/summon with NBT: equipment, attributes and the tags that make a mob behave
Summoning a mob is one word. Making it keep its gear, not despawn, not burn and not wander off takes six specific tags. Here is what each one does.
/summon zombie works. A zombie that keeps its armour, stands still, survives daylight and never despawns needs six more tags, and they are not discoverable from the command help.
The six that matter
/summon zombie ~ ~ ~ {PersistenceRequired:1b,NoAI:1b,Silent:1b,Invulnerable:1b,
CustomName:'"Guard"',CustomNameVisible:1b}| Tag | Effect |
|---|---|
PersistenceRequired:1b | Never despawns. The single most important one for map-making |
NoAI:1b | Frozen — no movement, no attacks, no gravity |
NoGravity:1b | Floats, but keeps its AI |
Silent:1b | No mob sounds |
Invulnerable:1b | Immune to everything except /kill and the void |
Glowing:1b | Outline through walls |
PersistenceRequired and naming are related but not the same: a name tag also prevents despawn, but CustomName set via NBT does not unless you add PersistenceRequired. That trips up nearly everyone building a shop NPC.
Equipment that does not drop
{HandItems:[{id:"minecraft:diamond_sword",count:1},{}],
ArmorItems:[{},{},{},{id:"minecraft:diamond_helmet",count:1}],
HandDropChances:[0f,0f],ArmorDropChances:[0f,0f,0f,0f]}Two things to note. ArmorItems is ordered feet, legs, chest, head — bottom to top, which is the reverse of how people list armour. And the empty {} entries are required placeholders; you cannot skip slots.
Drop chances are floats from 0f to 1f. Anything above 1f guarantees the drop and keeps the item's enchantments and durability intact.
Attributes
{attributes:[{id:"minecraft:max_health",base:40},
{id:"minecraft:movement_speed",base:0.35}]}Setting max_health does not heal the mob to the new maximum — it will spawn at its old health value and look damaged. Add Health:40f alongside it.
Common ids: max_health, movement_speed, attack_damage, armor, knockback_resistance, follow_range, scale.
Passengers stack downward
{Passengers:[{id:"minecraft:skeleton",Passengers:[{id:"minecraft:chicken"}]}]}The outermost entity is the one at the bottom. Nesting Passengers inside Passengers builds the tower upward. Each rider needs its own full NBT if you want it configured.
Bedrock is different
Bedrock has no NBT argument on /summon. The syntax is /summon <entity> <pos> <yRot> <xRot> <spawnEvent> <name>, and behaviour is set through spawn events rather than tags. A Java NBT blob pasted into Bedrock will not run.
Pick a mob and toggle these tags visually — with the armour slot order handled for you — in the /summon Generator.