Can you ride the Sniffer in Minecraft?

The new 1.20 Minecraft patch introduces a unique creature into the expanding scope of mobs in Minecraft: the Sniffler, a passive mob that sniffs out seeds for you to pick up like a true companion. This big-nosed, fluffy creature is what we call a Certified Friend, and given its Certified Friend status some players that may or may not include me have one question when looking at this fluffy beast: can we ride it? Let’s find out the answer together. Can you ride the Sniffer in Minecraft?

Is the Sniffer in Minecraft rideable?

Kind of. Technically.

You see, you can ride it. But only in Creative mode with cheats enabled, and only using a specific command. In Survival or otherwise, it’s not meant to be ridden. It cannot be saddled and ridden through normal means.

If you are in Creative and standing near to one, you have to type in a complex command in order to get on top of it. That command being:

/ride [player name] mount @e[type=minecraft:sniffer,limit=1,distance=..10]

As a reminder, you have to press ‘T’ first in order to get the command box to pop up. You’re probably not going to get it right manually typing it out, so feel free to copy and paste. This will put your character on top of the Sniffler. Change the camera and set the FOV to Quake for the best visual result.

Screenshot by PC Invasion

You can’t control the Sniffler while riding it in any manner, even though its HP will pop up like other rideable mounts. Once you’re done with the novelty of riding the big furry friend, you have to type a similar command to dismount it, which is thankfully a lot easier:

/ride [player name] dismount.

Maybe if enough people ask for it, the mob will become a more official mount, but at least there’s sort of a way to do it for now.