Litematica ghost blocks too solid or too faint? The settings that control it

If the hologram hides the terrain you are trying to line up with, or fades into the background in bright biomes, you can change how opaque it is. The setting is easy to miss because it is spread across a few options in the Visuals tab.

Where to look

Press M+C, then open the Visuals tab. These are the relevant entries in the 1.21.4 source:

• ghostBlockAlpha defaults to 0.5 and runs from 0 to 1. Lower values are more see-through.
• renderBlocksAsTranslucent is off by default. Turning it on draws the schematic blocks as translucent.
• renderTranslucentBlockInnerSides is off by default and controls whether inner faces of translucent blocks are drawn.
• placementBoxSideAlpha is 0.2 and shades the sides of the placement box.

If a change does not appear, rebuild the schematic render with F3+M.

A hologram you cannot see at all is a different problem

Check M+R (all rendering) and M+G (ghost blocks) first. Holding Right Control draws the overlay through world blocks while the key is held, which helps when an existing block hides part of the hologram.

Underwater builds show red

Fluid blocks inside the schematic area are marked as extra and painted red. In Visuals, turn on ignoreExistingFluids to stop that, and renderCollidingSchematicBlocks so schematic blocks still draw where something already occupies the space. The second option also helps with snow layers.

Performance note

Large holograms with translucency cost more to render. Use a render-layer mode to show only the floor you are building, and keep translucency off unless you need it.

None of these values are stored in the .litematic. They are client settings, so two players can see the same file differently.

The same list, with the settings in a table, is on Litematica schematic opacity. If a placement is in the wrong spot rather than the wrong brightness, see move a schematic placement.

I build a Minecraft schematic generator that exports .litematic files, so I end up reading this config a lot.

Not affiliated with Mojang. Names and defaults checked against the 1.21.4 source.

More notes in this series: Do you need to download a schematic, or can you generate one? A short decision guide · Paste or build? Two ways to use a .litematic and when each one fits · Change the wood type of a litematic without rebuilding it · Litematica shows only a small cyan box after loading? Check the Manual Origin option