23 Great Minecraft Challenges To Do with Your Friends

The goal with Minecraft is simple, beat the Ender dragon. It can easily get boring once you’ve done it a few times and maybe even speedran it. Luckily, Minecraft is also a game that the players can play almost endlessly mod and change up, creating custom maps with various games inside one huge game. That’s partly the fun of it, to be honest.

You can build and create your games if you know how to, and if you’re like me, you don’t know how to do that on your own. Luckily, plenty of other people are working to provide you with the best content and challenges possible, and what better way to take advantage of that than by playing it with friends? Let’s list 25 great Minecraft challenges to do with your friends if you’re starting to get bored or are running out of ideas.

1. Hardcore Survival

If you’re a seasoned Minecraft player, you’ve likely already tried this, but not everyone is, so the first and likely easiest challenge to get your hands on is beating the game in hardcore survival. The rules are simple, die once, and your whole world gets deleted. You can play it on a server with friends and come up with different challenges that’ll put you at risk of dying.

In the end, you can think of a punishment for the player that died. Or, you can turn against each other one day and kill one of your own. There’s a realm of possibilities awaiting you in a game mode already embedded into the game.

2. Speedrunner VS hunters

You can do this with or without a mod. The premise is simple, try to beat the game while others try to hunt you down. Seems simple enough? Enjoy the outplays you try or fail to make and try and think of some limitations for the hunters. For example, Dream, a famous Minecraft speedrunner, usually has a limitation that hunters can’t use bows; only he can.

To make it more interesting, you can give the person trying to speedrun an x amount of lives; you can keep score on who killed the speedrunner and come up with an award system in-game or in real life.

3. Surviving a super flat world

A super flat world is also a game mode embedded into Bedrock and Java Editions. As the name suggests, there’s no terrain, only a flat patch of bedrock, grass, and dirt, accumulating a total of 4 layers. Mobs spawn like usual, but the real challenge is getting wood. This will put your mechanics and game knowledge to the test.

You might want to play with friends to make it easier because the night is fast approaching. To get a good idea of how it works, there are numerous YouTube videos of people trying to survive a super flat with extra limitations even though, for that, you’re likely to have to find a mod.

4. Trying to make a perfect circle

Some people have done this before, but I don’t want to spoil it for you; gather your friends and challenge them to make a perfect circle in Minecraft; whoever does it first is the winner. It is possible, although you might have to use cheats and be creative to make it a bit easier.

Or don’t; you might want the extra challenge. Maybe the perfect circle can then later be the unholy grail of your Minecraft world. A shrine to your new cool build since it’s cursed and shouldn’t exist whatever.

5. Trying to break bedrock

This has also been done before, and yes, it doesn’t look like a challenge per se, but the game’s code says you can’t break bedrock, so try beating the code because it can be done somehow. This will also test your knowledge of the game, or you can use this to weird out your friends, who’ll wonder how you managed to do it.

It may not be up to par with other challenges listed here, but for some, custom maps and mods aren’t going to cut it, so you have to make do with what you already have.

6. Make a base in the Nether

Go to the Nether and, well, survive. Make a base, eat, don’t sleep because your bed will break, and make a beautiful creation with everything the Nether offers. Make it fun and try not to die, or make it so that if you get back to the Overworld, you lose the challenge.

The hellish creations await you, and good luck trying to fight off all the mobs that are out to get you. One word of advice, hoglins are your friend since they are a great food source. Just watch out for the Bastion Remnants and the piglins out to get you.

7. Scavenger hunt

There’s one map, 180+ artifacts, you, and your friends. The biomes in the custom map are all mashed in together, bringing hours of fun for you and your friends and looking nice. This is the first custom map on the list, and it’ll continue at the same pace.

The countdown of how many artifacts you’ve found will appear after you collect them. The rules are as follows: You need to play in adventure mode, it’s compatible with version 1.16, no mob spawning, command blocks are enabled, and it’s in peaceful mode. The map was created by Koenie and can be downloaded from minecraftmaps.com.

8. Minecraft escape rooms

If you’re an escape room fan, the Minecraft player base has a lot to offer you. You can download the map from Mediafire under the final escape room name. If you can’t find the file, Wifies made a video about it and tried to solve it. I tried to play it for myself, and it’s hard unless you have a lot of game knowledge.

It’s said to be one of the hardest escape rooms, so maybe your friends can join in on the fun, and you can try and solve it together. Don’t catch any spoilers on the Wifies channel because you’ll ruin the fun for yourself and your friends. It’s a 1.19 escape room, which is the theme of the escape room.

9. Can’t kill mobs

Ok, this is another one that doesn’t involve you downloading a custom map or mods, but it’s so hard, it’s good, and there are a lot of ways for you to avoid being threatened by the mobs by building. For example, a mob switch but that kind of ruins the fun unless you want to mess with your friends a bit.

The goal should be to win the game, and you can’t kill any mobs in the process if you exclude the dragon and blazes since, unfortunately, you can’t win the game without having to kill a few blazes along the way.

10. Defend the castle

This is a PvP-style game mode. You and your friends start by splitting into two groups. One group is the attackers, while the other has to defend their castle to death. The last team standing is the winner.

This is the time to show off your game knowledge, cool builds, and strategic thinking. You’ll have a couple of days to prepare for the attack as best you can; after that, the show can start, and you can see all of the cool things you and your friends came up with in action.

11. The Apocalypse

You’ll have one day to prep for the challenge, and you and your friends will try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. There are a few rules to follow. The preset difficulty should be hard, but if you’re feeling up to the challenge, you can also try and do it in hardcore.

The premise is this: there was a nuclear blast, and you’re now in a post-apocalyptic world. The damaging effects of the blast made it so that the sun is now very damaging, so you can’t go outside unless you’re wearing protection. You can scavenge after the sun sets, but any outside mobs that spawn during the day can’t be eaten because they’re infected. Fresh water will also be contaminated, so you can only use water from the caves, and your shelter has to have thick outer walls and airlocks between each room. You’ll have to seal each room with a door and walls.

12. Survive in an ocean

In this challenge, you’ll have a grace period of one full Minecraft day to prepare for what’s to come. It doesn’t include mods and custom maps, so you’ll have to use your imagination. Anyways, after the initial grace period, you must live in an ocean and survive there.

Your base must be built underwater or at sea level, and you can create air pockets to breathe underwater, but that’s about it. To make it even better, you can do a PvP after a certain period to see who will win the underwater battle.

13. Civilization wars

If you have a large group of friends, you might be more interested in this challenge than others. You can make a custom map or play in your regular survival world. Each group will get to live in one biome and use every resource available from that biome to survive. After a set time, you open your doors and either wait to get wiped out or be the one to wipe out other civilizations first.

Sipover made an excellent video about the best Minecraft players playing this challenge. What they came up with was nothing short of amazing, and maybe you can use the video to draw inspiration for your builds and tactics.

14. Beat Minecraft with an X-ray on

X-ray means that the whole world is see-through. Every ore is visible, and it might sound easy at first, but it’s hard to make your way through this type of unstructured world. You’ll have to use a special mod available at planetminecraft.com or any other mod source website. You can find it using the keyword x-ray-

Your goal here is to try and beat the game, or you can have hunters chase while another group tries to win. On its own, this mod allows for endless possibilities for you to come up with new challenges.

15. King of the ladder

You have a tower filled with ladders. The point is to get on top of the wall and stay there for a few minutes. If you’re familiar with this game mode, a new version of the challenge is available under the name ” Super Ladder Battle Royale”. The user uniqueimpact made it.

The objective is to avoid falling and get as high as possible. The arena starts crumbling after a while, and the higher you are, the better it is for your survival. You’ll find different item boxes along the way that contain items that’ll help you personally or help you sabotage your enemies.

16. Capture the flag

Capture the Flag is a game mode well known to Call of Duty players, and so it’s made its way onto Minecraft as well. MrSlimeYT and EndSlayer800 created this particular map. The map is fully vanilla and was made for 1.10.

The game auto resets, and the players carrying the flag will be slowed. You’ll need to have your own server, command blocks, and PvP enabled, while mob spawning should be disabled.

17. TNT Olympics

Sethbling created TNT Olympics; you’ll have to download the mod to play it. You have a runner’s track, and you take no damage. You can’t move, and the only way to get to the finish line is to TNT your way through the track.

It isn’t just one race track; the Olympics include various events. In the mod, you’ll have the chance to compete in hurdles, long jumps, equestrian, bolt, balance beam, trap shooting, crew, javelin, high jump, and synchronized swimming. The map can be downloaded on Planet Minecraft.

18. Parkour racing

Parkour racing is another popular game mode Minecraft has to offer. You’ll have to race your friends through obstacles, and whoever gets to the finish line first wins. The obstacles are meant to slow you down, and you’ll get eight obstacle courses.

This custom map has no player limit and no special game mechanics. It’s simply parkour which also happens to be the name of the map created by Huntman.

19. Gladiator games

In this map, you’ll have a unique set of weapons to choose from, and you’ll be able to find different mobs. The creators of the map, Average Map Enjoyers, recommend playing it with a large group of people.

Whenever you die and another player dies, you’ll have to fight them for the respawn; the player who loses is out of the game. You can upgrade weapons using the chests provided on the map. You can set up in groups and fight to the death.

20. Survivors VS undead

The map was created by Kahlzara and has a horror theme, so if you’re into that, you’ll enjoy this challenge even more. Depending on the number of players on the server, you’ll have a different number of the undead. They can spawn mobs, and they will try to kill you.

The game’s objective is to survive; you may even turn against your friends and betray them while fighting for your lives. You and your friends will have the flaming sword ability, though.

21. Hide & seek abandoned mall

You’re in an abandoned mall, there are 1 or 2 seekers, and the rest have to hide. You can assign more seekers if you’d like by using command blocks. This challenge works best with 1.18 or newer.

The ones hiding will glow every 30-60 seconds but in the last 30 seconds, the ones hiding will glow constantly. You’ll also get the chance to play a total of 2 different special modes. To learn the rules, you can open the book in the lobby to learn about it.

21. Excruciating streams maze

Deuxiemecarlin, the creator of this maze custom map, said that it’s an extremely frustrating experience to get out of the maze, but even more so, there’s no point to it, so you won’t be rewarded once you finish it. You can, however, change that while you play with friends and set up your prizes.

It’s said to be the hardest one, even though that’s a subjective opinion, but it’s the largest maze out there. Even if you took every right turn, it would still take you hours to complete, so good luck.

22. Color shuffle

The goal of the game is to get the highest score possible. To do that, you’ll need to step on the colored blocks before the time runs out. The map creator, _GEWOON_JOEY_, went so far that they even created their custom music for the map.

23. Dodge all

It’s dodgeball, but instead, you have to dodge all. You want to ensure you don’t get hit while also trying to land hits yourself. You can set how many lives you have and even make the game more chaotic.

There is no player limit, but you’ll have to make sure every one of your friends has downloaded the resource pack if you want to play successfully. WOUTBELT and ENDER3K created the map, and you can download it on Minecraftmaps.com.

Have a challenge to add to the list? Let us know in the comments below!