Helmets are one of four Minecraft armor types players can equip. Similar to other armor pieces, it can be enchanted with additional effects, and a couple of them are even unique. In this article, Gurugamer is going to showcase the 8 most useful enchantments for helmets in Minecraft 1.19.

Table of Contents

1. Respiration

Respiration is a helmet enchantment for extending breathing time underwater. It extends the duration you can stay underwater for 15 seconds each level. With Respiration III, you should be able to dive for 60 seconds without having to submerge. Furthermore, this effect can be extended further by 10 seconds if you wear a turtle shell, one of the most common ways to breathe underwater in Minecraft.

A perfect gear set to fight underwater.

In older versions of Minecraft, this enchantment also has a hidden effect of letting you see a little bit better underwater as well. Overall, Respiration is a nice effect to have, but not nearly as useful as a water-breathing potion.

2. Aqua Affinity

Aqua Affinity is an enchantment that increases underwater mining speed. Similar to Respiration, this is a helmet-only enchantment. Usually, when the player's head is underwater, mining blocks take 5 times as long as mining while out of water. Wearing armor with Aqua Affinity causes this penalty to be ignored. This enchantment has only one level. If you plan on building a base underwater, this enchantment is a must. Mining without Aqua Affinity is super slow and therefore not recommended. You can build a conduit for even faster mining.

This enchantment is super useful especially when combined with Efficiency and a conduit.

3. Protection

This enchantment increases the damage reduction of armors, similar to how sharpness and power work on weapons. While there are specific defense enchantments, this is the best and most versatile, especially if you don't have money for multiple armors.
Protection in Minecraft is probably the most popular enchantment to have.

Stacking Protection on all pieces of armor is probably the best strategy in Minecraft that allow players to deal with most threats.

4. Thorns

Thorns is an armor enchantment that causes attackers to be damaged when they deal damage to the wearer. This enchantment gives players up to 45% of dealing 1-4 damage to whatever attacks them. This affects both melee attacks and ranged projectile. This enchantment is super useful against low HP fast attack mobs such as vexes. Durability is its weakness, however - players need either mending or unbreaking for thorns to work. Every time the enchantment is triggered, the armor piece lost 2 points of durability.

Thorns enchantment gives players some extra damage in a fight.

5. Fire Protection

In the Nether, lava is pretty much everywhere - you can't walk two steps without seeing them. Falling into lava is usually lethal, and mobs in the nether have a tendency to knock you into it. Because of this, having the Fire Protection enchantment on at least one piece of your gear is required. It's also a key factor to beat the Nether Fortress in Minecraft.

Fire Protection is one of the most useful enchantments for exploring the Nether in Minecraft.

Every additional level of Fire Protection adds an extra 8% of protection and Fire Protection IV is the max level, which translates to 32%. You can stack this by enchanting multiple pieces of armor, up to a max of 80% reduction. This enchantment also allows you to tank the Blazes' fireballs.

6. Blast Protection

Blast Protection is an armor enchantment that reduces explosion and firework damage. This can protect players against various damage sources, including the creeper, TNT traps, and more. The highest level (Blast Protection IV) absorbs 32% (4 x 8%) of the damage inflicted by any explosion. Additionally, it also reduce up to 60% of the knockback from an explosion.

Blast protection can shield you against the creepers fairly easily.

7. Mending

Mending is a universally useful enchantment that can be applied to all kinds of gears with durability. It is even more popular than protection. With it active, the boots will automatically use the XP players earn in-game to repair themselves. Combine that with an XP farm and the boots would become indestructible. Getting Mending on all gears, including helmets, would remove the need for repair.

The highest level of enchantment for mending in Minecraft is level I.

It counts as a treasure enchantment; it can be obtained from chest loot, fishing, or trading with a Librarian of any level. Players cannot obtain it from an enchanting table.

8. Unbreaking

Unbreaking is best applied to everything you often use, especially the helmet.

This is especially useful if players want to use the Thorn enchantment.

However, unlike Mending, Unbreaking just increases the durability of the item it was applied to. You would still need to repair the item but it should take a lot longer than normal.

>>> Read more: 5 Useful Items For Exploring The Nether In Minecraft 1.19