make a selection from the UI Settings menu, your changes are reflected immediately.

Hint: If you accidentally adjust things to where you can't read the settings to fix it, press the Alt F4 keys on your keyboard to close Editor. Then, launch Editor again and create a new project. (This is part of why we're doing this first.)

Editor works with Minecraft Accessibility features.

When you're happy with the UI Settings, you can click the X to close the UI Settings window.

Editor UI Windows: Move, Minimize, Close

You can move Editor windows by clicking and dragging them by the title bar.

Click the double "up arrows" in the corner to collapse the windows upwards so you can tuck them out of the way if you don't want to close them.

If you do want to close the window, click the X in the corner. Some windows can be re-opened with a keyboard shortcut.

Welcome/Quick Start

Animation of the parts of the Quick Start Welcome screen

Tab Content
Introduction Welcome to Minecraft Editor!
Minecraft Editor is a multiblock editing experience that helps you easily craft high-quality worlds in Minecraft Bedrock. We are early in our development and excited for the opportunity to build alongside our creator community!
Click through the tabs above to learn the basics!
Movement Hold down your right mouse button on the viewport to enable movement.
Move horizontally using W A S D.
Move vertically using Shift or Space.
Selection Left-click anywhere in the world to select a single block.
Use the gizmo or hold Shift between left-clicks to place opposite corners of an area. Press Ctrl to make additional selections.
Move using the gizmo, or hold down Alt and move with arrow keys (horizontal) and page up/page down (vertical).
Resize using corner gizmos, or hold Ctrl (increase) or Shift (decrease) with arrow keys and page up/page down.
Tools Select the brush from the left toolrail.
Left-click and drag to paint.
Actions Undo (Ctrl Z) or redo (Ctrl Y) your edits.
Cut (Ctrl X) or copy (Ctrl C) a selection.
Select a single block and quick paste (Ctrl V) what you cut or copied.
Or, paste preview (Ctrl Shift V) and use arrow keys and page-up / page-down for precise placement.
Help Editor will be exclusively available in Bedrock Preview until the feature set and quality meets our standards to be made visible in the Launcher.
- Documentation
- Log issues and give feedback.
You may close this panel. To reopen at any point, select "QuickStart" from the top "Help" menu.

Movement

Before we dive into the Tool Mode UI, you might want to take a moment to familiarize yourself with how to look around and move around in the different modes.

  • Unlock the camera: In Tool mode, hold down the right mouse button to look around. In Crosshair Mode, you do not need to hold down the right mouse button.

  • Moving around: In Tool Mode, hold the right mouse button down while you press W, A, S, D, Space, and Shift keys. You do not need to hold down the right mouse button to use the same keys to move around in Crosshair Mode.

  • Look-to-teleport: In Tool Mode, point your cursor at a block in the distance, and hit G on your keyboard. You will be "Grapple teleported" there. This function does not work in Crosshair Mode.

Editor and Bedrock Dedicated Server

Editor is only enabled in the preview version of Win32 Bedrock Dedicated Server (BDS). There are two ways to launch it:

Launch the .exe with the command line, like this:

bedrock_server.exe Editor=true

This will only work if you're launching BDS from scratch with no existing world.

You should see the output say:

#####################################################
#                                                   #
#              CREATING EDITOR PROJECT              #
#                                                   #
#####################################################

Create an Editor project from Minecraft

  1. Launch Editor from the usual desktop shortcut.
  2. Create a new Editor Project.
  3. Locate the Editor Project in the com.mojang/minecraftWorlds folder and copy it into the BDS worlds folder
  4. Ensure that server.properties has the correct world name.
  5. Execute bedrock_server.exe.

If correctly set up, you should see the output say

[2023-10-24 07:21:43:977 INFO] Enabling Editor Services

Editor Mode is controlled by a flag in the level data (not by the command line), so you need to launch the server either by having the server create a new Editor project, or by launching the server using an existing Editor project.

When the server is up and running, any client connections from Minecraft Bedrock Preview Edition will connect as editor sessions and present the editor interface. Connections from Non-Preview editions of Minecraft will be refused.

What's Next?

Now that you know more about the parts of Editor, let's use the tools to do some editing!

Editor Tutorial