ARK Official Servers Shutting Down: What Happens to Saves

Studio Wildcard is shutting down 468 inactive ARK: Survival Ascended official servers on Sunday 29 November 2026. For saves, it only says it is working with Nitrado to offer them after the sunset "through Nitrado's interface", and no official source says yet whether an official save can move to a private server.

Below is what the announcement in Community Crunch 527 says, what it leaves out, and how to pick a new home for your tribe before the 29th.

What is closing and when

Wildcard calls it "sunsetting a selection of our inactive official servers". Its reason: when it launches fresh content, it typically puts up "more servers than we need in the long term", and over time those servers "become ghost towns". The process has three steps:

1. The servers get a "SUNSET" prefix in their name. Once renamed, they drop out of the in-game Favorites list, so you have to search for them by hand to reconnect. The post gives no date for the rename.
2. On Sunday 29 November 2026, the servers on the list are sunset. The post gives no time of day.
3. After that, Wildcard wants to offer the saves through Nitrado's interface. "Please stay tuned for more details."

The Steam version of the post calls them "inactive Island servers", but the list covers far more than The Island. The copy of the same post on survivetheark.com just says "these inactive servers". We counted the 468 names on the list:

To check your own server, open Community Crunch 527 on Steam, click "Show More" in the sunset section and search the page for your server's name or number. Then check again in each Community Crunch until the 29th, because lists have changed before the date in earlier rounds. In October 2024 Wildcard decided "to keep several of the previously mentioned servers online" after player feedback (Community Crunch 429), and the June 2026 round had a list of servers "removed from the sunset list" (Community Crunch 511).

What happens to characters, dinos and bases

The post does not mention characters, creatures, structures or tribes at all. It talks about servers and about "these saves", and this is everything it says about what comes after the 29th:

We're working with our partner at Nitrado to offer these saves after the scheduled sunset through Nitrado's interface. Please stay tuned for more details.

So the official text gives you three things. The servers stop on the 29th: in the December 2025 round, Wildcard wrote that sunset servers "will still go offline" on the date (Community Crunch 487). The saves of those servers are meant to be offered afterwards, through Nitrado's interface. And the details are still to come. It does not say whether you can download a save, what it costs, or who gets access to the save of a server that many tribes shared.

Transfers are not mentioned either. On the official network, transfers are how you move "items, creatures, and characters" from one map to another, in Wildcard's own words (same Community Crunch 487). If your server still allows uploads, that is the one route that does not depend on the save offer: move your survivor, your best creatures and your gear to a server that is not on the list before the 29th. A base cannot come along that way, because structures are not among the things you can transfer. In the December 2025 round, Wildcard opened transfers out of its Isolated servers to the main network ahead of the shutdown (Community Crunch 480). The November 2026 post has no line like that.

Can an official save move to a private server?

Wildcard has not said so. The Nitrado sentence is the only official statement, and it does not say that the save will be downloadable, that it will run on a server hosted somewhere else, or that it will run as an unofficial server at all. Until Wildcard publishes the details, the honest answer is: not stated.

The history is worth knowing. Nearly the same sentence has been in every ASA sunset announcement we found:

After the first round, Wildcard wrote that it was "working closely with our partners at Nitrado to make the official server saves from our sunsetted servers available soon" (Community Crunch 432). We went through all of Wildcard's Steam announcements for ASA, back to launch week in October 2023, and found no follow-up that explains how those saves are offered. That does not prove nothing happened, but it does mean you cannot plan around it today. If your progress matters to you, transfer what you can before the 29th and treat the rest as a fresh start.

If a save file does reach you one day, the mechanics are the same as moving any ASA world: upload the save and config files over FTP, set the map and cluster IDs to match, and restart. Whether an official save then runs cleanly on an unofficial server is something nobody can test until the files exist.

Your options

Move to another official server

If you want official rules and the official network, pick a server that is not on the list and move before the 29th, by transfer where your server allows it. Wildcard is closing a selection of inactive servers, not the official network, and it says it still intends "to provide capacity at launches as much as possible".

Start a private server with friends

A private server is a world you control: your rates, your mods, your rules and no sunset list. ASA has a non-dedicated Host mode in the game menu (Wildcard refers to "Host/Single Player mode" in Community Crunch 511), but a non-dedicated session runs on the host's own machine, so the world is only up while that person plays. For a tribe that plays at different times, a dedicated server, at home or rented, stays online when everyone logs off. Our ARK Survival Ascended server hosting guide covers the setup.

Join a community server

Unofficial community servers show up in the in-game server browser too, and our post on official and unofficial ASA servers explains how they differ. Before you move a whole tribe, look at how long the server has existed, how active its admins are, its rates, its wipe schedule and its mod list, and whether it has a Discord where you can read the rules first.

What to look for in a private server

1. Enough memory for ASA with your map and mods. Ask what a plan includes, and what it takes to run a cluster if you want more than one map.
2. File access over FTP. You need it to download your own backups, edit the config, and upload a save if you ever get one.
3. Access to GameUserSettings.ini and Game.ini, so you set the rates, taming, breeding and structure limits yourself.
4. Backups you can restore yourself and download.
5. CurseForge mods from the panel. If you came from one of the 68 modded official servers on the list, you need the same mods, and some ASA mods are paid premium mods (Community Crunch 525 mentions several), so check each one on CurseForge first.
6. Cluster support, if your tribe used more than one map.
7. A location close to most of your players.
8. Console access, confirmed. If anyone in your group plays on Xbox or PlayStation, check that they can find and join the server before anyone pays. Wildcard has not clearly documented console access to unofficial servers in general, and our crossplay guide sets out what is documented.
9. Updates on time. ASA moves to Unreal Engine 5.8 on Wednesday 28 October, a month before the sunset, and any server you join or rent has to be on the new build that day. Our UE 5.8 server checklist covers what changes.

Hosting it with us

Our ARK server hosting runs unofficial Survival Ascended servers in nine regions: the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Canada, USA (California), USA (Virginia), Singapore, India and Australia. Plans start at €25.99 a month for 16 GB, one map and up to 20 players (€27.99 in the two US regions), and the 24 GB Rex plan (€38.99, or €41.99 in the US) is cluster ready for up to 40 players. Every plan has three backup slots, full FTP and RCON access, full access to GameUserSettings.ini and Game.ini, CurseForge mods from the control panel and DDoS protection. An ASA save you already have goes up over FTP: match the map and cluster IDs and restart. We have not confirmed console access on our ASA servers, so if your group is not PC only, ask our support team before you order. Support is online from 08:00 to 20:00 UTC, seven days a week.

FAQ

When are ARK official servers shutting down? Only the inactive servers on Wildcard's list, 468 of them, are sunset on Sunday 29 November 2026. The rest of the official network is not part of this announcement, and Wildcard has not given a time of day.

Will I get my official server save after the sunset? Wildcard says it is working with Nitrado to offer the saves of these servers through Nitrado's interface after the sunset, with more details to follow. It has not said how, when or at what cost, and it has used nearly the same sentence for every sunset round since 2024.

Can I move my ARK official save to a private server? Not stated. Nothing Wildcard has published says an official save can be downloaded or run on an unofficial server. What you control is a transfer of your survivor, items and creatures to another official server before the 29th, if your server allows uploads.

How do I find my server after it is renamed SUNSET? Renamed servers drop out of the in-game Favorites list. Search the server browser for the name or number to reconnect until the 29th.

Is my server on the list? Open Community Crunch 527 on Steam, click Show More in the sunset section and search for your server's name or number. Look again in later Community Crunch posts, because Wildcard has taken servers off its lists before the date in earlier rounds.

Related guides: ARK UE 5.8 update checklist | Official vs unofficial ASA servers | ARK crossplay and console players | ARK Survival Ascended server hosting guide