Minecraft Server Requirements for 10 Players (2026)

Quick answer: a vanilla or Paper Minecraft server for 10 players runs well on 6 to 8 GB of RAM, a CPU with high single-core speed and NVMe storage. The current release, Minecraft 26.3, needs Java 25. Modpacks need more: 8 GB for a light pack and 16 GB for a kitchen sink pack like ATM10.

Requirements at a glance

RAM for 10 players

6 to 8 GB is the comfortable range for vanilla or Paper with a normal plugin list. Memory holds the loaded chunks around each player, the entities in them, and your plugins or mods, so 10 players who build in one area need less than 10 players who all explore in different directions.

This is how we size 10 players on our own plans and product pages:

Don't over-allocate. Giving a 10 player vanilla server 16 GB does not make it faster. If you run the server yourself, PaperMC's docs recommend keeping -Xms and -Xmx the same and setting them about 1000 to 1500 MB below the memory the machine has, so the operating system keeps some (Aikar's flags on docs.papermc.io).

CPU: single-core speed matters more than core count

Minecraft runs its main game loop on one thread, aiming for 20 ticks per second, so every tick has to finish in 50 ms. A CPU with fast cores gets through a busy tick sooner than a CPU with many slow cores, which is why a modern desktop-class chip often beats an old server chip with twice the cores.

For 10 players, look for:

• A recent CPU generation with a high boost clock, and a host that names the model.
• At least 4 cores, so chunk loading, networking and garbage collection have room next to the main thread.
• A shared CPU is normal on game hosting. What matters is how busy the machine is, which you can see in TPS once your group plays.

Our Standard plans run on an AMD EPYC 7443 in the Netherlands, Germany and Poland and on Ryzen 9 3900X-class CPUs in Canada and India. Premium runs on the Ryzen 9 9950X. The CPU is shared on both, the RAM is reserved for your server. If TPS drops while RAM is fine, a faster core helps more than more memory. Our guide to the best CPU for a Minecraft server compares chips.

Storage: use an SSD, preferably NVMe

Every time a player walks into new terrain, the server generates or loads chunks and saves them to disk. On a spinning hard disk that shows up as terrain loading in late when several players explore at once. An SSD reads and writes chunks far faster, and NVMe is the fastest common option.

Space depends on how far your players travel and whether you pre-generate the world. Our plans for 10 players come with 35 GB (MC Gold) to 45 GB (MC Diamond) of NVMe storage, which leaves room for a large world plus backups you make in the panel. If you pre-generate, check free space first, because pre-generated chunks are saved to disk.

Network and location

Your players download the world from the server, so on a home connection the upload speed is the one that matters, and it is usually the first thing to run out. On a hosted server that is the host's job.

Ping follows distance, so host where most of your players live. Our Minecraft plans run in the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Canada, the USA (California and Virginia), Singapore, India and Australia.

Java version

Every Minecraft version needs a specific Java version. From Mojang's own version manifest, read on 25 October 2026:

Modpacks follow their Minecraft version: ATM10 runs on 1.21.1 and needs Java 21, even though vanilla has moved on to Java 25. If the server stops with UnsupportedClassVersionError, the Java version is too old.

JVM flags for a 10 player server

For 6 to 8 GB, these are Aikar's G1 flags as PaperMC publishes them, with the heap set to 6 GB:

java -Xms6G -Xmx6G \
  -XX:+UseG1GC \
  -XX:+ParallelRefProcEnabled \
  -XX:MaxGCPauseMillis=200 \
  -XX:+UnlockExperimentalVMOptions \
  -XX:+DisableExplicitGC \
  -XX:+AlwaysPreTouch \
  -XX:G1NewSizePercent=30 \
  -XX:G1MaxNewSizePercent=40 \
  -XX:G1HeapRegionSize=8M \
  -XX:G1ReservePercent=20 \
  -XX:G1HeapWastePercent=5 \
  -XX:G1MixedGCCountTarget=4 \
  -XX:InitiatingHeapOccupancyPercent=15 \
  -XX:G1MixedGCLiveThresholdPercent=90 \
  -XX:G1RSetUpdatingPauseTimePercent=5 \
  -XX:SurvivorRatio=32 \
  -XX:+PerfDisableSharedMem \
  -XX:MaxTenuringThreshold=1 \
  -Dusing.aikars.flags=https://mcflags.emc.gs \
  -Daikars.new.flags=true \
  -jar server.jar nogui

Change both -Xms6G and -Xmx6G to your own size and keep them equal, and swap server.jar for the name of your server jar. Our Aikar's flags guide explains each flag.

Self-hosting or a hosted server for 10 players

For 10 players who want the server online while the host PC is off, a game server host is the least work. If you would rather run it yourself, our guide on how much RAM a Minecraft server needs helps you size the machine. Ready to pick a plan? See our Minecraft hosting plans.

For heavily modded servers, see the ATM10 server requirements guide, and for larger groups, how many players a Minecraft server can handle.