Modded Minecraft server hosting, from a search box to a running pack.
Pick a loader, search CurseForge and Modrinth from the panel — or paste a link, or upload a .mrpack — and the server assembles everything itself the next time it boots: the correct server build, the Java it needs, the pack’s own configs. You pay from $0.08/hr awake, and only for the hours the server is online.
~9 hours to try · no card · instant setup
A mod loader is the only way mods reach a Minecraft server, and installing one by hand means matching the loader build to the Minecraft version, then the Java underneath both, then every mod to all three. Here that stack is assembled at boot from a list you edit in the dashboard, and nothing has to be uploaded from your own PC.
Installing a CurseForge or Modrinth pack
There is no file-manager step. The dashboard is where you decide what runs; the server itself does the downloading, at the next start.
What the Mods tab does
- Search both catalogs at once. Every moddable server has a Mods tab — labeled Plugins on the Paper family. Search CurseForge and Modrinth together, or paste a link or slug from either.
- Read the compatibility preview. Pixly matches the project against your loader and pinned Minecraft version before anything installs, so a mod that will not fit is flagged at that moment rather than found later in a crash log.
- Save and restart. The server fetches each project straight from its catalog and puts it where the loader expects it — the mods folder on a mod loader, plugins on the Paper side.
A modpack is one entry, not eighty: the pack's full mod list and its configs arrive together. Track its release channel, or pin one exact build so the pack only changes when you decide — and per mod, a release/beta/alpha channel plus an optional flag give individual installs the same control.
Uploading works too, and is sometimes the point. A .mrpack you exported yourself from the Modrinth app or Prism Launcher is read on arrival: Pixly shows the Minecraft version and loader the pack declares, and offers a one-click switch when the server is set to something else. Plain .jar files go up the same way, for the patched fork or the plugin that never reached a catalog.
Mods go on both sides; plugins go on neither
A mod that adds blocks, items or mobs goes on each player's own game as well as on the server, at the same version and on the same loader — the server runs that content, and each player's copy of Minecraft draws it.
Modrinth labels every project by where it runs, and the label is the answer:
Required on both sides
Anything adding blocks, items or entities. Modrinth's own example is Cobblemon, which "needs to be on both the client and server to work". If you install a modpack, the simple version is that everyone runs the same pack.
Server-side only
Mods that change how the server behaves. They ask nothing at all of the people joining.
Client-side only
Rendering and interface mods such as OptiFine or Sodium. Uploaded to a server they do not help — they crash the load.
Versions have to match, not just mod names. The classic first-week failure is a mismatch error where both sides swear they have the same list. Either one side updated a mod and the other did not, or a client-only mod went up to the server. Pin the pack to one exact build and the server's half stops moving underneath you.
Changing the server's mods has the same effect on purpose: add or remove one and every player still on the old list is refused, usually with nothing on their screen explaining why. That is a coordination problem rather than a hosting one, so treat a pack update like a game night and announce it. Nothing changes here until you save and restart, which means you pick the moment.
A mod loader
New blocks, items and mobs — the things only a mod can add. Everything above is the price of that: the same list, at the same versions, on every machine that joins.
The Paper family
Plugins run entirely server-side — claims, homes, economies, minigames, moderation — and players join with a completely stock Minecraft. The trade is real: plugins cannot add new blocks or mobs, and the two systems do not mix. PaperMC says it will not run Fabric or Forge mods, Fabric says you cannot mix mods, and PaperMC calls hybrids that attempt both "fundamentally flawed".
Every loader, and what each one is for
Server type is chosen when you create the world and is a Settings dropdown afterwards. Pick the one your pack names: Forge mods and NeoForge mods do not cross over, and neither runs a plugin.
Forge
The loader classic modded Minecraft is built on, and where most of the big kitchen-sink packs still live. Set anything from the 1.12.2-era classics to the current release and the matching server build installs itself.
NeoForge
Forge's actively developed successor, which most new Forge-style mods target from Minecraft 1.20.1 onward. If a modern pack lists NeoForge in its requirements, that is the one to pick.
Fabric and Quilt
Lightweight, and usually first to support each new Minecraft release — snapshot servers included. Quilt is the community fork and runs Fabric mods unchanged.
The Paper family
Paper, Purpur, Pufferfish, Leaf, and Folia, all running the same Bukkit/Spigot plugins. Which fork you pick is a performance and tuning decision rather than a compatibility one — a plugin written for Paper runs on any of them.
Pin the Minecraft version; Java follows it
Mods are built against specific Minecraft releases, so the version picker is not biased toward the newest one. Set the exact release your pack calls for — whether it shipped years ago or this week — and every catalog install resolves against that pin instead of whatever happens to be current.
The Java underneath has stepped up several times over the game's history, and a wrong pairing refuses to boot at all rather than running slowly.
Which Java each era of Minecraft needs
- Before 1.17 — Java 8
- 1.17 through 1.20.4 — Java 17
- 1.20.5 and later — Java 21
- The newest releases — Java 25
Pixly reads the version you pinned and starts the server on the matching build, so that table stops being your problem. Settings still carries a Java selector that can force a specific build, for the rare mod that demands one and refuses anything newer: choose it, restart, and the server comes back on that runtime.
How much RAM a modded server needs
Start from the figure your pack's own team publishes. For a small group those run from 4 GB to 16 GB:
- Most Feed The Beast packs: 4–6 GB — FTB's own server guide, which adds that some need more.
- Most All the Mods packs: 6 GB or more — the All the Mods team's server setup guide.
- Vault Hunters: 8 GB plus 2 GB per player — the pack wiki's own formula, so a group of four reaches 16 GB.
- A five-player vanilla server: 2 GB — Minecraft's own wiki, which puts a connected player at roughly 50–100 MB.
- 32 GB "will only waste your money with minimal returns" — PaperMC's tuning guide, on where extra memory stops helping.
Pixly sizes run from 4 GB to 128 GB, and the CPU and RAM are dedicated to your server, nothing shared. Most of the memory runs the server, set from the size automatically with no launch flags to edit; the rest stays with the operating system, exactly as PaperMC's guide tells you to.
Servers run in United States — Portland, Oregon and Ashburn, Virginia; Asia Pacific — Singapore; Europe — Frankfurt, Germany.
Modded carries no surcharge — the rate is your size's rate, from $0.08 like any other world, and a heavy pack simply wants a size with more memory behind it.
Start small, watch the dashboard's memory readout, and move the size up — or back down — when the pack asks for it. The world and its address stay where they are, and because billing is hourly a larger size only costs more for the hours someone is actually playing on it. The pay-per-hour Minecraft server hosting page explains the billing model itself, and what a Minecraft server costs works it out at real play patterns. For a modded pack specifically, cheap modded hosting with more RAM compares a part-time group's bill against an always-on plan.
Why a modded server lags: ticks, not memory
Lag on a modded server is rarely a memory problem. A server advances the world in ticks — twenty a second, one every 50 milliseconds — and ticks cannot run in parallel, so a tick that overruns delays the next one and the backlog compounds.
That is what server-side lag is, and it is why Minecraft's own requirements page says the server wants strong single-core performance and typically uses no more than three cores. Every vCPU on a Pixly size is dedicated to your server, so a neighbor never steals your ticks.
View distance sets how much work each tick carries. It is a radius in chunks, so the work grows quadratically:
| View distance | Chunks loaded per player |
|---|---|
| 7 | 225 |
| 10 | up to 441 |
| 16 | 1,089 |
Dropping from 10 to 7 takes about half the work away with no hardware change at all. Simulation distance should sit lower than view distance, because ticking entities costs more than sending chunk data — and beyond simulation distance nothing moves: no redstone, no fluid flow, no crop growth, which is why a farm appears to stop while nobody is standing near it.
After that come the usual suspects. Mob farms, dense entity clusters, hoppers and villagers are recognized lag sources, and Paper and Spigot both ship throttles aimed at exactly those.
Switching loader or version, and what happens to the world
Mods write into the world itself, so the dashboard shows what each change does to it and offers the recovery step at the moment you need it.
- Changing server type is a Settings dropdown, not a new server. Moving between mod loaders keeps the world in place, and mods built for the old loader simply stop loading. Leaving the Paper family resets the world, and the old one is backed up first.
- Raising the Minecraft version is an ordinary save. Lowering it is not, because a world cannot be opened by an older Minecraft — a downgrade requires a reset, asks for confirmation, and snapshots the current world automatically before anything is touched.
- Removing a mod takes it off the server at the next restart. Clearing a whole modpack leaves its files in the world, so the dashboard pins a banner offering a one-click world reset, and the old world is backed up before anything is touched.
Bedrock friends can join modded worlds too. On Fabric, NeoForge, and Quilt the Geyser bridge installs as just another mod, and everything that runs on the server — worldgen, mechanics, plugins, datapacks — applies to Bedrock players too. Crossplay Minecraft server hosting covers what translates across.
Modded hosting questions
The ones that come up between picking a pack and getting everyone into it.
Do my friends need to install the mods too?
Usually yes. A mod that adds blocks, items or mobs has to be installed on each player's own game as well as on the server, at the same version and on the same loader, because only a player's own copy of Minecraft can draw the new content. Mods that only change server behavior don't need anything from players, and plugins never do.
What's the difference between mods and plugins?
Plugins run entirely on the server, so players join with a completely stock Minecraft — that's how claims, homes, economies and moderation tools work without anybody downloading anything. Mods run in the game itself, which is what lets them add blocks, items and mobs, and that's why content mods have to be on both sides. The two systems don't mix, so pick the Paper family for plugins and a mod loader for mods.
Why does my server say the mods don't match?
Almost always one of two things. Mod versions have to match, not just mod names — one side updating a single mod is enough to block the connection, even though both lists look identical. Or a client-only mod such as OptiFine or Sodium was uploaded to the server, where it crashes the load instead. Pinning your pack to one exact build stops the server's half from moving, which leaves only the client side to line up.
What is modded Minecraft server hosting?
It's hosting where the server runs a mod loader instead of the stock jar, so gameplay-changing mods and full modpacks load server-side for everyone who joins. On Pixly the loader, the server build, the Java runtime, and the catalog downloads are all part of the managed setup — your job is choosing what to run, not assembling it.
How do I install a CurseForge or Modrinth modpack on my server?
Open the Mods tab and search — it covers CurseForge and Modrinth together — or paste the pack's link. Packs from either catalog build themselves on the next start: every mod plus its configs. One pack runs at a time, and you can pin an exact build so an update never lands uninvited. Uploading a .mrpack or plain .jar files works too, which is also the way around the occasional CurseForge project whose author has switched third-party downloads off.
Which loaders and server types can I run?
Every moddable type Pixly offers — Paper, Purpur, Pufferfish, Leaf, Folia, Fabric, Forge, NeoForge, or Quilt — plus stock Vanilla when you want no mods at all. The Paper family takes plugins rather than mods; Fabric, Forge, NeoForge, and Quilt take mods from CurseForge and Modrinth. Whichever you pick, the right server software is installed for the Minecraft version you pinned.
Which Java version do modded servers need?
It depends on the Minecraft version underneath: releases before 1.17 run Java 8, 1.17 through 1.20.4 need 17, 1.20.5 and later use 21, and the newest releases step up to 25. On Pixly you don't chase that table — the server resolves Java from your pinned version, with a manual override in Settings for the rare pack that insists otherwise.
How much RAM does a modded server need?
Start from the figure your pack's own team publishes: Feed The Beast says most of its packs want 4–6 GB, the All the Mods team asks for 6 GB or more, and Vault Hunters asks for 8 GB plus 2 GB per player. Minecraft's wiki puts a five-player vanilla server at 2 GB. Pixly sizes run from 4 GB to 128 GB of dedicated memory, and because billing is hourly and sizes are switchable, you can start small, watch the live memory readout, and resize whenever the pack asks for more.
Why is my modded server lagging?
Rarely because of memory. A server runs 20 ticks a second and ticks can't run in parallel, so one slow tick delays the next and the backlog compounds. Every vCPU on a Pixly size is dedicated to your server, so no other server competes for those ticks. How much work each tick carries comes down to view distance first: it's a radius, so 10 loads up to 441 chunks per player against 1,089 at 16, and dropping to 7 takes it to 225. Set simulation distance lower than view distance, then look at mob farms, dense entity clusters, hoppers and villagers.
What's the best hosting for a modded server?
Judge it against your pack, not a feature list. It has to offer the loader your pack names, let you pin the exact Minecraft version it was built for rather than pushing you onto the newest release, install from the catalog your pack lives on, and give the pack the memory its authors ask for. Then there's the shape of the bill: a modded group that plays a few evenings a week is paying a fixed monthly plan for a lot of hours nobody is online. Pixly charges by the hour for the hours the server is up, which is the difference that matters most for weekly play.
Can I put mods on Minecraft Realms?
No. Mojang's Realms settings — for Java and for Bedrock alike — offer no way to add a plugin or a mod loader; the whole configuration surface is worlds, players, subscription and settings. Bedrock Add-Ons are a separate thing, and Mojang says so directly: Add-Ons are not mods, mods are exclusive to Java Edition, and it recommends playing with at most three Add-Ons. A rented server you can install a loader on is the way to run a modpack. The Minecraft Realms alternative page compares the two in full.
What happens when I remove a modpack or mods?
A removed mod comes off the server at the next restart. A cleared modpack leaves its files in the world, so the dashboard flags exactly that and offers a one-click world reset, which backs the old world up first — a clean start is one confirmation away.
Can Bedrock players join a modded server?
Yes, on Fabric, NeoForge, and Quilt, where the Geyser bridge installs alongside your mods; Geyser publishes no build for Forge. Mojang lists mods as Java-only, so modded blocks and items show up as stand-ins on a Bedrock screen, while everything that runs on the server — worldgen, mechanics, plugins and datapacks — applies to every player.
Does modded server hosting cost extra?
No — the price is your size's per-hour rate whatever you run on it, and a heavier pack simply wants a size with more memory. Idle time works like any Pixly server: while it sleeps, a small storage fee keeps the saved world. There's no hourly charge again until someone joins and wakes it.
Put your pack on a server tonight
Create a server, pick the loader, paste the pack. Start with about9 hours of play to try it, then pay for the time you play.
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