Minecraft server hosting pricing

No subscription and no monthly plan. You add funds up front, and they are only used for the minutes your server is online - from $0.04/hour. A typical friends server works out to $2–6/month.

How pay-per-minute pricing works

Your server starts automatically when a player joins and stops after the last player leaves (configurable). You are not charged for the start and stop time itself, and your prepaid balance never expires.

Flat-rate hosts charge $8–15/month for similar specs whether anyone plays or not. With usage-based billing you keep the "free while nobody plays" property and only pay for actual play time.

Every package, one hourly price

All packages bill per minute of server uptime. Upgrade or downgrade anytime.

PackageCPUMemoryPriceBest for
Coal1 vCPU3GB RAM$0.04/hourVanilla with 1-2 people
Copper1 vCPU4GB RAM$0.05/hourVanilla with more players or light datapacks
Quartz2 vCPU5GB RAM$0.06/hourPaper servers with a handful of plugins
Iron2 vCPU6GB RAM$0.07/hourPlugin servers and light modpacks
Lapis2 vCPU7GB RAM$0.08/hourMid-size Forge and Fabric modpacks
Gold2 vCPU8GB RAM$0.09/hourMid-size modpacks with more players
Redstone2 vCPU10GB RAM$0.10/hourHeavy modpacks like All the Mods or DawnCraft
Diamond2 vCPU11GB RAM$0.11/hourHeavy modpacks with a bigger crowd
Emerald2 vCPU12GB RAM$0.12/hourThe largest modpacks and busy servers

Running mods or plugins? See our Forge, NeoForge, Fabric, and Paper hosting pages.

What a Minecraft server actually costs

Three realistic setups, priced with the real package rates above.

Casual vanilla crew

Five friends on a vanilla survival world, playing a couple of evenings a week.

Weekend modpack group

Four friends working through a mid-size Forge or Fabric modpack on weekends.

Always-active community

A public community server with players online most evenings and weekends.

Past roughly 150 hours a month, a flat-rate host can be price-competitive - the difference is you keep per-minute billing for the quiet weeks.

Storage pricing

Storage costs $0.18 per GB per month, deducted daily from your balance - it is the only charge while your server is offline. A typical 1–2 GB vanilla world costs about $0.18–0.36/month; a 600MB world works out to roughly $0.003 per day.

Adding funds

Add $5, $10, or $20 at a time. Your balance never expires.

Pricing questions, answered

Is there a monthly fee or subscription?

No. You add funds up front, and they are only used for the minutes your server is online, plus a small daily storage fee. If nobody plays for a month, you pay nothing for server time.

Am I charged for the time it takes my server to start and stop?

No! Billing begins when your server is fully online and stops when the shutdown process starts.

Does my balance expire?

No, your prepaid balance never expires. Play a lot one month and barely at all the next - whatever is left carries over until you use it.

What happens when my balance runs out?

Your server stops and cannot be started again until you top up. Your world and files stay safe: servers are only deleted after three weeks with an empty balance, and we send email warnings before that happens.

Can I set a spending limit?

There is no separate spending-limit setting, but your balance is prepaid, so you can never spend more than you have added. If you add $5, that is the most your server can use - there are no surprise overage bills.

How do storage fees work?

Storage costs $0.18 per GB per month, deducted daily from your balance. For example, 600MB of storage would cost $0.003 per day.

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