Biome backgrounds

Biome backgrounds are images that appear behind objects and blocks in each biome. Each biome has its own set of backgrounds that usually show a landscape of the biome. In a world, each biome is randomly assigned a background from its own set, and can be changed by using a World Globe. Backgrounds can also be overridden using Monoliths. Backgrounds do not affect a biome in any way, except in The Hallow, where the current background affects the style of hallowed trees. Turning off backgrounds in Settings hides them, though ambient entities will still appear.

Surface backgrounds

Forest

• 
  Updated classic background with evergreens with distant, realistic mountains
• 
  Forest blocking mountains
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  Bushy trees blocking a mountain
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  Hilly landscape with evergreens
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  Pine trees blocking a hilly landscape
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  Tall cliffs with an animated waterfall
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  Tall cliffs with trees and grass.
• 
  Tall cliffs with evergreens
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  Large lake in a forest with a distant house and snowy mountains
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  Hills with a plateau
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  Evergreens blocking hills with plateau
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  Forest blocking plateau hills
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  Bushy forest blocking plateau hills
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  Tall pillars with floating islands
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  Pine forest with mountains in the distance
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  Mountains with a lake

Desert

• 
  Classic sand dunes
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  Sand dunes with animal skeletons
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  Sand dunes with rocks and buttes
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  Sand dunes with cacti and a few ruins
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  Dry flat desert over a cliff, with a few dead trees and bones

Infected Desert

• 
  Corrupt desert
• 
  Crimson desert
• 
  Hallowed desert

Snow biome

• 
  Updated classic evergreen forest blocking snowy mountains
• 
  Mountains with leafless trees
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  Icy mountains with sparse trees
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  Frozen tree forest blocking snowy mountains
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  Evergreen forest blocking snowy mountains
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  Icy mountains with snowy evergreens
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  Frozen forest blocking mountains
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  Evergreen forest blocking snowy mountains
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  Icy mountains with evergreens
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  Leafless forest blocking snowy mountains with evergreens
• 
  Snowy fields with sparse evergreens.
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  Snowy plains with sparse trees.
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  Snowy plains with pine trees, a few piles of Snowballs and a snowman behind a frozen lake

Jungle

Some Jungle backgrounds are combined with the current forest background.

• 
  Classic bushy green canopies
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  Grassy field with rich mahogany trees
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  Thorny hills
• 
  Bonsai-like tree jungle
• 
  Muddy jungle with dark textures over a cliff
• 
  Marsh-like field with sparse jungle trees and animated water bodies

The Corruption

• 
  Classic corrupt trees without leaves
• 
  More detailed corrupt trees on darker purple grass
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  Plains with chasms and thorny, organic-looking structures
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  Large spike structures emerging out of a thorny landscape
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  Jagged mountains with a single ebonwood tree and chasm

The Crimson

• 
  Classic background, consisting of crimson trees and a distant giant skull and bones
• 
  Similar to the previous image, but has a redder grass hue and different trees, skull and bones
• 
  Red hills with crimson trees and large brown arches
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  Red field with eyeballs and bones
• 
  Blood lake with dragon bones in a crimson field with many trees and more dragon bones.
• 
  Jagged, dark red rocky landscape with stone arches.

The Hallow

Every Hallow background has a rainbow in it.

• 
  Updated classic Hallow evergreen forest
• 
  Hallowed trees of several colors
• 
  Hallow field with a magenta river, a few hallowed trees, an extra rainbow and distant pink and blue crystals
• 
  Plateaus with sparse hallow trees
• 
  Hills with rocky formations, evergreen-like rainbow trees and crystals

Ocean

• 
  Classic distant mountains
• 
  Distant sandy islands with palm trees and moʻai
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  Distant sandy islands without moʻai
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  Distant islets and sea stacks
• 
  Distant alternative islands
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  Distant mountains with mesas. Has different water color.

Glowing Mushroom biome

Glowing Mushroom backgrounds are combined with the current forest background.

• 
  Classic Glowing Mushrooms
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  Smaller mushrooms towering in groups
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  Open mushroom field with a lake in the background
• 
  Smaller mushrooms on a hilly landscape. Has a different grass color

Underground backgrounds

These backgrounds consist of only one layer, unlike surface backgrounds, and cannot be changed with World Globes.

Underground

• 
  Old rocky dirt background used pre-1.2
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  Rough dirt pattern with rocks
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  Rough dirt pattern without rocks
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  Bumpy dirt pattern with larger rocks
• 
  Crumbling dirt wall with rocks
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  Crumbling dirt wall without rocks
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  Circular dirt wall
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  Circular dirt wall with grass seeds
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  Cracked dirt wall revealing stone behind it

Cavern

• 
  Old rocky stone background used pre-1.2
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  Smooth stone wall with rocks
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  Smooth stone wall without rocks
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  Stone wall covered in larger rocks
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  Stone wall covered in medium sized rocks
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  Crumbling stone wall
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  Rocky stone wall
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  Rocky stone wall with orange moss
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  Cracked stone wall, matching pattern revealed by matching underground layer background

Pre-Underworld

• 
  Old underworld background used pre-1.2, features very thin lava flow
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  Twisting lava flow
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  Thin lava flow with skulls in the rocks
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  Very thick lava flow around large rocks

Glowing Mushroom biome

• 
  Small glowing mushrooms illuminating a rocky background
• 
  Large glowing mushrooms illuminating a rocky background

Ice biome (Underground)

• 
  Multiple thin layers of ice stacked on top of each other
• 
  Smooth wall of ice
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  Bumpy ice wall
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  Irregular ice layers stacked on top of each other

Ice biome (Cavern)

• 
  Ice crystals
• 
  Darker ice wall
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  Bumpy ice wall with extra ice rocks
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  Smooth wall littered with ice rocks

Underground Ocean

• 
  (Default) sand wall with different types of coral
• 
  (Corrupt) Ebonsand wall with corrupt coral
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  (Crimson) Crimsand wall with dying and crimson coral
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  (Hallowed) Pearlsand wall with hallowed, crystal-like corals

Underground Jungle (Underground layer)

• 
  Small vines growing on a dirt background
• 
  Large leaves growing from rocks

Underground Jungle (Cavern)

• 
  Rocky wall with small vines spread across
• 
  Smooth stone wall with leaves growing from it

Underground Corruption

On the  PC version,  Console version,  Mobile version,  Old Chinese version,  tModLoader version, and  tModLoader 1.3-Legacy version, the following backgrounds are used. On the  Old-gen console version,  Windows Phone version, and Nintendo 3DS version, the cavern layer background for any other biome the player is in is dynamically tinted purple.

• 
  Rocky ebonstone wall with green moss growing in the cracks
• 
  Rocky ebonstone wall with small dots of moss placed around
• 
  Jagged ebonstone wall
• 
  Bumpy ebonstone wall
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  (Corrupt Ice) Smooth purple ice wall with normal stone rocks, or possibly claws or teeth. There appears to be a frozen eye to the right.

Underground Crimson

On the  PC version,  Console version,  Mobile version,  Old Chinese version,  tModLoader version, and  tModLoader 1.3-Legacy version, the following backgrounds are used. On the  Old-gen console version,  Windows Phone version, and Nintendo 3DS version, the cavern layer background for any other biome the player is in is dynamically tinted red.

• 
  Blistered crimstone wall
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  Crimstone wall with red moss growing over the rocks
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  Alternative moss arrangement
• 
  Dark crimstone wall
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  Gray stone wall with blisters scattered
• 
  (Crimson Ice) Smooth red ice wall
• 
  (Crimson Ice) Bumpy red ice wall with Blood Jellies and eyeballs frozen within it

Underground Hallow

On the  PC version,  Console version,  Mobile version,  Old Chinese version,  tModLoader version, and  tModLoader 1.3-Legacy version, the following backgrounds are used. On the  Old-gen console version,  Windows Phone version, and Nintendo 3DS version, the cavern layer background for any other biome the player is in is dynamically tinted pink.

• 
  Large rocks blocking blue and pink crystals on a purple background
• 
  Diagonal purple crystals. May cause confusion with underground corruption due to purple color
• 
  Bumpy stone wall with blue and pink crystals growing out of it
• 
  (Hallowed Ice) Cracked purple ice wall with blue and pink dots. (May cause confusion with Corrupt ice due to purple color.)
• 
  (Hallowed Ice) Smooth pink ice wall
• 
  (Hallowed Ice) Bumpy multicolored ice wall
• 
  (Hallowed Ice) Smooth multicolored ice wall

Underworld backgrounds

Unlike the underground backgrounds, these have multiple layers like surface backgrounds do.

• 
  Original background from 1.3 with large pillars with lava pools
• 
  Large lava lake with islands and lava falls
• 
  Large mountain structures with caves

Trivia

• The 3rd Hallow surface background features a large animated lake on its 3rd layer which cannot be easily seen in-game.
• The backgrounds of the Underground Corruption, Crimson, or Hallow biomes revert to the default caverns background just before the underworld, and they don't appear until the underground layer isn't visible anymore on the screen.

History

 PC version

• Desktop 1.4.0.1:
  • Added 27 new surface backgrounds and updated the graphics of many existing ones.
    • Added 2 new Forest backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Desert backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Snow backgrounds.
    • Added 4 new Jungle backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Corruption backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Crimson backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Hallow backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Ocean backgrounds.
    • Added 3 new Glowing Mushroom backgrounds.
  • Added new normal, corrupt, crimson and hallowed underground layer backgrounds for the Ocean.
  • Added 2 new Underworld backgrounds.
  • A world can now have up to 4 unique backgrounds for the forest biome, determined by the same areas as the 4 tree types.

• Desktop 1.3.0.1: Underworld background now displays with multiple layers, similar to surface backgrounds.

• Desktop 1.2: Added 34 new surface backgrounds.

• Desktop 1.1:
  • Added unique surface backgrounds for the Forest, Desert, Jungle, Ocean, Corruption and Hallow.
    • Prior to the update, only the basic blue background could be seen in every biome.

• Desktop-Release: Introduced underground and cavern backgrounds.