Resource packs (formerly texture packs) let you customize Minecraft’s visuals to your liking. There are plenty of great packs to download online, but maybe you’d like to put one together yourself. It can be a fun long-term project, though you can also change just a single texture and leave everything else as is. Either way, you’ll need to learn how to make a resource pack. Today, we’re giving you a complete step-by-step guide to add your own textures to the game.
Preparation: Tools and settings for your Minecraft resource pack
Our tutorial is based on Windows 11 and the tools available there, but you can follow the same steps on other operating systems.
First, download and change a few important things to make your life easier later. Enable file extensions in File Explorer (View → Show → File name extensions). This helps you distinguish and rename files later on. You’ll also want WinRAR (or 7-Zip), as it works better than Microsoft’s built-in archive handling. All other required tools, like a text editor, should already be installed.
To edit the textures themselves, you’ll need an image editor. Choose the program you’re comfortable with. We recommend GIMP because it’s free and easy to use. For more detailed pixel work, Aseprite is a great choice since it’s designed specifically for pixel art.
Create a template: Extract the original Minecraft assets
To make a texture pack, you’ll want a template to work from. There are different options here, such as downloading a template online. But that’s not necessary if you look through Minecraft’s files a bit. You can also extract the assets directly from the game.
Create a Minecraft resource pack template:
- Navigate to the “.minecraft” folder (under %appdata%), then to “versions”. Choose the version you want, in our case 1.21.11. Copy the .jar file to a separate location for editing.
- Rename the file from .jar to .zip (you need file extensions enabled as described above). Confirm the warning. Then extract the file; you can delete the original version afterward.
- In this folder, delete all folders and files except “assets”. That’s where the important files live.
- From “assets”, go to “minecraft” and delete all folders there except “textures”. As the name suggests, that’s where you’ll find all textures, organized into subfolders.
Edit textures: Create your own Minecraft textures
You now have a template for editing textures. Browse the remaining folders and look for the things you want to modify. In “block” you’ll find all blocks, in “item” all items, and so on. Editing every single asset takes a lot of time, but you can also change just individual files.
For this demonstration, we chose these textures:
- apple.png in “item”
- stone.png in “block”
- inventory.png in “gui” → “container”
Edit the files in the image editor of your choice. Note that Minecraft’s standard textures are 16x16 pixels. That’s not much space, but it can spark creativity. Some other assets, such as the inventory, use different dimensions. Work within the given constraints and use the original file as a base to trace over. It’s best not to change the actual image size.
When you’re done, save or overwrite the original file. Do NOT rename the original files, otherwise the game won’t recognize them. Of course, you can change the texture itself—that’s the whole point.
In the end, you can delete anything you didn’t modify. Default assets don’t need to be overridden. In-game, you can stack packs on top of one another and even combine them.
Create pack.mcmeta and pack.png correctly
Once you’ve adjusted all the textures you want, you’ll need to create two more files. To do this, go back out of the assets folder and first create a text file named “pack”. Paste the following content into this file and adjust it later:
{
"pack": {
"description": "desc",
"min_format": 75,
"max_format": 75
}
}
You can change a few things here, starting with the number. Check the Minecraft Wiki under Pack format and see in the bottom table which number applies to your Minecraft version. For 1.21.11 it’s 75, so change that number for both values accordingly. Also replace “desc” with a description of your choice, in our case “It’s just a test”. Save your changes. Then rename the .txt to a .mcmeta to get the correct file type—so pack.mcmeta.
The second file is optional, but you should create it anyway. This is the image for your resource pack, which should be named “pack.png”. The image must be square. We recommend 128x128 pixels.
Installation: Activate the resource pack in Minecraft
You’ve completed the important steps—now you have to bring the resource pack into Minecraft. Select assets, pack.mcmeta, and pack.png, and compress these into a .zip file. At the same time, you can give your texture pack a name. Your file is now ready.
Start Minecraft and, under Options, go to Resource Packs. There, you can open the corresponding folder and drag your finished pack into it. If everything works, it should appear in the list. Your textures will now show up in the game, and you can continue to tweak them afterward.
You can also upload your resource pack or share it with other players if you like. Or, time permitting, keep modifying more assets as you go.
Conclusion: Create your own Minecraft resource pack
Creating your own resource pack for Minecraft can be a big challenge, but it’s perfect for customizing the game to your taste. We recommend it for advanced PC users or pixel-art creators who want to experiment. As long as you follow our tutorial, nothing should go wrong.
You can also use the texture pack on your own Minecraft server, which you can rent from us with ease: https://www.4netplayers.com/en/gameserver-hosting/minecraft/. Design a custom pack with friends and share it among yourselves for a unique gameplay experience!
