Just Enough Items shipped 31.0.0.5 for NeoForge 26.3 on 16 September 2026, alongside continued releases on the 19.x line for 1.21 and 15.x for older versions. Three active major versions of the same mod, all updated the same day.
Why a recipe viewer is not optional
In vanilla Minecraft, the recipe book covers everything. In a modded install, recipes come from machines, rituals, multiblock structures and mod-specific crafting systems that the vanilla book knows nothing about.
Without a viewer, discovering how to make something means reading a wiki that may not exist for the mod version you are running. With one, it is a keypress.
The three-way split
- JEI – the original, the one most NeoForge packs ship, the one mods write plugins for first.
- REI – Fabric-first, can load JEI plugins, more configurable interface.
- EMI – newest, with recipe tree resolution that plans multi-step crafts for you.
They are close enough that the choice is usually made by whichever your pack already includes. Running two is possible and pointless.
What the version numbers mean
JEI’s major version tracks the Minecraft version it targets. 31.x is 26.3; 19.x is the 1.21 line; 15.x is older still. A higher JEI number is a newer Minecraft, not a newer feature set, and downloading by number alone is how people end up with a file that will not load.
This numbering scheme is common and it trips up new modded players constantly. The rule is always the same: read the game version tag, ignore the mod version.
Beta on release week
31.0.0.5 is marked beta, which for a utility mod on a five-day-old Minecraft version is appropriate rather than concerning. The plugins that other mods provide have not all been updated, so the viewer works while some mods’ recipes may not display yet.
That gap closes as content mods port, which puts a recipe viewer in the odd position of being ready before there is much for it to show.
Where it goes in the install order
After the loader and API, after config libraries, before content mods. It depends on the layers below it and everything above it assumes it exists.
Getting that order right is most of what makes a first modded install succeed, and the full process from download to first launch walks through why each layer comes where it does.
Loader considerations
JEI ships NeoForge and Fabric builds, though its centre of gravity is NeoForge. REI’s is Fabric. In practice this means the loader you pick nudges which viewer you end up with, which is one of the few places the loader choice has a visible effect on daily play.
The rest of that decision comes down to which content mods you want, and the honest comparison makes the case that it matters less than the arguments suggest.
Features worth knowing
- Press U on an item to see what it makes; R to see how it is made.
- The search bar supports @modname to filter by source mod.
- Bookmarks persist between sessions and are the fastest way to track a long craft.
- Cheat mode in creative gives you items directly from the list.
The @modname filter is the one most people never learn and the one that saves the most time in a large pack.
Availability
Builds for NeoForge and Fabric across 26.3, the 1.21 line and older versions, all published on 16 September 2026. Maintaining three generations of the same mod simultaneously is unusual even by modded Minecraft standards.
Plugins are where the value is
JEI on its own shows vanilla recipes. What makes it indispensable is that mods write plugins for it, registering their machines, their rituals and their custom crafting types so the viewer can display them.
This is why the viewer being ready before the content mods is a strange state: it works, and there is almost nothing modded for it to show until the mods that feed it arrive.
The search syntax nobody learns
@modname– filter to one mod’s items.#tag– search by item tag, which finds categories rather than names.$– search by creative tab in some configurations.- Plain text matches item names and tooltips.
The tag search is the advanced one and it answers questions like “what counts as a log for this recipe”, which is otherwise a wiki trip.
Performance note
A recipe viewer renders hundreds of item models on screen at once, which makes it one of the more expensive GUI screens in a modded game. If your frame rate collapses when you open it, a GUI rendering optimisation mod addresses exactly that case.
It is also why viewer screens are a good benchmark for GUI performance work – the effect is immediate and obvious.
Images: JEI project gallery on Modrinth.