How to Create a Free Minecraft Server That Stays Online 24/7
Free Minecraft hosting that does not expire: create the server, pick your software, tune it for 5 GB of RAM and let hibernation keep it alive while nobody is online.
What you actually get for free
Every SadHost account can run a free Minecraft Java server with 2 vCores (200% CPU), 5 GB of RAM and 5 GB of disk, three network ports and one database. That is enough for a survival world with friends, a light modded pack or a creative build server — as long as you do not run it like a 200-player network. One free server per account, and no credit card at any point.
| Resource | Free tier | Good for |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | 2 vCores (200%) | Up to ~10 players on Paper, fewer with heavy mods |
| RAM | 5 GB | Paper plus a handful of plugins, or a light modpack |
| Disk | 5 GB | Normally-sized worlds; watch it if you explore widely |
| Ports | 3 allocations | Game port plus two extras (voice chat, Geyser, map…) |
Step 1 — Create the server
- Sign in with Discord. Everything starts from the Discord sign-in. It keeps bot signups out and means no extra password to remember.
- Open the Create Server wizard from your dashboard.
- Pick the game and software. For Minecraft choose Paper (best default: fast and plugin-friendly), Purpur (Paper plus extras), Fabric (light modding), Forge (big modpacks) or Folia, plus the Minecraft version you want.
- Name the server and optionally reserve a free subdomain so the address is readable instead of a raw IP and port.
- Pick a region close to your players — routing matters more for smooth play than any server-side tweak.
Press create and the panel installs the files, then starts the server. First boot is the slow one: it downloads the Java runtime and the jar, then generates the world.
First join takes a minute. If Minecraft says "Timed out" straight after you press start,
wait for the console to print Done (12.345s)! For help, type "help" and try again. The server
cannot accept connections before that line appears.
Step 2 — Tune it for 5 GB
Most "laggy" free servers are simply over-configured. On 5 GB you want a world that is cheap to tick:
- View distance 6–8, simulation distance 4–6. On Paper these live in
server.propertiesandconfig/paper-world-defaults.yml. Lowering simulation distance is the single most effective change you can make. - Keep the plugin list honest. Every plugin costs memory and tick time — see installing plugins on a Paper server for a lean starter set.
- Pre-generate before you invite everyone. Chunk generation is what makes a fresh world stutter. One pre-generation pass means players explore a world that is already written to disk.
- Skip extra map renderers (Dynmap, BlueMap, squaremap) on a 5 GB server. They are lovely and they will happily eat a third of your memory.
Step 3 — Stay online 24/7 without leaving your PC on
Hosting already solves the classic problems: your computer does not need to be on, nobody unplugs the router, and there is no port forwarding to fight. What people usually mean by "24/7" is "online whenever my friends happen to log in", and that is what hibernation does.
When nobody is playing, the server sleeps: the process stops and its memory returns to the pool. It still shows up in the Minecraft server list, and joining it wakes it automatically — the MOTD even says the server is asleep and that joining will wake it. After a few seconds of wake-up, players are in. You can also wake it from the panel.
What keeps a server alive
- Someone joining. Any connection — you, a friend or a player from the public list — wakes it.
- A quick visit now and then. Servers that are never woken are eventually cleaned up to free capacity, so log in when you play rather than leaving a world untouched for weeks.
- Pinging is not playing. Server-list pings are treated differently from real sessions; the exact thresholds are documented in the Semi-24/7 hibernation helpdesk article.
- The churn guard. Repeated stop/start cycles in a short window are throttled, so a crash loop cannot hammer the node.
Download your world before long breaks. Open the file manager, select your world folder and download it as a ZIP. If you are away for months and the server is cleaned up, your build still exists on your own drive — and you can re-upload it later in two clicks.
Step 4 — Invite your friends
Give people one address. The Network tab shows your IP and port; if you claimed a free subdomain,
players can type that instead. If your port is not the default 25565 it must be included:
play.example.com:25566. The full walk-through — including the four connection errors you are most
likely to meet — is in
how to join a Minecraft server.
The 24/7 checklist
- Paper (or Purpur) with the smallest plugin set that makes the server fun.
- View distance 6–8, simulation distance 4–6.
- A pre-generated world around spawn and along the routes you actually travel.
- No extra map renderers on a 5 GB server.
- A free subdomain, so friends stop mistyping IPs.
- A ZIP of your world downloaded to your own PC, refreshed occasionally.
Do those six things and a free server behaves like a paid one for a friend group. When something does go wrong, start with the lag checklist — it works through TPS, MSPT and the profiler in the same order a support engineer would.
Updated 22 September 2026. Spotted something out of date? Tell us on Discord or email support@sadhost.com and we will fix it.