Host your own game server on a VPS

Why put a game server on a VPS

The usual way a friend group runs a server is that one person hosts it on their gaming PC. That works until they turn the machine off, their home IP changes, or their upload bandwidth chokes when six people connect at once. A VPS fixes all three: it stays on, it has a fixed address, and its network is built for serving rather than for streaming video downstream.

There is a privacy angle that fits the rest of what we do. You rent the box no-KYC, with a 32-character order ID and a Monero or USDT payment, so standing up a server for your community does not tie a machine to your legal identity or put a home IP on a public server list. The players connect to the VPS, not to your house.

This is a page about hosting a server you are licensed to run. Bring your own Minecraft, your own game licences, and your own mods. We rent the machine.

Example: a Minecraft server on Ubuntu

The steps below stand up a vanilla Minecraft server on a fresh Ubuntu VPS and keep it running as a background service. Adapt versions and paths to your setup — and read Mojang’s EULA, because you have to accept it before the server starts.

1. Install Java

Recent Minecraft needs a current JRE. On Ubuntu 24.04:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y openjdk-21-jre-headless
java -version   # confirm it runs

2. Create a user and download the server jar

Don’t run the server as root. Make a dedicated user and drop the official server jar into its home directory (get the current URL from minecraft.net):

sudo useradd -m -r -s /bin/bash minecraft
sudo -u minecraft -i
mkdir -p ~/server && cd ~/server
# replace with the current server.jar URL from minecraft.net
wget -O server.jar https://piston-data.mojang.com/.../server.jar

3. Accept the EULA

The first run writes an eula.txt. You must set it to true yourself — this is you agreeing to Mojang’s terms, not us:

echo "eula=true" > eula.txt

4. Allocate RAM

Minecraft’s memory is set with the JVM -Xms / -Xmx flags. Give it a fixed budget that leaves headroom for the OS — on an 8 GB box, 6 GB for the server is a safe ceiling:

java -Xms6G -Xmx6G -jar server.jar nogui

Type stop in that console to shut it down cleanly once it has generated the world.

5. Run it as a systemd service

So the server survives a reboot and restarts on crash, wrap it in a unit. Exit back to your admin user and create /etc/systemd/system/minecraft.service:

[Unit]
Description=Minecraft server
After=network.target

[Service]
User=minecraft
WorkingDirectory=/home/minecraft/server
ExecStart=/usr/bin/java -Xms6G -Xmx6G -jar server.jar nogui
Restart=on-failure
SuccessExitStatus=0 1

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable and start it:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now minecraft
sudo systemctl status minecraft

6. Open the port

Minecraft’s Java edition listens on TCP 25565. Allow it through the firewall so players can connect:

sudo ufw allow 25565/tcp
sudo ufw reload

Give your players the VPS IP (and :25565 if you changed the port). That’s it — the server is live and will come back on its own after a reboot.

Sizing: RAM is the lever

For game servers, memory is what you buy. A handful of friends on a vanilla world sit happily in a couple of gigabytes; a heavy modpack, a large render distance, or a dozen-plus concurrent players climbs to 6–8 GB and beyond. CPU matters in a narrower way: most game loops are single-threaded, so fast cores raise your tick rate more than many cores do. That balance — generous RAM, a couple of quick cores — is why we point game servers at the Pro tier rather than the smallest plan.

Storage is modest for vanilla worlds but grows with mods and long-lived maps, so leave room and back up the world directory on a schedule.

Latency is about location, not marketing

The single biggest driver of in-game ping is the physical distance between a player and the server. There is no routing trick that beats the speed of light, and we won’t pretend otherwise. Pick a location roughly central to your group: a European crew is well served by an EU box, a mixed transatlantic group has to compromise on one side. If your community is genuinely global, some players will always see higher ping than others — that is geography, not a plan you can upgrade your way out of.

Keep it legitimate

Run games you’re licensed for, follow each publisher’s server terms, and keep an eye on who you let in. Like everything we host, a game server is covered by our AUP and reachable by our abuse desk. Within those bounds, the box is yours: order it with crypto, pay no KYC, and give your group a stable home to play in.