How much RAM would a 20 player server need (with custom plugins)?

[u/ilovesimius]

Hey everyone. I'm going to create a server for my uni's gaming club. We don't plan to use mods (for now) and I'm thinking about writing some custom plugins to create a unique experience. I read about how much RAM I would need online, but couldn't find a consistent number. The version will probably be 1.20+ but I haven't decided yet. Would 6GB be enough?

[u/VFequalsVeryFcked]

6GB should be plenty. Depending on size of plugins as well. But assuming you're using under 100, then yeah, should be plenty

[u/Flaze07 → u/VFequalsVeryFcked]

this is only plenty if you don't have multiple people generating new chunks I feel

[u/Affectionate-Toe-467]

Yea should be enough

[u/Tybiest]

I have a server running on paper with about 40 plugins at it reaches about 7gb max but only if there is much activity normally around 5.6 gb

[u/Jwhodis]

It depends on the mods/plugins, but it should be fine. Make sure to pregenerate the world with Chunky too.

[u/TheMythicSorcerer]

Depends on exactly what plugins they are some consume a lot some consume less. 20 players? 6GB should be plently I've been able to have like 25 players on 4GB with optimizations (pre-generated 2k world border w/ chunky, lagfixer, clearlag++) with an i5. though it was sort of slow.

6 GB should be plenty.

[u/Retardation-Syndrome]

8gb if you're under 50 mods,on pregen 4x4 or 10x10, and all the 20 ppl aren't making the server generate new chunks at the same time

[u/kai-zaphosting]

6GB is enough for 20 players on Paper, so agreed with the "should be enough" take. Just keep in mind that's total vs. what you give the JVM. I'd set the heap to around 4 to 5GB and leave the rest for the OS and everything else on the machine.

With custom plugins, honestly the thing that gets people is CPU, not RAM. The main tick thread is single-core, so a plugin doing heavy work or blocking calls on it (database queries, HTTP requests) will tank TPS long before you run out of memory. Run that stuff async.

Once you have something to test, use spark so you can see what's actually eating tick time instead of guessing. On Paper 1.21+ it's already bundled, so just run /spark profiler start. On 1.20.x you'd drop the .jar into the plugins folder and restart first.

[u/DevBigLife]

probably even 4 gigs is enough but just dont get the cpu so old

[u/qwertyjgly]

as long as the plugins aren't whatever the java equivalent of...

while(1){malloc(SIZE_MAX);};

... is, yeah you should be fine with 6GB

[u/ISHx4xPresident]

As long as you gen the word a good amount, it’s a perfectly good amount

[u/South-Writing-162]

8gb

[u/Mobile_Accident_8944]

4-6GB is more than enough