Minecraft Pocket Edition, also written MCPE or PE, was the name of Mojang Studios' mobile release of Minecraft. It is now called Bedrock Edition. Mojang dropped the Pocket Edition name when the 1.2.0 line arrived, so the app on a phone today is Bedrock, not a separate game. This page reads the sources on 13 October 2026.
What Pocket Edition was
The Minecraft Wiki describes Minecraft: Pocket Edition as the former title of the Bedrock Edition for mobile devices before 1.2.0. It is listed as officially discontinued. It is no longer updated or sold, though it can still be played where it was already installed. The wiki adds that later releases are still commonly, if wrongly, called Pocket Edition.
It also matters for a reason beyond phones. The wiki says Pocket Edition introduced the Bedrock Engine, which was later ported to Windows 10 Edition, Gear VR Edition, Apple TV Edition and Fire TV Edition. Bedrock is the name of the C++ codebase they all share.
How Pocket Edition began and grew
A Mojang post dated 12/2/16 says Pocket Edition started as an experiment by Mojang coder Aron Nieminen, put together in about three months. In his words, the first internal release had only an ASCII renderer and was not meant to have multiplayer. By that post Mojang counted over 40 million players. The wiki also records 16.5 million copies sold by December 2013, against 13 million for Java Edition.
| Platform | First release | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Android (Xperia Play only) | 16 August 2011 | Sold at US$6.99 on Google Play |
| Android (other devices) | 7 October 2011 | Delayed from a planned 29 September |
| iOS | 17 November 2011 | Last release 1.1.7, 15 September 2017 |
| Amazon Appstore | 13 September 2012 | Fire OS listing |
| Windows Phone 8.1 | 10 December 2014 | Discontinued after 0.16.2 on 18 November 2016 |
| Windows 10 Mobile | 22 February 2017 | Replacement release from 1.0.3, free to earlier owners |
The 1.0.0 release, the Ender Update, arrived on 19 December 2016. The Minecraft Wiki says it added the End and the Ender dragon, and that the Alpha and Beta tags were dropped because the game had reached a completed gameplay loop.
Why it was renamed
When Pocket Edition and its sibling editions received the Better Together Update, the Edition subtitle was removed and the official name for all of them became Minecraft. To keep things clear, Mojang and the community began calling them collectively Bedrock Edition. The wiki's last Pocket Edition releases are 1.1.7 on iOS and iPadOS and 1.1.5 elsewhere. The sources we read give no single rename day, so we do not state one.
How Pocket Edition relates to Bedrock Edition today
They are the same line of the game under different names. Mobile Bedrock is the direct successor, not a rival product. The differences between Bedrock and Java are laid out in Minecraft Java vs Bedrock Edition.
Where Bedrock runs now
Minecraft's own comparison page lists Bedrock Edition on Windows 10 and 11, Xbox One, Xbox Series S and X, PlayStation 4 and 5, Nintendo Switch, Android, iOS and Windows Mobile. Java Edition is only on Windows, Mac and Linux. That page also says Java and Bedrock players cannot play together because the two use different servers. For which Bedrock devices can join each other, see Is Minecraft cross platform. For the newest console release, see Minecraft Switch 2 Edition explained.
What MCPE still means to players who use add-ons or packs
The comparison page says Bedrock has a curated Marketplace and supports add-ons, which change how things look and behave. Start with what Bedrock add-ons are, then how to install add-ons on Bedrock. For looks only, texture packs on Minecraft PE for Android and iOS covers the steps.
Limits and what the sources do not say
We read sources and did not play any Pocket Edition release. The wiki lists the original Windows Phone and Windows 10 Mobile releases as discontinued. It gives no install size for Pocket Edition and no exact rename day. Current release numbers sit on the Minecraft Wiki and in the latest version page.
