Best Minecraft Server Hosting (2026): 8 Picks, 2 Free Tiers

ScalaCube's free Java plan is the reason to look at it first. The vendor's plan page lists the free tier with 8 GB of RAM, 4 CPU cores and 30 GB of SSD storage, with instant setup and no card required. That is enough to host a small friend group on vanilla or lightly modded Java, and it lets you judge the panel before you spend anything.

On paid plans, ScalaCube says its game server plans are all-inclusive with no setup fees, and that upgrading means paying only the difference between your old and new plan. One ScalaCube page also mentions unlimited player slots. Bedrock plans have their own plan constructor, and some Bedrock pages mention extra charges such as data transfer and memory, so read the constructor summary before checkout.

The main caution is price clarity. The pages we found show different entry figures and some look dated, so we are not printing a number here. Check the current price on the vendor page.

Skip it if you want one flat, clearly published price table with no add-ons to read through.

Godlike's Java page lays out three paid tiers. The Double plan lists 2 GB of RAM, Quadro lists 4 GB and Ultra lists 6 GB, all on 30-day billing. The page shows both a sale price and a list price for each tier, which is typical of the promo-heavy hosting market, so confirm what you will actually pay on the day you order.

The vendor says players are unlimited on all plans and that you can scale a plan at any time. It also lists a free 2 GB tier available to US clients. Slot ranges on the Java tier table (for example 5 to 10 slots on the 2 GB plan) do not line up neatly with the unlimited-player wording elsewhere, so ask support what applies to your plan before you promise a server size to your community.

Godlike also publishes its own comparison and ranking posts. Treat those as marketing material rather than independent testing.

Skip it if you are a player outside the US who wants the free tier, or if you need a single consistent description of slot limits before buying.

Apex Hosting's homepage lists unlimited slots and its pricing page says all plans include DDoS protection. The vendor also states that it offers plans supporting both Bedrock and Java Edition with full panel access, which matters if some of your group joins from a console or phone while others play on PC.

At the top end, the pricing page lists an EX Series plan with an AMD Ryzen 9 7950X, 16 GB of DDR4 RAM, NVMe storage, 4 dedicated vCores and a free dedicated IP. The pricing page says most packages deploy instantly after you click Order Now. Apex advertises promo codes on its homepage, but the entry price shown there is already a promo figure, so check the current price at checkout.

Apex is a good fit for a community server that may grow, since a larger plan exists on the same site. Smaller plan details were not visible in the results we found, so confirm the RAM tier you need on the pricing page.

Skip it if you want the lowest possible monthly bill and do not need Bedrock or a large-server tier.

Shockbyte's main Minecraft page lists 11 standard plans from 1 GB to 12 GB of RAM, plus a custom tier that starts at 17 GB and up. The page advertises a 72-hour self-serve refund, instant setup, 99.9% uptime, 24/7 support and DDoS protection. The uptime figure is the vendor's own claim and we did not verify it.

The vendor also has dedicated pages for Bedrock, modded Minecraft and an Australian storefront priced in Australian dollars. A blog post on the Shockbyte site explains a Minecraft price increase that took effect on June 3, 2024, with existing customers keeping their old rates. That tells you pricing here has moved before, so check the current price instead of relying on an old comparison table.

Because there are many small steps in the plan ladder, Shockbyte makes it easy to start small and upgrade as your world grows.

Skip it if you need a long refund window or a free plan, since the published window is 72 hours.

BisectHosting's homepage lists unlimited slots, 24/7/365 support, 2,300+ modpacks on one-click installs and 21 locations. For modded Minecraft that library is the draw, since you can start from a known pack instead of uploading files by hand.

The company sells Premium and Budget tiers. A BisectHosting knowledge base article says Budget servers come with the same performance and support but add-ons must be chosen separately, and the BisectBoost add-on can bring a Budget server close to Premium features. An older Java listing runs from a 2 GB plan to a 48 GB plan, which suggests room to grow.

Availability can vary by location, because one selector page showed a Java plan as out of stock with a waitlist option. Entry prices differ across BisectHosting pages, so use the live selector for the current price.

Skip it if you play vanilla with a few friends and have no use for a large modpack library.

Sparked Host sells Minecraft in three tiers. The Budget page lists plans from 1 GB up to 22 GB of RAM with 10 to 100 GB of storage. The main Minecraft page lists Enterprise on AMD Ryzen 9 7900 hardware and Extreme on a Ryzen 9 9900X, both with RAID 1 NVMe storage, with plans running up to 26 GB of RAM.

The vendor also lists bundles named Starter, Community and Network that pair game hosting with web hosting and a Discord bot. Add-ons are listed separately: backup slots, a dedicated IP or port, and server management are all extra on the pages we found.

Pricing pages for this host vary in age, and a Fall sale page advertises a first-period discount with a code. Because of that, we are not printing a price and suggest you check the live page.

Skip it if you want backups and a dedicated IP bundled in, since the vendor lists them as add-ons.

Hostinger sells Minecraft through VPS-based Game Panel plans. The listing we found shows Game Panel 1 with 1 vCPU, 4 GB of RAM, 50 GB of NVMe storage and 4 TB of bandwidth, scaling up to Game Panel 8 with 8 vCPU, 32 GB of RAM, 400 GB of storage and 32 TB of bandwidth. Hostinger says a dedicated IP, a built-in firewall and DDoS protection are included.

The vendor states that the monthly rate shown is the total plan price divided by the number of months, and that all plans are paid upfront. Renewal rates are shown higher than the sign-up rate, so work out the multi-year cost before choosing a long term. We are not printing the numbers because the page we found looked dated and Hostinger's own tutorial quotes a different starting figure.

This is a strong fit if you are comfortable with a VPS-style product and want to know exactly how many vCPUs and how much RAM you are getting.

Skip it if you want a month-to-month plan with no upfront commitment.

Nodecraft splits Minecraft into two tiers. Lite servers shut down when unused and resume when someone wakes them, which suits a group that plays a few evenings a week. Pro servers stay online 24/7 with a static IP and automated tasks. Both tiers list 2 GB, 4 GB and 8 GB sizes, and a Build Your Own option runs from 2 GB to 32 GB.

The vendor lists a free 24-hour trial with no credit card required, which is a useful way to test the panel. Backups differ by tier: Lite creates a backup when the server is idle, while Pro backups run weekly. Nodecraft shows a first-month sale rate and a higher renewal rate, so we are leaving the numbers out and asking you to check the current price.

The wake-and-play model keeps costs down for casual groups but means friends cannot join at random hours without waking the server.

Skip it if you run a public server that must be reachable at any hour on a Lite plan.