How much RAM does a Minecraft server need?

For a small server, two to ten players, no mods and no heavy plugins, 1 GB is enough, and that is what NimBlock gives you. Past ten concurrent players, or with a lot of running machinery, budget 2 to 4 GB. What eats memory is not the player count but the number of world chunks loaded at once: ten players exploring in ten directions cost more than twenty players standing together.

Can you host a Minecraft server for free?

Yes, in three ways, and none of them is free in the same sense. At home you pay nobody, but you pay for electricity, you leave a machine running, and you open a port of your home router to the internet. On a free host you pay in ads, queues, and a server that shuts down when nobody is playing. NimBlock is free during its beta because it is looking for feedback rather than customers, and it says so instead of hiding it.

Do my players need to install anything?

No. Paper is a server, not a mod: the official Minecraft Java client connects to it as is. Your players type the address and port, and that is all. This is the difference with a Forge or Fabric modded server, where every player must install exactly the same mods as the server.

Can Bedrock players (console, mobile, Windows 10) join?

No. NimBlock hosts Minecraft Java servers, and a Bedrock client cannot connect to one. That is a limit of the game, not of the host: the two editions do not speak the same network protocol.

Can I install mods, or plugins downloaded elsewhere?

No, and that is a deliberate choice. NimBlock runs the plugins you compose in its studio, described by a public grammar, not arbitrary .jar files from the internet. A server that accepts any .jar also accepts any code next to its neighbours. If what you need is a modpack or a stack of existing plugins, a regular Minecraft host is the right tool, and this page would rather tell you plainly.

What happens to my world if I stop using NimBlock?

You take it with you. One button in the panel builds an archive of your world and hands it to you: it is an ordinary Minecraft world, which opens in the game or drops onto any other server. Nothing keeps you here.

How to host a Minecraft server

A Minecraft server is a program that runs continuously on a machine reachable from the internet. The whole question is which machine, and how much you are willing to do yourself. This page compares the four possible answers, says what each one really costs, and ends with the one NimBlock offers.

The four ways to host, and their real price

Nobody ever puts the four side by side, because every page that discusses them is selling one. Here they are, with the expensive part of each.

Option	What you pay	What you do yourself
At home	Electricity, and a machine that never sleeps.	Java, port forwarding on your router, a public IP that changes, backups, and the security of your home network.
A VPS	5 to 20 € a month depending on memory.	Everything: Linux, the firewall, installing Paper, a service that restarts, backups. This is systems administration.
A Minecraft host	3 to 15 € a month, usually per gigabyte of RAM.	Almost nothing to get started. Plugins, though, are still yours to find, configure and maintain, and that is where the time goes.
NimBlock	Nothing during the beta.	Nothing for the server, and nothing for the plugins either: you compose them from blocks in the browser.

The surprising row is the second one. A VPS is often presented as the cheap option, and it is, as long as your own time counts for nothing. If you have never opened a terminal, it is not the front door.

What you need, whichever route you take

Memory. 1 GB for a server between friends, 2 to 4 GB past a dozen concurrent players. What consumes it is the number of loaded world chunks, so players exploring in every direction more than players gathered in one place.
An address and a port. A Minecraft server listens on port 25565 by default. If yours is elsewhere, your players type address:port, which works exactly the same.
Mojang's EULA, accepted. No Minecraft server starts until eula.txt is accepted, and that acceptance binds the operator of the server, which is you.
A machine that stays on. This is the real constraint of hosting at home: a server is only useful if your players can join when you are not sitting in front of it.

What NimBlock hosts, exactly

A Paper 26.1.2 server, in its own container, on its own network. Paper is the most widespread build of Minecraft Java on the server side: faster than the official server, and above all able to load plugins. Your players connect with their usual client and install nothing.

One server per account, with 1 GB of memory and 5 GB of disk.
Start, stop, restart from the page, and the console live.
You can answer in the console: what you type reaches the server as an operator command.
The world is yours. One button builds the archive and hands it to you, at any time.
And the part that exists nowhere else: plugins are composed from blocks, installed without stopping the server, and need no Java at all.

What NimBlock does not do

Better said here than discovered after signing up.

No mods, no modpacks. Paper is neither Forge nor Fabric. If your project is a modpack, you need a host that supports them.
No .jar plugin downloaded elsewhere. NimBlock runs the plugins composed in its studio, described by a public grammar. That is also what lets servers sit next to each other on one machine safely.
No Bedrock. Minecraft Java only, the two editions do not speak the same protocol.
No custom domain name. Your server has an address and a port on nimblock.com.
A counted number of seats. The beta runs on a single machine, and the panel refuses honestly when it is full rather than creating a server that would get killed mid-game.

What it costs

Nothing during the beta, and this is not a launch offer in disguise: at this stage NimBlock is looking for people who try it and say what breaks. There is no card to hand over, no seven-day trial that turns into a subscription, and no server that shuts down to nudge you into paying.

The day something becomes paid, it will be announced beforehand, and your world will still be one button away.

Frequently asked questions

How much RAM does a Minecraft server need?: For a small server, two to ten players, no mods and no heavy plugins, 1 GB is enough, and that is what NimBlock gives you. Past ten concurrent players, or with a lot of running machinery, budget 2 to 4 GB. What eats memory is not the player count but the number of world chunks loaded at once: ten players exploring in ten directions cost more than twenty players standing together.
Can you host a Minecraft server for free?: Yes, in three ways, and none of them is free in the same sense. At home you pay nobody, but you pay for electricity, you leave a machine running, and you open a port of your home router to the internet. On a free host you pay in ads, queues, and a server that shuts down when nobody is playing. NimBlock is free during its beta because it is looking for feedback rather than customers, and it says so instead of hiding it.
Do my players need to install anything?: No. Paper is a server, not a mod: the official Minecraft Java client connects to it as is. Your players type the address and port, and that is all. This is the difference with a Forge or Fabric modded server, where every player must install exactly the same mods as the server.
Can Bedrock players (console, mobile, Windows 10) join?: No. NimBlock hosts Minecraft Java servers, and a Bedrock client cannot connect to one. That is a limit of the game, not of the host: the two editions do not speak the same network protocol.
Can I install mods, or plugins downloaded elsewhere?: No, and that is a deliberate choice. NimBlock runs the plugins you compose in its studio, described by a public grammar, not arbitrary .jar files from the internet. A server that accepts any .jar also accepts any code next to its neighbours. If what you need is a modpack or a stack of existing plugins, a regular Minecraft host is the right tool, and this page would rather tell you plainly.
What happens to my world if I stop using NimBlock?: You take it with you. One button in the panel builds an archive of your world and hands it to you: it is an ordinary Minecraft world, which opens in the game or drops onto any other server. Nothing keeps you here.

Your server runs in two minutes, and your first plugin right after.

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Free during the beta · one 1 GB server per account