📦 Iron Chests — The Complete Guide (All Chest Types & Upgrades Explained)

Iron Chests is a simple but incredibly useful Minecraft storage mod that lets you upgrade your basic wooden chest into larger, more efficient, and more durable storage options. Whether you want massive inventory space, blast-proof chests, or visually transparent containers, Iron Chests provides a chest tier for every situation.

This is the complete guide to every chest, how to craft them, how much they store, and how to upgrade them easily.

Prefer a video Explanation? Click here -

🟫 1. Dirt Chest 9000 (Joke Chest)

The Dirt Chest 9000 is an intentional meme item included in the mod.

Features:

• Only stores one stack of dirt.
• Comes with a humorous instruction manual.
• Has no practical use beyond comedy.

You’ll never craft this for storage — but it’s fun to keep around.

🟧 2. Chest Tiers & Storage Sizes

Iron Chests adds several chest upgrades, each with increasingly larger storage. All upgraded chests hold more than a standard Minecraft single or double chest.

Copper Chest

• Equivalent to roughly a double chest, but compacted into a single block.
• Storage: 5 rows × 9 columns (45 slots)

Iron Chest

• Larger than Copper.
• Storage: 6 × 9 (54 slots)

Gold Chest

• Significantly larger storage.
• Storage: 8 × 9 (72 slots)

Diamond Chest

• One of the largest chest sizes in the mod.
• Storage: 9 × 12 (108 slots)

💎 3. Special Chests: Diamond, Crystal, Obsidian

Diamond, Crystal, and Obsidian chests all share the same maximum storage size (108 slots), but each has unique behavior.

Diamond Chest

• The baseline "top tier" chest.
• Large, reliable, and easy to upgrade into other types.

Crystal Chest

• Same storage as Diamond.
• Displays items inside the chest through transparent sides.
• Great for aesthetics, but can be laggy on servers because it renders contents.

Obsidian Chest

• Same storage as Diamond.
• Blast-proof against:
• Creepers
• TNT
• Withers
• The safest chest tier, especially in multiplayer worlds.

Summary:

🔧 4. Crafting Chest Upgrades

Iron Chests lets you upgrade any lower-tier chest into a higher-tier one without breaking it or losing items. This is one of the mod’s best features.

How Upgrades Work

1. Hold the correct upgrade item (e.g., Iron → Gold Upgrade).
2. Right-click the chest you want to upgrade.
3. The chest instantly converts to the next tier while preserving all stored items.

Examples:

• Iron to Gold Upgrade → Converts an iron chest into a gold chest
• Gold to Diamond Upgrade → Converts gold into diamond
• Diamond to Crystal Upgrade → Turns diamond into crystal
• Diamond to Obsidian Upgrade → Turns diamond into blast-proof obsidian

This system means you never need to:

• Break chests
• Move items
• Recraft storage setups

It’s efficient, clean, and extremely user-friendly.

🧱 5. Crafting Recipes (Overview)

Here’s a simplified recipe summary:

• Copper Chest: Copper + Glass
• Iron Chest: Iron + Glass (or upgrade from Copper)
• Gold Chest: Gold (or Iron → Gold upgrade)
• Diamond Chest: Diamonds + Glass
• Crystal Chest: Diamond Chest + Glass
• Obsidian Chest: Diamond Chest + Obsidian

Exact recipes vary slightly across modpacks, but JEI/REI will always show the correct version.

📘 6. Which Chest Should You Choose?

Best Overall:

Obsidian Chest — same capacity as Diamond but blast-proof. Perfect for servers, wither fights, or valuables.

Prettiest:

Crystal Chest — great for display builds and organized storage rooms.

Easiest Upgrade Path:

Start with Copper → Iron → Gold as soon as you have resources, then jump to Diamond or Obsidian.