Using a shovel enchanted with Fortune on sand in an ocean or river biome has a chance to yield sunken treasure. This can include rare loot like sponges and a Message in a Bottle.

Guide

In order to have a chance of obtaining a sunken treasure reward from a block of sand, the player must have at least 4 blocks of water above them and break the sand block with a shovel enchanted with Fortune. Each additional level of Fortune increases the chance of receiving sunken treasure from a sand block; Fortune I yields a 10% chance, Fortune II yields a 26% chance, and Fortune III yields a 48% chance.

Main Rewards

If the player obtains sunken treasure from a sand block, the distribution of items they can find is below. Note that the weights of the first table are not quite exact due to a simplification of how the sunken treasure loot tables are actually set up, but for all intensive purposes, they are close enough.

In Java Edition, each sunken treasure contains 1 item stacks, with the following distribution:

Item Stack Size [FN 1] Weight [FN 2] Chance [FN 3] Avg.
per chest
[FN 4]
Avg. # chests
to search
[FN 5]
 Bone 11729⁄999917.3%0.1735.8
File:ParallelItemSprite message-in-a-bottle.pngMessage In A Bottle 11152⁄999911.5%0.1158.7
 Prismarine Crystals 1576⁄99995.8%0.05817.4
File:ParallelItemSprite waders.pngWaders 1300⁄99993.0%0.03033.3
 Bottle o' Enchanting 1288⁄99992.9%0.02934.7
 Gold Ingot 1288⁄99992.9%0.02934.7
 Leather Boots 1250⁄99992.5%0.02540.0
File:ParallelItemSprite treasure-chest.pngTreasure Chest 158⁄99990.6%0.006172.4
  1. ↑ The size of stacks (or for unstackable items, number) of this item on any given roll.
  2. ↑ The weight of this item relative to other items in the pool.
  3. ↑ The odds of finding any of this item in a single chest.
  4. ↑ The number of items expected per chest, averaged over a large number of chests.
  5. ↑ The average number of chests the player should expect to search to find any of this item.


Treasure Chest Rewards

The rarest item the player has a chance of obtaining from a sunken treasure drop is a Treasure Chest, which has the following distribution:

In Java Edition, each sunken treasure chest contains items drawn from 7 pools, with the following distribution:

Item Stack Size [FN 1] Weight [FN 2] Chance [FN 3] Avg.
per chest
[FN 4]
Avg. # chests
to search
[FN 5]
1× 0–2× 1–3× 4–8× 2–4× 0–1× 2× 1× 0–2× 1–3× 4–8× 2–4× 0–1× 2×
 Clay Ball ———5–9——————15⁄50———86.7%12.6001.2
 Sand ———1–4——————15⁄50———86.7%4.5001.2
 Raw Cod ——————2–5——————5⁄1458.7%2.5001.7
 Raw Salmon ——————2–5——————5⁄1458.7%2.5001.7
 Lapis Lazuli ————4–12——————10⁄50——47.9%4.8002.1
 Gunpowder ————2–5——————10⁄50——47.9%2.1002.1
 Iron Nugget ————1–4——————10⁄50——47.9%1.5002.1
 Gold Nugget ————1–3——————10⁄50——47.9%1.2002.1
 Emerald —1–2——————20⁄35—————46.3%0.8572.2
 Bone ————1–5——————5⁄50——26.8%0.9003.7
 Rotten Flesh ————1–5——————5⁄50——26.8%0.9003.7
 Diamond —1–2——————10⁄35—————25.9%0.4293.9
 Enchanted Book[FN 6] —————1——————2⁄4—25.0%0.2504.0
 Heart Of The Sea 1——————10⁄61——————16.4%0.1646.1
  1. ↑ The size of stacks (or for unstackable items, number) of this item on any given roll.
  2. ↑ The weight of this item relative to other items in the pool.
  3. ↑ The odds of finding any of this item in a single chest.
  4. ↑ The number of items expected per chest, averaged over a large number of chests.
  5. ↑ The average number of chests the player should expect to search to find any of this item.
  6. ↑ All enchantments are equally probable, including treasure enchantments (except Soul Speed, and Swift Sneak), and any level of the enchantment is equally probable.