
A maximum of eight pillagers spawn naturally in an outpost. In Bedrock Edition, pillagers continually spawn at or below a particular location in the outpost, choosing the highest opaque block with a non-solid block on top and spawning on the northwest corner. In Java Edition, there can be unlimited pillagers that spawn in outposts naturally, limited only by the natural spawning rules. They may spawn on any valid opaque block if the block light level is less than or equal to 8. Some pillagers spawn as outpost captains. Pillagers continually spawn in a 72×54×72 block volume centered on the top floor in a pillager outpost. After 5 1⁄ 2 in-game days, patrols appear 24 to 48 blocks away from the player, at a light level of 7 and below on Easy or any light level on Normal and Hard difficulty. One of these pillagers is a patrol captain. In Bedrock Edition, each patrol spawns two to five pillagers. The individual pillagers of a patrol can spawn only at block light level less than 9, regardless of sky light. A patrol spawns 24 to 48 blocks away from a random player, on the highest solid block. Patrols occur after 5 1⁄ 2 in-game days, any time and independently of structures, which means they still spawn in worlds without generated structures. In Java Edition, the number of pillagers spawning in each patrol varies from one to five and depends on the regional difficulty, with one spawning as a patrol captain.

In Java Edition, a pillager spawned by a player using a spawn egg or commands can be a captain which has an ominous banner sticking out of its head.
