Minecraft – Mob limit per chunk

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Some sources say that there is no mob-limit-per-chunk, other say, that there is one. I found this formula on the Minecraft-Wiki: cap = constant * chunks / 256

Is this true for minecraft vanilla (PC)? If so:

  1. What it the value of "constant"?
  2. Will mobs despawn if a chunks reaches this limit but more mobs are delivered from other chunks?

Why am I asking this:
I want to build a mob farm without using a mob spawner (see this video). I thought that it would be clever to create a bigger spawn-area by making it 4x the size from the farm in the video. If this limit exists, I would place the farm in a way that it reaches a bigger amount of chunks.

Best Answer

This limit is for all existing mobs in the loaded chunks. Generally mobs stop spawning when active mob count reaches this number, but a code quirk allows squids to exceed the limit.

Mobs will not despawn automatically when the limit is reached, only spawning is suppressed. If existing mobs despawn (using their independent criteria), spawning can continue.

Again, limit is per all loaded chunks, not per chunk.

Practically, for mob farms, you usually don't need to consider this limit. The true limiting factor is that mobs immediately despawn when further that 128 meters from the player, so your whole farm must fit a 128 m sphere around where you will stand.

As for the value of constant, try reading the next sentence in the wiki you quoted:

Hostile = 70
Passive = 10
Ambient (Bats) = 15
Water = 5
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