Your portal frame broke. You're in the Nether. Stop. You have options. Read quickly.
TL;DR
Ghast fireballs cannot break obsidian — but explosions from other sources can. If your portal is out, find obsidian in the Nether itself (ruined portals and Bastion chests are your best bets), build a minimum 4-block frame (10 blocks total with corners), and light it with a fire charge if you've lost your flint-and-steel.
What actually breaks a portal frame
First thing to clear up: Ghasts did not break your portal frame. Ghasts can scream and shoot fireballs all day, and those fireballs deal zero damage to obsidian. Obsidian is blast-resistant enough to laugh at Ghast projectiles.
What can break obsidian in the Nether is a Wither explosion, TNT that a player or Creeper triggered, or a bed explosion (yes, someone placed a bed). If your frame is broken, one of those is the cause. Knowing that helps — it tells you the damage was a one-time event, not something that will happen again the moment you rebuild.
The portal frame itself does not need to be repaired. You only need enough obsidian to make a working frame, and you can place that anywhere near your current location.
Finding obsidian in the Nether
The Nether is not a place where obsidian grows naturally in the ground — except in two reliable spots.
Ruined portals spawn in every biome of the Nether. They look like a partially built portal frame, often with some blocks missing or on the ground nearby. Walk the area around a ruined portal and pick up any obsidian on the ground or still in the frame. You usually find 4–8 blocks this way, which may be enough.
Bastion Remnants chests sometimes contain obsidian — up to a few blocks per chest. This only helps if you can locate a Bastion and navigate it safely, which is a separate challenge.
If you are carrying a diamond or netherite pickaxe, you can mine obsidian from a ruined portal frame directly. This is slower than just taking loose blocks, but it works.
The 4-block minimum frame
A full portal frame is 4 blocks wide and 5 blocks tall — 14 blocks total if you count every position. But corners are optional. The minimum working portal uses only 10 blocks: two vertical columns of 3 on each side, and 2 on the top and 2 on the bottom, skipping the four corner positions.
If you are short on obsidian, use the 10-block layout. It lights and works exactly like a full frame. The corners are aesthetic.
Lighting it without flint-and-steel
If you lost your flint-and-steel, a fire charge does the same job. Fire charges show up in Bastion Remnant chests and Fortress chests fairly often. Right-click the inside of the portal frame with a fire charge to light it.
If you have neither flint-and-steel nor a fire charge, you can create fire by placing a piece of flint (from gravel drops) and an iron ingot in a crafting grid — that makes flint-and-steel. One iron ingot and one piece of flint. Both items can sometimes be found in Nether fortress or Bastion chests.
The panic spiral to avoid
The worst thing you can do right now is run. Sprinting in a random direction uses food, pulls you farther from your original portal site, and increases the chance you fall into lava or get cornered.
Stand still. Open your inventory. Check what you have. Check F3 for your current coordinates. Write those down.
From that calm starting point, you make a plan — find obsidian, build a frame, light it. That sequence has a beginning and an end. Panicking does not.
Common mistakes
- Mining the frame with the wrong tool. Obsidian requires a diamond or netherite pickaxe. Any other pickaxe takes so long it is not a practical option.
- Building the frame with netherrack or other blocks. Only obsidian and crying obsidian work. Crying obsidian looks similar but cannot anchor a portal.
- Forgetting to note current coordinates before moving. Before you walk anywhere to search for obsidian, press F3 and write down your XYZ position.
- Trying to swim through lava to retrieve something. Whatever item fell in lava is gone. Do not follow it.
Closing thought
Being stuck in the Nether with a broken portal is genuinely stressful — but it is a solvable problem. Ruined portals exist specifically because Mojang knew players would need emergency obsidian. The game put the solution in the Nether on purpose. Find it, build the frame, go home.
Next: Portal Linking Guide — how portals calculate their Overworld counterparts so you can build them in the right spot the first time.
← BACK TO NETHER WASTES