Start

Quick start

RustMC is one program. It reads the same server.properties the vanilla server does, plus an optional rustmc.yml for what vanilla has no setting for. With no rustmc.yml, it behaves like the vanilla dedicated server.

1. Get the server

Release builds for Linux x86-64, Windows x86-64 and Linux ARM64 will be on the downloads page at launch.

To build it yourself you need Rust 1.98 or newer. From a checkout of the repository:

cargo build --release -p rustmc-server

The binary is target/release/rustmc-server. Add --features wasm to load WebAssembly plugins; a build without it ignores .wasm files and says so in its log.

2. Start it

Run it with no arguments in an empty folder:

mkdir my-server && cd my-server
/path/to/rustmc-server

A first start at a terminal asks a few questions: the port, the game mode, the difficulty, the world seed, the most players at once, whether to check accounts with Mojang, and whose name to make an operator. Press Enter to take the game's own default for each. The answers go into server.properties, where you can change them later.

The server then writes rustmc.yml with every key at its default, and generates the world from the seed. Started by a service or a script rather than at a terminal, it asks nothing and writes the defaults.

With online mode on, an operator needs their account id from Mojang, so the server asks you to join once and then type op <name> at its console.

A server whose server.properties was made without the questions gets vanilla 26.3's defaults, which include white-list=true: only players on the allowlist can join. Add them from the console with whitelist add <name>, or set white-list=false.

3. Connect

Open Minecraft Java Edition 26.3, choose Multiplayer, and add localhost (or the machine's address, with :<port> if you changed it from 25565).

4. Let Bedrock players in

In rustmc.yml:

bedrock:
  enabled: true

Restart. Bedrock Edition 1.26.50 clients connect on UDP port 19132 and join the same world as Java players. Open that port in your firewall.

Next

• rustmc.yml: every setting vanilla lacks, with its default.
• The web map and the web portal.
• Backups, before you put a world you care about on it.
• The plugin API, to change what the server does.

Written for this site.