Minecraft-Hosting.pro : Free Minecraft Server Hosting

Hardware & software requirements

- A powerful PC Gamer, with High-frequency CPU to have a high single Thread power of calculation, 3Ghz+ is highly recommended, 4Gh+ is better, capable of running Minecraft single player in perfect condition.
- NVMe Disk, or SSD disk to have fast read and write bandwidth, avoid deprecated SATA disk.
- 6GB+ Memory, if you want to run your game server on your computer, or 2GB+ if you using a hosting company.
- Very Good bandwidth internet connection with a static IP address, with at least 10Mb upload, to have a low latency (fiber connection recommended)
- APC Battery unit to keep your computer powered 24/24h
- DDOS Protection, only available in a Datacenter.
- Scheduled Backup capabilities
- Optimized Java version and server software

It's possible to host your Minecraft server on your local computer, but it's taking security risks, as you will have to publish your external IP address. This will expose your computer and your home network over the internet, in case of DDoS attacks, you won't be protected, and your whole home internet network will be down.
Your computer will need to have enough resources available to host your friends and to allow you to play in good conditions, without lags.

So your computer hardware will need to be oversized compared to what you would need to connect to an external dedicated server.

To avoid this, you can install a second machine to be used as a server only, but you need 2 computers, if you make this choice, we strongly recommend you to install the second machine under Linux in minimal setup, to dedicate most hardware resources to Minecraft.

Also, to keep your Minecraft server online, your computer will need to stay powered all the time, most public computer hardware is not designed to this, especially your power supply, or motherboard.

By using our server hosting service, you don't have to care anymore at those concerns, since all the game server hardware is independent of your computer.

As long you can play on single player, you will enjoy the same gaming experience on multiplayer. You won't have to use your public IP address, we will provide you one for your Minecraft server.

It's why we recommend you to use our service, to avoid sacrificing your computer resources and keep them to enjoy your multiplayer gaming experience. Also, most of the time, it costs much less to simply rent a Minecraft server to a hosting company.

All our game servers are running under the latest AMD Ryzen 3900X 4.6Ghz Processors, with NVMe Disk 2500MB/s and DDR4 2666Mhz.
All servers are Powered by industrial-grade 90% Platinum Power supply,
on redounded power sources Tier III Datacenters, with 1GB/s Bandwitch fully protected from DDoS Attacks. Our support is also here to assist you with whatever issue you have, configuring your Minecraft server.

Amount of ram required

Depending on the version of minecraft that you want to play, Minecraft will need more or less RAM.
Standard vanilla will require less memory than a spigot with installed plugins, or a forge version with mods.

More plugins or mods you install, and more memory you will need.
Same with your world size, a small map will consume less memory than a large one, since the number of loaded chunks will be different.

Last, the number of players connected will also increase your memory usage, to have 3-5 players connected will not be the same as having 20+.

Also note that recent versions need more memory than old ones, because they contains more content.

You have to take all of this in consideration before choosing your server memory amount, generally, we advise having at least 2GB to begin with a vanilla Minecraft server, and up to 3-4GB if you want to install some plugins or mods, and 6GB+ for large mod-pack or 10+ players connected.

Network Requirements

More Bandwidth your internet connection has, and slower your latency (ping) will be, we can compare the network, to a pipe with water, if you have a big pipe, you will be able to provide more water, faster than with a small pipe.

We do recommend to have a least 10Mbits Upload (not download), since your server will have to send information to all connected players, in the difference that when you simply connect to a server.

You need to have a router firewall, to confiture a port translation to your local server, to allow your Minecraft server to be visible from the outside, and to block all the unneeded ports to avoid exposing too much your home network.
This will redirect all the traffic destinated to your minecraft server running on this port, to your local computer.
You have to check your network equipment documentation to see how to configure the port translation, most of the time it's on advanced settings, and you may have to reboot your router to apply them.

As told before, the main issue to host yourself your server is to expose your Home IP address to all kinds of attacks (DDoS, intrusions, ...).
It's why having a dedicated computer is safer.

Chosing your version of minecraft

The power of Minecraft is that you can do whatever you want, the original game was used as a base by the community to create a multitude of versions, some powerful tools were added, as the plugins and mods, that you can combine to add functionality to the original game.

This way, you can literally use Minecraft to create your own game, without having to code, just by selecting the plugins or mods that you want.

Vanilla

It's the official Minecraft java edition, created by Mojang, it's where everything started, years after years many new functionalities were added. If it's your first-time server, this version is good, to begin with.
You can download the Minecraft server files here
For windows / OSX or Linux.

Bukkit - Spigot - PaperMC

Bukkit was the first version to introduce plugins into Minecraft, originally named Craftbukkit, allowing you to add some must-have functionalities as Fworld-edit, Essentials, Factions etc...
Then Spigot took over Bukkit and is now the reference to add plugins on your Minecraft server.
As Bukkit and Spigot, PaperMC allows you to install plugins, but it's a low latency optimized Minecraft version, if you want to improve your overall server performance, we recommend you to use PaperMC.

Once you know which type of server you are going to use, you need to download the server .jar file on your local computer, or use our one click install available on our host control panel.
This will automatically copy the server files that your selected, you will be able to start your server on the way.

Installing plugins

You can download all plugins from Curseforge or Spigot

Simply download the jar files, and put them in your server plugins directory, some of them have config files, just open them with an plain text editor, we invite you to read the plugins documentation file before to know what you need to do.
The main advantage to use plugins over mods is that you only need to install the plugins on the server, allowing your players to join using the default vanilla minecraft client.

Installing mods with Forge

Forge Mod Reloader (FML) is used to install mods on your server.
What's the difference between mods and plugins?

Mods allow you to do more than plugins, to deeply change and tune Minecraft, to the point to create an entirely new game experience.
Because of that, mods are much more complex than plugins, need more hardware resources, and are more difficult to set up and configure.
Players also need to install the mods on their Minecraft client to be able to connect to the server, most of the time a specific client loaded is made to make it easier, and to avoid to have to manually install each mod.

The community proposes thousand of modpacks based on forge that combines multiple mods to create entire games based on Minecraft, but with original game experience.
As some famous modpacks: RLCraft, SkyFactory, RAD, PixelMon, feed the beast

Bedrock edition

Minecraft is also available on mobiles, they do not use java to runs the server, you simply have to unzip the bedrock container server files in an empty folder, and starting the server with the bedrock_server.exe file under windows.

Connect to your Server

Once your Minecraft server is started, you or your friends can connect by using the server IP Address affected to him.

If you make the choice to host yourself your game server, you will need to configure your router/firewall to allow your server to be visible outside your local network.

This is a bit complicated, and you will need some network skills since you have to configure a port forwarding on your router and to open the port used by your Minecraft server on your firewall (by default 25565).
If you don't do this, outside connections will be denied and your server will only be accessible from your home network.
Of course, if we are hosting your server, you don't have to worry about this, we take care of everything, we will provide you a cool subdomain name portless to connect to your server, in addition to the IP: Port of your server.

To configure a Port Forwarding, you need to connect to your home router and find the section where you can configure port forward (consult your router documentation).

You will need to enter the local computer address that you used to host your Minecraft server, by example 192.168.1.10, the port used by your server, by default 25565 (if you didn't change it in the server.properties file) and also which addresses are allowed to connect.
If you also have a firewall on your computer, you will have to open the port 25565 to allow traffic to enter and exit on TCP protocol.
Once you did this, you can give your home network address to your friends, you can find her by going on www.myip.com.
If you did everything right, they will be able to connect to your game server, otherwise, check your router/firewall configuration.

As warned before, publishing your home IP address over the internet is a security risk, it's why it's recommended to host your server in a Datacenter Minecraft hosting company, to not expose your home network to all kinds of attack and malicious entities.

Once it's done, to join your server, simply open Minecraft, using the client compatible with the server version, then click on Multiplayer, and add a server by entering the IP Address : Port, or directly your domain name if you have one.

Configure your Server

The server properties are found under the file name "server.properties" that contains a line for each server option parameters. Simply edit them with a text editor, they will be applied to your server on the next restart.
You will find a list of the most used parameter here

If you choose to run your game server on Minecraft Hosting Pro, those parameters will be directly selectable under the main panel page, without having to edit manually the file.

If you want to change your Minecraft version, you need to replace the .jar file before restarting your server.

Become Operator

Once your server is launched, under the console, enter /op username, this will add your account as the operator. This player will gain full access to the server and will be able to launch any commands.

All operator UUID are stocked under the file ops.json, you can also manually edit this file if you know your player account UUID.
You need to assign op-permission-level=4 if you want to have enough right to launch commands.

Under Minecraft Hosting Pro, you only have to go to the player page, and add the player's name to OP.

Adding a player to the whitelist

You can activate the white list by putting true in the server.properties, the online mode will also need to be turned on, otherwise, no one will be able to connect.

Same as the OP, you need to run the command /whitelist add username, this will add the players UUID under the file whitelist.json, you can also manually edit this file.
If you use our hosting, you only have to add a player name on the player page.

Monitoring and managing the server

One of the advantages to use an hosting company is that you can check your server status from anywhere.
All our servers are 24/24 monitored. We give you direct status access, this way, you can check by yourself, at any moment the node memory, CPU usage, and uptime.

Connecting by FTP to your Minecraft server

If you host your game server on your local computer, you will not need to connect by FTP, because you can directly access your server file under your system, but if you run an online hosting solution, you will need remote access to your server files.

To do this, we provide you an FTP file access, allowing you to upload/download/edit configuration files on your server, such as Minecraft versions, plugins, mods, world folder.

You can easily connect using our web FTP available on your panel, mainly used to upload small plugins/mods, or to manually edit settings files, however, to upload/download large files, we recommend you to use an FTP client such as WinSCP or Filezilla, you will find the login/password under the credential page of our panel.

How to Make your Minecraft Server?