This docker image provides a Minecraft Server that will automatically download the latest stable version at startup. You can also run/upgrade to any specific version or the latest snapshot. See the Versions section below for more information.

To simply use the latest stable version, run

docker run -d -it -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE itzg/minecraft-server

where, in this case, the standard server port 25565, will be exposed on your host machine.

If you plan on running a server for a longer amount of time it is highly recommended using a management layer such as Docker Compose or Kubernetes to allow for incremental reconfiguration and image upgrades.

Be sure to always include -e EULA=TRUE in your commands and container definitions, as Mojang/Microsoft requires EULA acceptance.

By default, the container will download the latest version of the "vanilla" Minecraft: Java Edition server provided by Mojang. The VERSION and the TYPE can be configured to create many variations of desired Minecraft server.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Looking for a Bedrock Dedicated Server
• Interacting with the server
• Data Directory
  • Attaching data directory to host filesystem
  • Converting anonymous /data volume to named volume
• Versions
• Running Minecraft server on different Java version
  • Deprecated Image Tags
• Healthcheck
• Deployment Templates and Examples
  • Helm Charts
  • Examples
  • Amazon Web Services (AWS) Deployment
  • Using Docker Compose
• Troubleshooting
• Server types
  • Running a Forge Server
  • Running a Bukkit/Spigot server
  • Running a Paper server
  • Running an Airplane server
  • Running a Purpur server
  • Running a Magma server
  • Running a Mohist server
  • Running a Catserver type server
  • Running an Canyon server
  • Running a SpongeVanilla server
  • Running a Fabric Server
  • Running a Limbo server
• Running a server with a Feed the Beast modpack
  • Environment Variables:
  • Upgrading
  • Example
• Running a server with a CurseForge modpack
  • Modpack data directory
  • Buggy start scripts
  • Fixing "unable to launch forgemodloader"
• Working with mods and plugins
  • Optional plugins, mods, and config attach points
  • Auto-downloading SpigotMC/Bukkit/PaperMC plugins
  • Downloadable mod/plugin pack for Forge, Bukkit, and Spigot Servers
  • Remove old mods/plugins
• Working with world data
  • Downloadable world
  • Cloning world from a container path
  • Overwrite world on start
• Server configuration
  • Message of the Day
  • Difficulty
  • Whitelist Players
  • Op/Administrator Players
  • Server icon
  • Rcon
  • Query
  • Max players
  • Max world size
  • Allow Nether
  • Announce Player Achievements
  • Enable Command Block
  • Force Gamemode
  • Generate Structures
  • Hardcore
  • Snooper
  • Max Build Height
  • Max Tick Time
  • Spawn Animals
  • Spawn Monsters
  • Spawn NPCs
  • Set spawn protection
  • View Distance
  • Level Seed
  • Game Mode
  • PVP Mode
  • Level Type and Generator Settings
  • Custom Server Resource Pack
  • Level / World Save Name
  • Online mode
  • Allow flight
  • Server name
  • Server port
  • Other server property mappings
• Miscellaneous Options
  • Replacing variables inside configs
  • Patching existing files
  • Running with a custom server JAR
  • Force re-download of the server file
  • Running as alternate user/group ID
  • Memory Limit
  • JVM Options
  • Interactive and Color Console
  • Server Shutdown Options
  • OpenJ9 Specific Options
  • Enabling rolling logs
  • Timezone Configuration
  • Enable Remote JMX for Profiling
  • Enable Aikar's Flags
  • HTTP Proxy
  • Using "noconsole" option
  • Explicitly disable GUI
  • Stop Duration
  • Setup only
• Autopause
  • Description
  • Enabling Autopause
• Running on RaspberryPi

Looking for a Bedrock Dedicated Server

For Minecraft clients running on consoles, mobile, or native Windows, you'll need to use this image instead:

itzg/minecraft-bedrock-server

Interacting with the server

RCON is enabled by default, so you can exec into the container to access the Minecraft server console:

docker exec -i mc rcon-cli

Note: The -i is required for interactive use of rcon-cli.

To run a simple, one-shot command, such as stopping a Minecraft server, pass the command as arguments to rcon-cli, such as:

docker exec mc rcon-cli stop

The -i is not needed in this case.

If rcon is disabled you can send commands by passing them as arguments to the packaged mc-send-to-console script. For example, a player can be op'ed in the container mc with:

docker exec mc mc-send-to-console op player
            |                     |
            +- container name     +- Minecraft commands start here

In order to attach and interact with the Minecraft server, add -it when starting the container, such as

docker run -d -it -p 25565:25565 --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

With that you can attach and interact at any time using

docker attach mc

and then Control-p Control-q to detach.

For remote access, configure your Docker daemon to use a tcp socket (such as -H tcp://0.0.0.0:2375) and attach from another machine:

docker -H $HOST:2375 attach mc

Unless you're on a home/private LAN, you should enable TLS access.

Data Directory

Everything the container manages is located under the container's /data path, as shown here:

NOTE: The container path /data is pre-declared as a volume, so if you do nothing then it will be allocated as an anonymous volume. As such, it is subject to removal when the container is removed.

Attaching data directory to host filesystem

In most cases the easier way to persist and work with the minecraft data files is to use the -v argument to map a directory on your host machine to the container's /data directory, such as the following where /home/user/minecraft-data would be a directory of your choosing on your host machine:

docker run -d -v /home/user/minecraft-data:/data ...

When attached in this way you can stop the server, edit the configuration under your attached directory and start the server again to pick up the new configuration.

With Docker Compose, setting up a host attached directory is even easier since relative paths can be configured. For example, with the following docker-compose.yml Docker will automatically create/attach the relative directory minecraft-data to the container.

version: "3"

services:
  mc:
    image: itzg/minecraft-server
    ports:
      - 25565:25565
    environment:
      EULA: "TRUE"
    tty: true
    stdin_open: true
    restart: unless-stopped
    volumes:
      # attach a directory relative to the directory containing this compose file
      - ./minecraft-data:/data

Converting anonymous /data volume to named volume

If you had used the commands in the first section, without the -v volume attachment, then an anonymous data volume was created by Docker. You can later bring over that content to a named or host attached volume using the following procedure.

In this example, it is assumed the original container was given a --name of "mc", so change the container identifier accordingly.

First, stop the existing container:

docker stop mc

Use a temporary container to copy over the anonymous volume's content into a named volume, "mc" in this case:

docker run --rm --volumes-from mc -v mc:/new alpine cp -avT /data /new

Now you can recreate the container with any environment variable changes, etc by attaching the named volume created from the previous step:

docker run -d -it --name mc-new -v mc:/data -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE -e MEMORY=2G itzg/minecraft-server

Versions

To use a different Minecraft version, pass the VERSION environment variable (case sensitive), which can have the value

• LATEST (the default)
• SNAPSHOT
• or a specific version, such as "1.7.9"

For example, to use the latest snapshot:

docker run -d -e VERSION=SNAPSHOT ...

or a specific version:

docker run -d -e VERSION=1.7.9 ...

When using "LATEST" or "SNAPSHOT" an upgrade can be performed by simply restarting the container. During the next startup, if a newer version is available from the respective release channel, then the new server jar file is downloaded and used. NOTE: over time you might see older versions of the server jar remain in the /data directory. It is safe to remove those.

Running Minecraft server on different Java version

To use a different version of Java, please use a docker tag to run your Minecraft server.

Tag name	Java version	Linux	JVM Type	Architecture
latest	16	Debian	Hotspot	amd64,arm64,armv7
java8	8	Alpine	Hotspot	amd64
java8-multiarch	8	Debian	Hotspot	amd64,arm64,armv7
java8-openj9	8	Debian	OpenJ9	amd64
java11	11	Debian	Hotspot	amd64,arm64,armv7
java11-openj9	11	Debian	OpenJ9	amd64
java16	16	Debian	Hotspot	amd64,arm64,armv7
java16-openj9	16	Debian	OpenJ9	amd64
multiarch-latest	15+	Debian	Hotspot	amd64,arm64,armv7

For example, to use Java version 16 on any supported architecture:

docker run --name mc itzg/minecraft-server:java16

Keep in mind that some versions of Minecraft server can't work on the newest versions of Java. Also, FORGE doesn't support openj9 JVM implementation.

Deprecated Image Tags

The following image tags have been deprecated and are no longer receiving updates:

• adopt13
• adopt14
• adopt15
• openj9-nightly

Healthcheck

This image contains mc-monitor and uses its status command to continually check on the container's. That can be observed from the STATUS column of docker ps

CONTAINER ID        IMAGE               COMMAND             CREATED             STATUS                    PORTS                                 NAMES
b418af073764        mc                  "/start"            43 seconds ago      Up 41 seconds (healthy)   0.0.0.0:25565->25565/tcp, 25575/tcp   mc

You can also query the container's health in a script friendly way:

> docker container inspect -f "{{.State.Health.Status}}" mc
healthy

Some orchestration systems, such as Portainer, don't allow for disabling the default HEALTHCHECK declared by this image. In those cases you can approximate the disabling of healthchecks by setting the environment variable DISABLE_HEALTHCHECK to true.

Deployment Templates and Examples

Helm Charts

• itzg Helm Chart:
  • GitHub repo
  • Helm Chart repo
• mcsh/server-deployment

Examples

The examples directory also provides examples of deploying the itzg/minecraft-server Docker image.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) Deployment

If you're looking for a simple way to deploy this to the Amazon Web Services Cloud, check out the Minecraft Server Deployment (CloudFormation) repository. This repository contains a CloudFormation template that will get you up and running in AWS in a matter of minutes. Optionally it uses Spot Pricing so the server is very cheap, and you can easily turn it off when not in use.

Using Docker Compose

Rather than type the server options below, the port mappings above, etc every time you want to create new Minecraft server, you can now use Docker Compose. Start with a docker-compose.yml file like the following:

version: "3"

services:
  mc:
    image: itzg/minecraft-server
    ports:
      - 25565:25565
    environment:
      EULA: "TRUE"
    tty: true
    stdin_open: true
    restart: unless-stopped

and in the same directory as that file run

docker-compose up -d

Now, go play...or adjust the environment section to configure this server instance.

Troubleshooting

To troubleshoot the container initialization, such as when server files are pre-downloaded, set the environment variable DEBUG to true. The container logs will include much more output, and it is highly recommended including that output when reporting any issues.

To troubleshoot just the command-line used to start the Minecraft server, set the environment variable DEBUG_EXEC to true.

To troubleshoot any issues with memory allocation reported by the JVM, set the environment variable DEBUG_MEMORY to true.

Server types

Running a Forge Server

Enable Forge server mode by adding a -e TYPE=FORGE to your command-line.

The overall version is specified by VERSION, as described in the section above and will run the recommended Forge version by default. You can also choose to run a specific Forge version with FORGEVERSION, such as -e FORGEVERSION=14.23.5.2854.

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data \
    -e TYPE=FORGE \
    -e VERSION=1.12.2 -e FORGEVERSION=14.23.5.2854 \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

To use a pre-downloaded Forge installer, place it in the attached /data directory and specify the name of the installer file with FORGE_INSTALLER, such as:

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data ... \
    -e FORGE_INSTALLER=forge-1.11.2-13.20.0.2228-installer.jar ...

To download a Forge installer from a custom location, such as your own file repository, specify the URL with FORGE_INSTALLER_URL, such as:

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data ... \
    -e FORGE_INSTALLER_URL=http://HOST/forge-1.11.2-13.20.0.2228-installer.jar ...

In both of the cases above, there is no need for the VERSION or FORGEVERSION variables.

Running a Bukkit/Spigot server

Enable Bukkit/Spigot server mode by adding a -e TYPE=BUKKIT or -e TYPE=SPIGOT to your command-line.

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data \
    -e TYPE=SPIGOT \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

If you are hosting your own copy of Bukkit/Spigot you can override the download URLs with:

• -e BUKKIT_DOWNLOAD_URL=
• -e SPIGOT_DOWNLOAD_URL=

You can build spigot from source by adding -e BUILD_FROM_SOURCE=true

Plugins can either be managed within the plugins subdirectory of the data directory or you can also attach a /plugins volume. If you add plugins while the container is running, you'll need to restart it to pick those up.

You can also auto-download plugins using SPIGET_RESOURCES.

NOTE some of the VERSION values are not as intuitive as you would think, so make sure to click into the version entry to find the exact version needed for the download. For example, "1.8" is not sufficient since their download naming expects 1.8-R0.1-SNAPSHOT-latest exactly.

Running a Paper server

Enable Paper server mode by adding a -e TYPE=PAPER to your command-line.

By default the container will run the latest build of Paper server but you can also choose to run a specific build with -e PAPERBUILD=205.

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data \
    -e TYPE=PAPER \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

If you are hosting your own copy of Paper you can override the download URL with:

• -e PAPER_DOWNLOAD_URL=

An example compose file is provided at examples/docker-compose-paper.yml.

If you have attached a host directory to the /data volume, then you can install plugins via the plugins subdirectory. You can also attach a /plugins volume. If you add plugins while the container is running, you'll need to restart it to pick those up.

You can also auto-download plugins using SPIGET_RESOURCES.

Running an Airplane server

An Airplane server, which is "a stable, optimized, well supported 1.17 Paper fork."

-e TYPE=AIRPLANE

NOTE: The VERSION variable is used to select an Airplane branch to download from. The available options are "LATEST" "1.17" "1.16" "PURPUR" and "PURPUR-1.16"

Extra variables:

• AIRPLANE_BUILD=lastSuccessfulBuild : set a specific Airplane build to use
• FORCE_REDOWNLOAD=false : set to true to force the located server jar to be re-downloaded
• USE_FLARE_FLAGS=false : set to true to add appropriate flags for the Flare profiler

Running a Purpur server

A Purpur server, which is "drop-in replacement for Paper servers designed for configurability, new fun and exciting gameplay features, and performance built on top of Airplane."

-e TYPE=PURPUR

NOTE: the VERSION variable is used to lookup a build of Purpur to download

Extra variables:

• PURPUR_BUILD=LATEST : set a specific Purpur build to use
• FORCE_REDOWNLOAD=false : set to true to force the located server jar to be re-downloaded
• USE_FLARE_FLAGS=false : set to true to add appropriate flags for the Flare profiler

Running a Magma server

A Magma server, which is a combination of Forge and PaperMC, can be used with

-e TYPE=MAGMA

By default, the "stable" channel is used, but you can set MAGMA_CHANNEL to "dev" to access dev channel versions.

NOTE there are limited base versions supported, so you will also need to set VERSION, such as "1.12.2", "1.16.5", etc.

Running a Mohist server

A Mohist server can be used with

-e TYPE=MOHIST

NOTE there are limited base versions supported, so you will also need to set VERSION, such as "1.12.2"

By default the latest build will be used; however, a specific build number can be selected by setting MOHIST_BUILD, such as

-e VERSION=1.16.5 -e MOHIST_BUILD=374

Running a Catserver type server

A Catserver type server can be used with

-e TYPE=CATSERVER

NOTE Catserver only provides a single release stream, so VERSION is ignored

Running an Canyon server

Canyon is a fork of CraftBukkit for Minecraft Beta 1.7.3. It includes multiple enhancements whilst also retaining compatibility with old Bukkit plugins and mods as much as possible.

-e VERSION=b1.7.3 -e TYPE=CANYON

NOTE only VERSION=b1.7.3 is supported

NOTE only Java 8 is supported

By default the latest build will be used; however, a specific build number can be selected by setting CANYON_BUILD, such as

-e CANYON_BUILD=11

Running a SpongeVanilla server

Enable SpongeVanilla server mode by adding a -e TYPE=SPONGEVANILLA to your command-line. By default the container will run the latest STABLE version. If you want to run a specific version, you can add -e SPONGEVERSION=1.11.2-6.1.0-BETA-19 to your command-line.

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data -e TYPE=SPONGEVANILLA \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

You can also choose to use the EXPERIMENTAL branch. Just change it with SPONGEBRANCH, such as:

$ docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data ... \
    -e TYPE=SPONGEVANILLA -e SPONGEBRANCH=EXPERIMENTAL ...

Running a Fabric Server

Enable Fabric server mode by adding a -e TYPE=FABRIC to your command-line. By default, the container will run the latest version, but you can also choose to run a specific version with VERSION.

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data \
    -e TYPE=FABRIC \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

A specific installer version can be requested using FABRIC_INSTALLER_VERSION.

To use a pre-downloaded Fabric installer, place it in a directory attached into the container, such as the /data volume and specify the name of the installer file with FABRIC_INSTALLER, such as:

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data ... \
    -e FABRIC_INSTALLER=fabric-installer-0.5.0.32.jar ...

To download a Fabric installer from a custom location, such as your own file repository, specify the URL with FABRIC_INSTALLER_URL, such as:

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data ... \
    -e FABRIC_INSTALLER_URL=http://HOST/fabric-installer-0.5.0.32.jar ...

In order to add mods, you have two options:

Running a Limbo server

A Limbo server can be run by setting TYPE to LIMBO.

Configuration options with defaults:

• LIMBO_BUILD=LATEST

  The VERSION will be ignored so locate the appropriate value from here to match the version expected by clients.

• FORCE_REDOWNLOAD=false

• LIMBO_SCHEMA_FILENAME=default.schem

• LEVEL="Default;${LIMBO_SCHEMA_FILENAME}"

Running a server with a Feed the Beast modpack

NOTE requires one of the Debian based images listed in the Java versions section.

Feed the Beast application modpacks are supported by using -e TYPE=FTBA (note the "A" at the end of the type). This server type will automatically take care of downloading and installing the modpack and appropriate version of Forge, so the VERSION does not need to be specified.

Environment Variables:

• FTB_MODPACK_ID: required, the numerical ID of the modpack to install. The ID can be located by finding the modpack and using the "ID" displayed next to the name
• FTB_MODPACK_VERSION_ID: optional, the numerical Id of the version to install. If not specified, the latest version will be installed. The "Version ID" can be obtained by drilling into the Versions tab and clicking a specific version.

Upgrading

If a specific FTB_MODPACK_VERSION_ID was not specified, simply restart the container to pick up the newest modpack version. If using a specific version ID, recreate the container with the new version ID.

Example

The following example runs the latest version of FTB Presents Direwolf20 1.12:

docker run -d --name mc-ftb -e EULA=TRUE \
  -e TYPE=FTBA -e FTB_MODPACK_ID=31 \
  -p 25565:25565 \
  itzg/minecraft-server:multiarch

Normally you will also add -v volume for /data since the mods and config are installed there along with world data.

Running a server with a CurseForge modpack

Enable this server mode by adding -e TYPE=CURSEFORGE to your command-line, but note the following additional steps needed...

You need to specify a modpack to run, using the CF_SERVER_MOD environment variable. A CurseForge server modpack is available together with its respective client modpack at https://www.curseforge.com/minecraft/modpacks .

Now you can add a -e CF_SERVER_MOD=name_of_modpack.zip to your command-line.

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data -e TYPE=CURSEFORGE \
    -e CF_SERVER_MOD=SkyFactory_4_Server_4.1.0.zip \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

If you want to keep the pre-download modpacks separate from your data directory, then you can attach another volume at a path of your choosing and reference that. The following example uses /modpacks as the container path as the pre-download area:

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data -v /path/to/modpacks:/modpacks \
    -e TYPE=CURSEFORGE \
    -e CF_SERVER_MOD=/modpacks/SkyFactory_4_Server_4.1.0.zip \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

Modpack data directory

By default, CurseForge modpacks are expanded into the sub-directory /data/FeedTheBeast and executed from there. (The default location was chosen for legacy reasons, when Curse and FTB were maintained together.)

The directory can be changed by setting CF_BASE_DIR, such as -e CF_BASE_DIR=/data.

Buggy start scripts

Some modpacks have buggy or overly complex start scripts. You can avoid using the bundled start script and use this image's standard server-starting logic by adding -e USE_MODPACK_START_SCRIPT=false.

Fixing "unable to launch forgemodloader"

If your server's modpack fails to load with an error like this:

unable to launch forgemodloader

then you apply a workaround by adding this to the run invocation:

-e FTB_LEGACYJAVAFIXER=true

Working with mods and plugins

Optional plugins, mods, and config attach points

There are optional volume paths that can be attached to supply content to be copied into the data area:

/plugins

contents are synchronized into /data/plugins for Bukkit related server types. Set SYNC_SKIP_NEWER_IN_DESTINATION=false if you want files from /plugins to take precedence over newer files in /data/plugins.

/mods

contents are synchronized into /data/mods for Forge related server types. The destination can be changed by setting COPY_MODS_DEST.

/config

contents are synchronized into /data/config by default, but can be changed with COPY_CONFIG_DEST. For example, -v ./config:/config -e COPY_CONFIG_DEST=/data will allow you to copy over files like bukkit.yml and so on directly into the server directory. Set SYNC_SKIP_NEWER_IN_DESTINATION=false if you want files from /config to take precedence over newer files in /data/config.

By default, the environment variable processing is performed on synchronized files that match the expected suffixes in REPLACE_ENV_SUFFIXES (by default "yml,yaml,txt,cfg,conf,properties,hjson,json,tml,toml") and are not excluded by REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDES and REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDE_PATHS. This processing can be disabled by setting REPLACE_ENV_DURING_SYNC to false.

If you want old mods/plugins to be removed before the content is brought over from those attach points, then add -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS=TRUE. You can fine tune the removal process by specifying the REMOVE_OLD_MODS_INCLUDE and REMOVE_OLD_MODS_EXCLUDE variables. By default, everything will be removed. You can also specify the REMOVE_OLD_MODS_DEPTH (default is 16) variable to only delete files up to a certain level.

For example: -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS=TRUE -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS_INCLUDE="*.jar" -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS_DEPTH=1 will remove all old jar files that are directly inside the plugins/ or mods/ directory.

These paths work well if you want to have a common set of modules in a separate location, but still have multiple worlds with different server requirements in either persistent volumes or a downloadable archive.

For more flexibility with mods/plugins preparation, you can declare directories to use in the MODS variable

Auto-downloading SpigotMC/Bukkit/PaperMC plugins

The SPIGET_RESOURCES variable can be set with a comma-separated list of SpigotMC resource IDs to automatically download SpigotMC resources/plugins using the spiget API. Resources that are zip files will be expanded into the plugins directory and resources that are simply jar files will be moved there.

NOTE: the variable is purposely spelled SPIGET with an "E"

The resource ID can be located from the numerical part of the URL after the shortname and a dot. For example, the ID is 9089 from

https://www.spigotmc.org/resources/essentialsx.9089/
                                               ====

For example, the following will auto-download the EssentialsX and Vault plugins:

-e SPIGET_RESOURCES=9089,34315

Downloadable mod/plugin pack for Forge, Bukkit, and Spigot Servers

Like the WORLD option above, you can specify the URL or path of a "mod pack" to download and install into mods for Forge or plugins for Bukkit/Spigot. To use this option pass the environment variable MODPACK, such as

docker run -d -e MODPACK=http://www.example.com/mods/modpack.zip ...

NOTE: The referenced URL must be a zip file with one or more jar files at the top level of the zip archive. Make sure the jars are compatible with the particular TYPE of server you are running.

You may also download or copy over individual mods using the MODS environment variable. MODS contains a comma-separated list of

• URL of a jar file

• container path to a jar file

• container path to a directory containing jar files

  docker run -d -e MODS=https://www.example.com/mods/mod1.jar,/plugins/common,/plugins/special/mod2.jar ...

Remove old mods/plugins

When the option above is specified (MODPACK) you can also instruct script to delete old mods/plugins prior to installing new ones. This behaviour is desirable in case you want to upgrade mods/plugins from downloaded zip file. To use this option pass the environment variable REMOVE_OLD_MODS="TRUE", such as

docker run -d -e REMOVE_OLD_MODS="TRUE" -e MODPACK=http://www.example.com/mods/modpack.zip ...

WARNING: All content of the mods or plugins directory will be deleted before unpacking new content from the MODPACK or MODS.

Working with world data

Downloadable world

Instead of mounting the /data volume, you can instead specify the URL of a ZIP file containing an archived world. It will be searched for a file level.dat and the containing subdirectory moved to the directory named by $LEVEL. This means that most of the archived Minecraft worlds downloadable from the Internet will already be in the correct format.

docker run -d -e WORLD=http://www.example.com/worlds/MySave.zip ...

NOTE: This URL must be accessible from inside the container. Therefore, you should use an IP address or a globally resolvable FQDN, or else the name of a linked container.

NOTE: If the archive contains more than one level.dat, then the one to select can be picked with WORLD_INDEX, which defaults to 1.

Cloning world from a container path

The WORLD option can also be used to reference a directory or zip file that will be used as a source to clone or unzip the world directory.

For example, the following would initially clone the world's content from /worlds/basic. Also notice in the example that you can use a read-only volume attachment to ensure the clone source remains pristine.

docker run ... -v $HOME/worlds:/worlds:ro -e WORLD=/worlds/basic

The following diagram shows how this option can be used in a compose deployment with a relative directory:

Overwrite world on start

The world will only be downloaded or copied if it doesn't exist already. Set FORCE_WORLD_COPY=TRUE to force overwrite the world on every server start.

Server configuration

By default the server configuration will be created and set based on the following environment variables, but only the first time the server is started. If the server.properties file already exists, the values in them will not be changed.

If you would like to override the server configuration each time the container starts up, you can set the OVERRIDE_SERVER_PROPERTIES environment variable like:

docker run -d -e OVERRIDE_SERVER_PROPERTIES=true ...

This will reset any manual configuration of the server.properties file, so if you want to make any persistent configuration changes you will need to make sure you have properly set the proper environment variables in your docker run command (described below).

Message of the Day

The message of the day, shown below each server entry in the client UI, can be changed with the MOTD environment variable, such as

-e MOTD="My Server"

If you leave it off, a default is computed from the server type and version, such as

A Paper Minecraft Server powered by Docker

That way you can easily differentiate between several servers you may have started.

The section symbol (§) and other unicode characters are automatically converted to allow formatting codes to be used consistently with all server versions. For example,

 -e MOTD="A §l§cMinecraft§r §nserver"

renders

Difficulty

The difficulty level (default: easy) can be set like:

docker run -d -e DIFFICULTY=hard ...

Valid values are: peaceful, easy, normal, and hard, and an error message will be output in the logs if it's not one of these values.

Whitelist Players

NOTE it is very important to set this with servers exposed to the internet where you want only limited players to join.

To whitelist players for your Minecraft server, pass the Minecraft usernames separated by commas via the WHITELIST environment variable, such as

docker run -d -e WHITELIST=user1,user2 ...

If the WHITELIST environment variable is not used, any user can join your Minecraft server if it's publicly accessible.

NOTE: When WHITELIST is used the server properties white-list and whitelist will automatically get set to true.

By default, the players in WHITELIST are added to the final whitelist.json file by the Minecraft server. If you set OVERRIDE_WHITELIST to "true" then the whitelist.json file will be recreated on each server startup.

Alternatively, you can set ENABLE_WHITELIST=true to only set the server properties white-list and whitelist without modifying the whitelist file. In this case the whitelist is solely managed using the whitelist add and whitelist remove commands.

Op/Administrator Players

To add more "op" (aka adminstrator) users to your Minecraft server, pass the Minecraft usernames separated by commas via the OPS environment variable, such as

docker run -d -e OPS=user1,user2 ...

By default, the players in OPS are added to the final ops.json file by the Minecraft server. If you set OVERRIDE_OPS to "true" then the ops.json file will be recreated on each server startup.

Server icon

A server icon can be configured using the ICON variable. The image will be automatically downloaded, scaled, and converted from any other image format:

docker run -d -e ICON=http://..../some/image.png ...

The server icon which has been set doesn't get overridden by default. It can be changed and overridden by setting OVERRIDE_ICON to TRUE.

docker run -d -e ICON=http://..../some/other/image.png -e OVERRIDE_ICON=TRUE...

Rcon

To use rcon use the ENABLE_RCON and RCON_PASSWORD variables. By default rcon port will be 25575 but can easily be changed with the RCON_PORT variable.

docker run -d -e ENABLE_RCON=true -e RCON_PASSWORD=testing

Query

Enabling this will enable the gamespy query protocol. By default the query port will be 25565 (UDP) but can easily be changed with the QUERY_PORT variable.

docker run -d -e ENABLE_QUERY=true

Max players

By default max players is 20, you can increase this with the MAX_PLAYERS variable.

docker run -d -e MAX_PLAYERS=50

Max world size

This sets the maximum possible size in blocks, expressed as a radius, that the world border can obtain.

docker run -d -e MAX_WORLD_SIZE=10000

Allow Nether

Allows players to travel to the Nether.

docker run -d -e ALLOW_NETHER=true

Announce Player Achievements

Allows server to announce when a player gets an achievement.

docker run -d -e ANNOUNCE_PLAYER_ACHIEVEMENTS=true

Enable Command Block

Enables command blocks

 docker run -d -e ENABLE_COMMAND_BLOCK=true

Force Gamemode

Force players to join in the default game mode.

• false - Players will join in the gamemode they left in.

• true - Players will always join in the default gamemode.

  docker run -d -e FORCE_GAMEMODE=false

Generate Structures

Defines whether structures (such as villages) will be generated.

• false - Structures will not be generated in new chunks.

• true - Structures will be generated in new chunks.

  docker run -d -e GENERATE_STRUCTURES=true

Hardcore

If set to true, players will be set to spectator mode if they die.

docker run -d -e HARDCORE=false

Snooper

If set to false, the server will not send data to snoop.minecraft.net server.

docker run -d -e SNOOPER_ENABLED=false

Max Build Height

The maximum height in which building is allowed. Terrain may still naturally generate above a low height limit.

docker run -d -e MAX_BUILD_HEIGHT=256

Max Tick Time

The maximum number of milliseconds a single tick may take before the server watchdog stops the server with the message, A single server tick took 60.00 seconds (should be max 0.05); Considering it to be crashed, server will forcibly shutdown. Once this criteria is met, it calls System.exit(1). Setting this to -1 will disable watchdog entirely

docker run -d -e MAX_TICK_TIME=60000

Spawn Animals

Determines if animals will be able to spawn.

docker run -d -e SPAWN_ANIMALS=true

Spawn Monsters

Determines if monsters will be spawned.

docker run -d -e SPAWN_MONSTERS=true

Spawn NPCs

Determines if villagers will be spawned.

docker run -d -e SPAWN_NPCS=true

Set spawn protection

Sets the area that non-ops can not edit (0 to disable)

docker run -d -e SPAWN_PROTECTION=0

View Distance

Sets the amount of world data the server sends the client, measured in chunks in each direction of the player (radius, not diameter). It determines the server-side viewing distance.

docker run -d -e VIEW_DISTANCE=10

Level Seed

If you want to create the Minecraft level with a specific seed, use SEED, such as

-e SEED=1785852800490497919

If using a negative value for the seed, make sure to quote the value such as:

-e SEED="-1785852800490497919"

Game Mode

By default, Minecraft servers are configured to run in Survival mode. You can change the mode using MODE where you can either provide the standard numerical values or the shortcut values:

• creative
• survival
• adventure
• spectator (only for Minecraft 1.8 or later)

For example:

docker run -d -e MODE=creative ...

PVP Mode

By default, servers are created with player-vs-player (PVP) mode enabled. You can disable this with the PVP environment variable set to false, such as

docker run -d -e PVP=false ...

Level Type and Generator Settings

By default, a standard world is generated with hills, valleys, water, etc. A different level type can be configured by setting LEVEL_TYPE to an expected type, for example

• DEFAULT
• FLAT
• LARGEBIOMES
• AMPLIFIED
• CUSTOMIZED
• BUFFET
• BIOMESOP (Biomes O' Plenty for 1.12 and older)
• BIOMESOPLENTY (Biomes O' Plenty for 1.15 and above)

Descriptions are available at the gamepedia.

When using a level type of FLAT, CUSTOMIZED, and BUFFET, you can further configure the world generator by passing custom generator settings. Since generator settings usually have ;'s in them, surround the -e value with a single quote, like below.

For example (just the -e bits):

-e LEVEL_TYPE=flat -e 'GENERATOR_SETTINGS=3;minecraft:bedrock,3*minecraft:stone,52*minecraft:sandstone;2;'

In Minecraft 1.13+ you need to pass json (generator site) like this (details see here):

-e LEVEL_TYPE=flat -e 'GENERATOR_SETTINGS={"biome":"minecraft:the_void","layers":[{"block":"minecraft:bedrock","height":1},{"block":"minecraft:stone","height":10},{"block":"minecraft:dirt","height":1}],"structures":{"structures":{}}}'

Custom Server Resource Pack

You can set a link to a custom resource pack and set it's checksum using the RESOURCE_PACK and RESOURCE_PACK_SHA1 options respectively, the default is blank:

docker run -d -e 'RESOURCE_PACK=http\://link.com/to/pack.zip?\=1' -e 'RESOURCE_PACK_SHA1=d5db29cd03a2ed055086cef9c31c252b4587d6d0'

NOTE: : and = must be escaped using \. The checksum plain-text hexadecimal.

Level / World Save Name

You can either switch between world saves or run multiple containers with different saves by using the LEVEL option, where the default is "world":

docker run -d -e LEVEL=bonus ...

NOTE: if running multiple containers be sure to either specify a different -v host directory for each LEVEL in use or don't use -v and the container's filesystem will keep things encapsulated.

INFO Refer to the data directory section for a visual description of where the $LEVEL directory is situated.

Online mode

By default, server checks connecting players against Minecraft's account database. If you want to create an offline server or your server is not connected to the internet, you can disable the server to try connecting to minecraft.net to authenticate players with environment variable ONLINE_MODE, like this

docker run -d -e ONLINE_MODE=FALSE ...

Allow flight

Allows users to use flight on your server while in Survival mode, if they have a mod that provides flight installed.

-e ALLOW_FLIGHT=TRUE|FALSE

Server name

The server name (e.g. for bungeecord) can be set like:

docker run -d -e SERVER_NAME=MyServer ...

Server port

WARNING: only change this value if you know what you're doing. It is only needed when using host networking and it is rare that host networking should be used. Use -p port mappings instead.

If you must, the server port can be set like:

docker run -d -e SERVER_PORT=25566 ...

however, be sure to change your port mapping accordingly and be prepared for some features to break.

Other server property mappings

Environment Variable	Server Property
PLAYER_IDLE_TIMEOUT	player-idle-timeout
BROADCAST_CONSOLE_TO_OPS	broadcast-console-to-ops
BROADCAST_RCON_TO_OPS	broadcast-rcon-to-ops
ENABLE_JMX	enable-jmx-monitoring
SYNC_CHUNK_WRITES	sync-chunk-writes
ENABLE_STATUS	enable-status
ENTITY_BROADCAST_RANGE_PERCENTAGE	entity-broadcast-range-percentage
FUNCTION_PERMISSION_LEVEL	function-permission-level
NETWORK_COMPRESSION_THRESHOLD	network-compression-threshold
OP_PERMISSION_LEVEL	op-permission-level
PREVENT_PROXY_CONNECTIONS	prevent-proxy-connections
USE_NATIVE_TRANSPORT	use-native-transport
ENFORCE_WHITELIST	enforce-whitelist
ENABLE_WHITELIST	white-list and whitelist
SIMULATION_DISTANCE	simulation-distance

Miscellaneous Options

Replacing variables inside configs

Sometimes you have mods or plugins that require configuration information that is only available at runtime. For example if you need to configure a plugin to connect to a database, you don't want to include this information in your Git repository or Docker image. Or maybe you have some runtime information like the server name that needs to be set in your config files after the container starts.

For those cases there is the option to replace defined variables inside your configs with environment variables defined at container runtime.

When the environment variable REPLACE_ENV_IN_PLACE is set to true (the default), the startup script will go through all files inside the container's /data path and replace variables that match the container's environment variables. Variables can instead (or in addition to) be replaced in files sync'ed from /plugins, /mods, and /config by setting REPLACE_ENV_DURING_SYNC to true (defaults to false).

Variables that you want to replace need to be declared inside curly brackets and prefixed with a dollar sign, such as ${CFG_YOUR_VARIABLE}, which is same as many scripting languages.

You can also change REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLE_PREFIX, which defaults to "CFG_", to limit which environment variables are allowed to be used. For example, with "CFG_" as the prefix, the variable ${CFG_DB_HOST} would be subsituted, but not ${DB_HOST}.

If you want to use a file for value (like when use secrets) you can add suffix _FILE to your variable name.

Variables will be replaced in files with the following extensions: .yml, .yaml, .txt, .cfg, .conf, .properties.

Specific files can be excluded by listing their name (without path) in the variable REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDES.

Paths can be excluded by listing them in the variable REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDE_PATHS. Path excludes are recursive. Here is an example:

REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES_EXCLUDE_PATHS="/data/plugins/Essentials/userdata /data/plugins/MyPlugin"

Here is a full example where we want to replace values inside a database.yml.

---
database:
  host: ${CFG_DB_HOST}
  name: ${CFG_DB_NAME}
  password: ${CFG_DB_PASSWORD}

This is how your docker-compose.yml file could look like:

version: "3.8"
# Other docker-compose examples in /examples

services:
  minecraft:
    image: itzg/minecraft-server
    ports:
      - "25565:25565"
    volumes:
      - "mc:/data"
    environment:
      EULA: "TRUE"
      ENABLE_RCON: "true"
      RCON_PASSWORD: "testing"
      RCON_PORT: 28016
      # enable env variable replacement
      REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLES: "TRUE"
      # define an optional prefix for your env variables you want to replace
      ENV_VARIABLE_PREFIX: "CFG_"
      # and here are the actual variables
      CFG_DB_HOST: "http://localhost:3306"
      CFG_DB_NAME: "minecraft"
      CFG_DB_PASSWORD_FILE: "/run/secrets/db_password"

volumes:
  mc:
  rcon:

secrets:
  db_password:
    file: ./db_password

Patching existing files

JSON path based patches can be applied to one or more existing files by setting the variable PATCH_DEFINITIONS to the path of a directory that contains one or more patch definition json files or a patch set json file.

Variable placeholders in the patch values can be restricted by setting REPLACE_ENV_VARIABLE_PREFIX, which defaults to "CFG_".

The following example shows a patch-set file were various fields in the paper.yaml configuration file can be modified and added:

{
  "patches": [
    {
      "file": "/data/paper.yml",
      "ops": [
        {
          "$set": {
            "path": "$.verbose",
            "value": true
          }
        },
        {
          "$set": {
            "path": "$.settings['velocity-support'].enabled",
            "value": "${CFG_VELOCITY_ENABLED}",
            "value-type": "bool"
          }
        },
        {
          "$put": {
            "path": "$.settings",
            "key": "my-test-setting",
            "value": "testing"
          }
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

NOTES: Only JSON and Yaml files can be patched at this time. TOML support is planned to be added next. Removal of comments and other cosmetic changes will occur when patched files are processed.

Running with a custom server JAR

If you would like to run a custom server JAR, set -e TYPE=CUSTOM and pass the custom server JAR via CUSTOM_SERVER. It can either be a URL or a container path to an existing JAR file.

If it is a URL, it will only be downloaded into the /data directory if it wasn't already. As such, if you need to upgrade or re-download the JAR, then you will need to stop the container, remove the file from the container's /data directory, and start again.

Force re-download of the server file

For VANILLA, FORGE, BUKKIT, SPIGOT, PAPER, CURSEFORGE, SPONGEVANILLA server types, set $FORCE_REDOWNLOAD to some value (e.g. 'true) to force a re-download of the server file for the particular server type. by adding a -e FORCE_REDOWNLOAD=true to your command-line.

For example, with PaperSpigot, it would look something like this:

docker run -d -v /path/on/host:/data \
    -e TYPE=PAPER -e FORCE_REDOWNLOAD=true \
    -p 25565:25565 -e EULA=TRUE --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

Running as alternate user/group ID

By default, the container will switch to user ID 1000 and group ID 1000; however, you can override those values by setting UID and/or GID as environmental entries, during the docker run command.

-e UID=1234
-e GID=1234

The container will also skip user switching if the --user/-u argument is passed to docker run.

Memory Limit

By default, the image declares an initial and maximum Java memory-heap limit of 1 GB. There are several ways to adjust the memory settings:

• MEMORY: "1G" by default, can be used to adjust both initial (Xms) and max (Xmx) memory heap settings of the JVM
• INIT_MEMORY: independently sets the initial heap size
• MAX_MEMORY: independently sets the max heap size

The values of all three are passed directly to the JVM and support format/units as <size>[g|G|m|M|k|K]. For example:

-e MEMORY=2G

NOTE: the settings above only set the Java heap limits. Memory resource requests and limits on the overall container should also account for non-heap memory usage. An extra 25% is a general best practice.

JVM Options

General JVM options can be passed to the Minecraft Server invocation by passing a JVM_OPTS environment variable. Options like -X that need to proceed general JVM options can be passed via a JVM_XX_OPTS environment variable.

For some cases, if e.g. after removing mods, it could be necessary to startup minecraft with an additional -D parameter like -Dfml.queryResult=confirm. To address this you can use the environment variable JVM_DD_OPTS, which builds the params from a given list of values separated by space, but without the -D prefix. To make things running under systems (e.g. Plesk), which doesn't allow = inside values, a : (colon) could be used instead. The upper example would look like this: JVM_DD_OPTS=fml.queryResult:confirm, and will be converted to -Dfml.queryResult=confirm.

Interactive and Color Console

If you would like to docker attach to the Minecraft server console with color and interactive capabilities, then add

  -e EXEC_DIRECTLY=true

NOTES

This feature doesn't work via rcon, so you will need to docker attach to the container. Use the sequence Ctrl-P, Ctrl-Q to detach.

This will bypass graceful server shutdown handling when using docker stop, so be sure the server console's stop command.

Make to enable stdin and tty with -it when using docker run or stdin_open: true and tty: true when using docker compose.

Server Shutdown Options

To allow time for players to finish what they're doing during a graceful server shutdown, set STOP_SERVER_ANNOUNCE_DELAY to a number of seconds to delay after an announcement is posted by the server.

NOTE be sure to adjust Docker's shutdown timeout accordingly, such as using the -t option on docker-compose down.

OpenJ9 Specific Options

The openj9 image tags include specific variables to simplify configuration:

• -e TUNE_VIRTUALIZED=TRUE : enables the option to optimize for virtualized environments
• -e TUNE_NURSERY_SIZES=TRUE : configures nursery sizes where the initial size is 50% of the MAX_MEMORY and the max size is 80%.

Enabling rolling logs

By default the vanilla log file will grow without limit. The logger can be reconfigured to use a rolling log files strategy by using:

  -e ENABLE_ROLLING_LOGS=true

NOTE this will interfere with interactive/color consoles as described in the section above

Timezone Configuration

You can configure the timezone to match yours by setting the TZ environment variable:

    -e TZ=Europe/London

such as:

    docker run -d -it -e TZ=Europe/London -p 25565:25565 --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

Or mounting /etc/timezone as readonly (not supported on Windows):

    -v /etc/timezone:/etc/timezone:ro

such as:

    docker run -d -it -v /etc/timezone:/etc/timezone:ro -p 25565:25565 --name mc itzg/minecraft-server

Enable Remote JMX for Profiling

To enable remote JMX, such as for profiling with VisualVM or JMC, add the environment variable ENABLE_JMX=true, set JMX_HOST to the IP/host running the Docker container, and add a port forwarding of TCP port 7091, such as:

-e ENABLE_JMX=true -e JMX_HOST=$HOSTNAME -p 7091:7091

Enable Aikar's Flags

Aikar has does some research into finding the optimal JVM flags for GC tuning, which becomes more important as more users are connected concurrently. The set of flags documented there can be added using

-e USE_AIKAR_FLAGS=true

When MEMORY is greater than or equal to 12G, then the Aikar flags will be adjusted according to the article.

Large page support can also be enabled by adding

-e USE_LARGE_PAGES=true

HTTP Proxy

You may configure the use of an HTTP/HTTPS proxy by passing the proxy's URL via the PROXY environment variable. In the example compose file it references a companion squid proxy by setting the equivalent of

-e PROXY=proxy:3128

Using "noconsole" option

Some older versions (pre-1.14) of Spigot required --noconsole to be passed when detaching stdin, which can be done by setting -e CONSOLE=FALSE.

Explicitly disable GUI

Some older servers get confused and think that the GUI interface is enabled. You can explicitly disable that by passing -e GUI=FALSE.

Stop Duration

When the container is signalled to stop, the Minecraft process wrapper will attempt to send a "stop" command via RCON or console and waits for the process to gracefully finish. By default it waits 60 seconds, but that duration can be configured by setting the environment variable STOP_DURATION to the number of seconds.

Setup only

If you are using a host-attached data directory, then you can have the image setup the Minecraft server files and stop prior to launching the server process by setting SETUP_ONLY to true.

Autopause

Description

There are various bug reports on Mojang about high CPU usage of servers with newer versions, even with few or no clients connected (e.g. this one, in fact the functionality is based on this comment in the thread).

An autopause functionality has been added to this image to monitor whether clients are connected to the server. If for a specified time no client is connected, the Java process is stopped. When knocking on the server port (e.g. by the ingame Multiplayer server overview), the process is resumed. The experience for the client does not change.

Of course, even loaded chunks are not ticked when the process is stopped.

You must greatly increase or disable max-tick-time watchdog functionality. From the server's point of view, the pausing causes a single tick to take as long as the process is stopped, so the server watchdog might intervene after the process is continued, possibly forcing a container restart. To prevent this, ensure that the max-tick-time in the server.properties file is set to a very large value or -1 to disable it entirely, which is highly recommended. That can be set with MAX_TICK_TIME as described in the section below.

NOTE: Non-vanilla versions might have their own configuration file, you might have to disable their watchdogs separately. For PaperMC servers, you need to send the JVM flag -Ddisable.watchdog=true, this can be done with the docker env variable -e JVM_DD_OPTS=disable.watchdog:true

On startup the server.properties file is checked and, if applicable, a warning is printed to the terminal. When the server is created (no data available in the persistent directory), the properties file is created with the Watchdog disabled.

The utility used to wake the server (knock(d)) works at network interface level. So the correct interface has to be set using the AUTOPAUSE_KNOCK_INTERFACE variable when using non-default networking environments (e.g. host-networking, Portainer oder NAS solutions). See the description of the variable below.

A starting, example compose file has been provided in examples/docker-compose-autopause.yml.

Enabling Autopause

Enable the Autopause functionality by setting:

-e ENABLE_AUTOPAUSE=TRUE

The following environment variables define the behaviour of auto-pausing:

• AUTOPAUSE_TIMEOUT_EST, default 3600 (seconds) describes the time between the last client disconnect and the pausing of the process (read as timeout established)
• AUTOPAUSE_TIMEOUT_INIT, default 600 (seconds) describes the time between server start and the pausing of the process, when no client connects inbetween (read as timeout initialized)
• AUTOPAUSE_TIMEOUT_KN, default 120 (seconds) describes the time between knocking of the port (e.g. by the main menu ping) and the pausing of the process, when no client connects inbetween (read as timeout knocked)
• AUTOPAUSE_PERIOD, default 10 (seconds) describes period of the daemonized state machine, that handles the pausing of the process (resuming is done independently)
• AUTOPAUSE_KNOCK_INTERFACE, default eth0
  Describes the interface passed to the knockd daemon. If the default interface does not work, run the ifconfig command inside the container and derive the interface receiving the incoming connection from its output. The passed interface must exist inside the container. Using the loopback interface (lo) does likely not yield the desired results.

Running on RaspberryPi

To run this image on a RaspberryPi 3 B+, 4, or newer, use any of the image tags list in the Java version section that specify armv7 for the architecture, which includes itzg/minecraft-server:latest.

NOTE: you may need to lower the memory allocation, such as -e MEMORY=750m

If experiencing issues such as "sleep: cannot read realtime clock: Operation not permitted", ensure libseccomp is up to date on your host. In some cases adding :Z flag to the /data mount may be needed, but use cautiously.