The ultimate guide to picking your minecraft server plan
In this article, we will explore all different options for server creation parameters and find the plan that is perfect for you!
Picking a Location
Picking the hardware/budget vs. premium
Resource/Plan Recommendations
In general, servers for friends and family don't require you to take into consideration location hardware. In contrast, it requires you to choose a node that is closest to your friends and family. If your friends are based in the US for example, a good server with optimal performance would be a node from either NYC, MIA, CHI, or LA. However, in some cases, your Friends and Family may not all be located in the same vicinity. In this case, the best server would be one that is in the "middle" of each party. If half of your Friends are based in the US, specifically Texas for example, and the other half is based in London, a prime location would be NYC, as NYC is in between these two locations.
Unlike the previous scenario, servers for commercial use rely on numerous conditions. In selecting a location for your server, depending on your Software, choosing a location with complementary Software would prove to be optimal. In addition, choosing a location that is in a "central zone" will also prove to be optimal. Let's take for example you want to create a Pocketmine-MP server. Since we know PocketMine-MP takes a lot of CPU compared to RAM (learn more about which software in our other article), we would choose a location that has a good CPU, which could be in our case NYC or SIN. Both locations are in "central zones" so it is up to you to choose which location is best for you. If you think your server will appeal to most Europeans (primary English speaking countries), NYC would be a better option, and vice versa.
One resource which everyone has access to is Command Prompt/Terminal. To see how close the node is to your location and see how much ping/latency you are expected to get: use the ping feature for help. Below is an example for seeing how good the NYC node would be. First open up command prompt and type in this command.
The above would output the following:
As you can see from my location I would be expected to be getting around 47 ms worth of ping. Or, in other words, it takes 47 ms for data to be transferred between me and the server location. You can test your ping to our different locations using the following domains below
• New York - ping wh-nyc-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Los Angeles - ping la-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Miami - ping mia-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Dallas - ping dal-01-b.witherhosting.com
• United Kingdom - ping uk-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Germany - ping ger-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Australia - ping au-01-p.witherhosting.com
• Singapore - ping sin-01-p.witherhosting.com
Budget - $1/gb
Premium - $2/gb
Budget - Single threaded score ranges from 1475-2393 points. Average score is 1980.65! ( Last updated 20th Mar 2022 )
You may get a pick between Xeon 2650v2, Xeon 2670v3, Xeon 1650v4 or equivalent models. We are updating our budget hardware to 3600X/5600X's, keep an eye out!
Premium - Single threaded score ranges from 2685-3500 points. Average score is 3166.71! ( Last updated 20th Mar 2022 )
You may get a pick between Ryzen 9 5950X, Ryzen 7 5800X, Ryzen 7 3700X, Intel i9-9900K, Intel-i9-10900K or equivalent models.
Please note that both budget and premium plans are capable of running minecraft servers. The single threaded score should only be taken into consideration when you have very resource-intensive servers such as big smps, skyblocks etc. Personal servers between friends and family will not benefit an upgrade since there would be little activity on the server. Additionally,
Budget - Live chat
Premium - Live chat, Discord support
Budget - Not available for free in any plans
Premium - Free for plans from Sheep | 6GB and above
Budget - Suited for 1.16.5 and below servers, lightly modded servers, servers for friends, non-intensive SMPs, games like skywars and bedwars
Premium - Suited for 1.17 and above, heavily modded servers, servers for running communities, resource intensive SMPs, games like skyblock
Please note, the base RAM is the quantity needed for the server to function properly, with no player activity. This is not the recommended amount.
For every 10 players, add 1gb of RAM to your plan
For every 10-15 plugins, add 1gb of RAM to your plan
For every 10 mods, add 1gb of ram to your plan
Some experienced Minecraft server owners may not recommend these exact values. The amount of ram you choose from our picks is meant to consider all factors such as max view distance, zero optimizations, heavy plugins, etc. and is a simplified version of it.
Based on the version you want to run, the amount of RAM varies a lot. Below is a table with the recommended ram amounts for bedrock, java, forge based servers
Minecraft is a single-threaded game, so upgrading in vcores is often not the solution to your lag! It is true however, that having many cores allows this thread to alternate between cores and obtain better performance. Additionally, most plugins processes do not work on the same thread as the minecraft server, hence why more cores is also beneficial for your plugins to keep up.
Having lots of plugins tends to take up a boatload of CPU. Check which ones are overusing your processing power with a timings report.
Please note that premium plans are recommended for Vanilla Bedrock especially, as it is very CPU demanding in a Linux environment.
Proxies: 1-2 GB and 1-2 vcores should be enough for most proxy softwares, depending on how many players pass through. For Java, we recommend optimized softwares such as Velocity or Waterfall.
If you intend on using geysermc as a plugin on your proxy, add another 1gb of ram per 10 players.
Discord Bots: 1 GB and 1-2 vcores should be enough to run most bots. We do, however, recommend premium for Music bots, which would profit from a 10 Gbps bandwidth.
👆 Jump to different parts of the article here 👇
Picking a Location
Picking the hardware/budget vs. premium
Resource/Plan Recommendations
🌍 Picking a Location 🌍
Servers for friends and family
In general, servers for friends and family don't require you to take into consideration location hardware. In contrast, it requires you to choose a node that is closest to your friends and family. If your friends are based in the US for example, a good server with optimal performance would be a node from either NYC, MIA, CHI, or LA. However, in some cases, your Friends and Family may not all be located in the same vicinity. In this case, the best server would be one that is in the "middle" of each party. If half of your Friends are based in the US, specifically Texas for example, and the other half is based in London, a prime location would be NYC, as NYC is in between these two locations.
Servers for Commercial Use
Unlike the previous scenario, servers for commercial use rely on numerous conditions. In selecting a location for your server, depending on your Software, choosing a location with complementary Software would prove to be optimal. In addition, choosing a location that is in a "central zone" will also prove to be optimal. Let's take for example you want to create a Pocketmine-MP server. Since we know PocketMine-MP takes a lot of CPU compared to RAM (learn more about which software in our other article), we would choose a location that has a good CPU, which could be in our case NYC or SIN. Both locations are in "central zones" so it is up to you to choose which location is best for you. If you think your server will appeal to most Europeans (primary English speaking countries), NYC would be a better option, and vice versa.
Using Command Prompt to see Server Proximity
One resource which everyone has access to is Command Prompt/Terminal. To see how close the node is to your location and see how much ping/latency you are expected to get: use the ping feature for help. Below is an example for seeing how good the NYC node would be. First open up command prompt and type in this command.
C:\Users\Vijay\> ping nyc-01-b.witherhosting.comThe above would output the following:
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds: Minimum = 47ms, Maximum = 48ms, Average = 47msAs you can see from my location I would be expected to be getting around 47 ms worth of ping. Or, in other words, it takes 47 ms for data to be transferred between me and the server location. You can test your ping to our different locations using the following domains below
• New York - ping wh-nyc-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Los Angeles - ping la-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Miami - ping mia-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Dallas - ping dal-01-b.witherhosting.com
• United Kingdom - ping uk-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Germany - ping ger-01-b.witherhosting.com
• Australia - ping au-01-p.witherhosting.com
• Singapore - ping sin-01-p.witherhosting.com
🖥️ Picking the Hardware/Budget vs. Premium 🖥️
Cost
Budget - $1/gb
Premium - $2/gb
Hardware
Budget - Single threaded score ranges from 1475-2393 points. Average score is 1980.65! ( Last updated 20th Mar 2022 )
You may get a pick between Xeon 2650v2, Xeon 2670v3, Xeon 1650v4 or equivalent models. We are updating our budget hardware to 3600X/5600X's, keep an eye out!
Premium - Single threaded score ranges from 2685-3500 points. Average score is 3166.71! ( Last updated 20th Mar 2022 )
You may get a pick between Ryzen 9 5950X, Ryzen 7 5800X, Ryzen 7 3700X, Intel i9-9900K, Intel-i9-10900K or equivalent models.
Please note that both budget and premium plans are capable of running minecraft servers. The single threaded score should only be taken into consideration when you have very resource-intensive servers such as big smps, skyblocks etc. Personal servers between friends and family will not benefit an upgrade since there would be little activity on the server. Additionally,
Support
Budget - Live chat
Premium - Live chat, Discord support
Dedicated IP
Budget - Not available for free in any plans
Premium - Free for plans from Sheep | 6GB and above
Server styles
Budget - Suited for 1.16.5 and below servers, lightly modded servers, servers for friends, non-intensive SMPs, games like skywars and bedwars
Premium - Suited for 1.17 and above, heavily modded servers, servers for running communities, resource intensive SMPs, games like skyblock
💸 Resource/Plan Recommendations 💸
RAM Recommendation
Standard Recommendations
Please note, the base RAM is the quantity needed for the server to function properly, with no player activity. This is not the recommended amount.
For every 10 players, add 1gb of RAM to your plan
For every 10-15 plugins, add 1gb of RAM to your plan
For every 10 mods, add 1gb of ram to your plan
Some experienced Minecraft server owners may not recommend these exact values. The amount of ram you choose from our picks is meant to consider all factors such as max view distance, zero optimizations, heavy plugins, etc. and is a simplified version of it.
Version Pick
Based on the version you want to run, the amount of RAM varies a lot. Below is a table with the recommended ram amounts for bedrock, java, forge based servers
1.17+
1.12+
1.8+
⚙️ CPU Recommendation ⚙️
Minecraft is a single-threaded game, so upgrading in vcores is often not the solution to your lag! It is true however, that having many cores allows this thread to alternate between cores and obtain better performance. Additionally, most plugins processes do not work on the same thread as the minecraft server, hence why more cores is also beneficial for your plugins to keep up.
Having lots of plugins tends to take up a boatload of CPU. Check which ones are overusing your processing power with a timings report.
Java CPU Recommendations
Bedrock CPU Recommendations
Please note that premium plans are recommended for Vanilla Bedrock especially, as it is very CPU demanding in a Linux environment.
Other Recommendations
Proxies: 1-2 GB and 1-2 vcores should be enough for most proxy softwares, depending on how many players pass through. For Java, we recommend optimized softwares such as Velocity or Waterfall.
If you intend on using geysermc as a plugin on your proxy, add another 1gb of ram per 10 players.
Discord Bots: 1 GB and 1-2 vcores should be enough to run most bots. We do, however, recommend premium for Music bots, which would profit from a 10 Gbps bandwidth.
Updated on: 18/12/2022
Thank you!