A Tour of Your Game Panel

Your server comes with a full control panel at panel.emeraldsmc.com — console, files, databases, backups and scheduled tasks, all in the browser. This is a tour of every tab and what it's actually for.

Signing in the first time

When your order completes, two emails arrive. One confirms the service. The other, Account Created, contains a link to set your panel password. That link is the only credential we send, so if it isn't in your inbox, check spam before opening a ticket.

Once you're in, you'll see your server on the dashboard with live CPU and memory readings. Click it.

Console

The heart of the panel. You get the live server log, and a command line that runs commands as the server operator — type op YourName or whitelist add YourFriend here without needing to be in game.

The four power buttons behave differently:

• Start boots the server.
• Restart stops and starts it cleanly.
• Stop asks the server to save and shut down. Always prefer this.
• Kill terminates the process immediately. It does not save. Use it only when Stop has failed.

Above the console you'll find live resource graphs. If memory sits pegged at the top of your plan's limit for long stretches, read our guide on how much RAM a Minecraft server needs.

Files

A full file manager: browse, edit, rename, move, download, upload, and — usefully — archive and unarchive right on the server. Editing server.properties here is the normal way to change your MOTD, difficulty, view distance or whitelist setting.

Two habits worth forming. Stop the server before replacing anything it's actively writing, particularly world folders. And for bulk transfers, use SFTP instead — see uploading worlds and plugins with SFTP.

Databases

Every plan includes one MySQL database. Create it here and the panel shows you the host, port, database name, username and password to paste into a plugin config — LuckPerms, CoreProtect, Essentials and most economy plugins can all use it.

One database is plenty: multiple plugins can share it safely, since each one creates its own tables.

Backups

Backups are taken on demand from this tab, and your plan sets how many you can keep — one on Coal, two on Iron and Gold, three on Diamond and Emerald. Each one is a snapshot of your whole server folder, and restoring is a two-click affair.

When you hit the limit, delete an old backup before taking a new one. And keep anything irreplaceable somewhere off the server too; a backup that lives only next to the original isn't really a backup.

Schedules

Cron for your server. A schedule is a time expression plus a list of tasks — send a command, take a backup, restart.

The most common setup, and one we recommend: a nightly restart at a quiet hour, with a say Server restarting in 60 seconds command a minute before it. Long-running Minecraft servers accumulate entities and memory fragmentation, and a daily restart keeps performance flat.

Server software

On your console page, next to the address panel, there's a picker for the server jar. Your server ships on Vanilla; choose Paper, Purpur or Spigot instead, pick a Minecraft version, and press Install. We stop the server, download the jar straight onto it — you'll watch the percentage climb — and tell you when to restart. The dropdown always shows what you're currently running, and your choice is remembered — if the server is ever reinstalled, it comes back on the same software.

Paper, Purpur and Spigot run plugins, and they also want more memory than vanilla: we recommend them on the 2 GB (Gold) plan and up. On 1 GB and 1.5 GB the panel will say so before you install.

Already built your own jar, or downloaded a modpack server? Upload it to your server's root folder, type its filename in the box underneath, and press Use file. We check the file is really there before pointing your startup at it.

One rule worth knowing: you cannot go backwards. Minecraft can't open a world created by a newer version — try it and the server dies with a level.dat or datapack error before it finishes loading. If you install an older version, you need to reset the world (rename or delete world, world_nether and world_the_end) for it to start. The panel warns you before you install something older than your world.

Sponge and BungeeCord aren't in this picker, because they need a different install process. Open a ticket, tell us what you want to run, and we'll switch your server over. Fabric, NeoForge and Forge are handled for you — see Mods below.

Mods, plugins and modpacks

There's a Mods tab in your server's navigation, next to Files. It opens a browser over Modrinth, so you never have to download a jar to your own computer and upload it again. Four tabs inside it:

Mods. Search by name, filtered to builds that actually match your loader and Minecraft version. Press Install and the file is downloaded straight onto your server, into mods/. Anything the mod needs to run is pulled in with it, and client-only mods are filtered out of the results — installing one of those is the single most common reason a modded server won't boot.

Plugins. The same thing for Bukkit and Spigot plugins, into plugins/. This one is open on every plan, including Coal. If your server isn't on Paper or Purpur yet the browser says so — plugins will sit there doing nothing until you switch software with the picker above.

Modpacks. Search whole packs and install one in a click. We fetch the pack, install the mod loader it asks for, choose the Java version that version of Minecraft needs, download every server-side mod and apply the pack's own configs. It takes a few minutes and you can watch it in the console. Your existing world is not deleted — but a world built in one pack usually can't be opened by another, so download anything you care about from the Files tab first.

Installed. Everything currently in mods/ and plugins/, with a Remove button on each. Restart to load or unload.

Which plan gets what

Mods need memory, and there's no point selling you a one-click install that can't finish loading. So:

Browsing is open to everyone on every tab — you can see exactly what's out there before deciding whether to move up. Where a plan doesn't reach, the Install button becomes a link to your billing account instead. Changing plan keeps your world.

Switching loader is in the same place: on the Mods tab there's a row of Fabric, NeoForge and Forge with your current one ticked. Fabric installs in seconds. NeoForge and Forge have to run their own installer, so those rebuild the server — a few minutes, world untouched. And whatever your plan, you can always upload a jar over SFTP and point the startup at it yourself.

Startup

This tab holds the startup command and its variables — including the jar filename your server boots from, which the software picker keeps in step for you. Your server runs on Java 25, which is what every current Minecraft and Paper build requires.

Network

Your server's address — an IP and a port — lives here. That 148.230.94.173:26xxx pair is what your players type into the Minecraft "Add Server" box.

If you own a domain, you can point a subdomain at it and hand out something friendlier instead — our SRV record guide has the exact steps for Cloudflare, Namecheap and GoDaddy.

Users

Add a co-owner or a moderator without giving away your password. Enter their email, tick the permissions they should have, and they get their own login scoped to your server. Console access without file access is a common, sensible split for moderators.

Activity

An audit log: who logged in, who started or stopped the server, who changed a file, and when. If something changes unexpectedly on a shared server, this tab usually explains it.

Billing

The Billing link in the top navigation and in the page footer takes you to your services and invoices on billing.emeraldsmc.com — plan changes, payment methods, and support tickets all live there.

Anything here behaving differently from what you expected? Open a ticket with your server name and what you were doing, and a human will read it.