11 Household-Friendly Minecraft Servers Where Your Kid Can Play Safely On-line

If your kid has spent some time enjoying Minecraft on their very own - or with different relations on your home community - they'll most likely attain some extent the place they’ll want to play with others on-line.

Taking part in Minecraft on a public server can take the game to a complete new stage. For one factor, there’s a brand new community of like-minded gamers to make friends with and collaborate with. This can help your kid study social abilities, comparable to cooperating, compromising and downside-solving.

In addition, most servers characteristic enormous, prebuilt worlds, with wonderful cities and buildings, transport networks, and mini-games to your kid to discover and enjoy.

Finally, most servers lengthen Minecraft utilizing a lot of server plugins, which permit for a whole range of extra gameplay features, together with money methods, jobs, position-playing components and teleports. (You don’t need to change your Minecraft recreation to add these options; they’re all handled by the server.)

By now you’re probably thinking: That is all very nicely, however aren’t public servers a harmful place for my kid? If they go on a server, how will I know they are going to be protected from dangerous language, bullying, or on-line predators?

After all, no public server is 100 percent secure, but there are some improbable Minecraft servers on the market that cater particularly to youngsters and families. (That said, if you’d reasonably arrange a totally private server on your kid and their close buddies, try Minecraft Realms.)

On this guide, you’ll discover eleven of the best household-friendly Minecraft servers on the market. You’ll additionally study a bit extra about how Minecraft servers work, and the way to attach to those servers and begin playing online.

At this level, I should level out that this information is for the Laptop/Mac version of Minecraft only. Whereas there are some household-pleasant servers for the Pocket Version and Xbox versions of Minecraft, the overwhelming majority of servers work with the Laptop/Mac version.

So with out further ado, let’s dive into the world of online, household-friendly Minecraft! We’ll start by looking at some vital ideas associated to public Minecraft servers.

Key server ideas you'll want to know

Here are a couple of key ideas and terms that are worth realizing before you join a public server:

Servers vs. worlds: Often, a single public Minecraft server has several worlds you could leap between. For instance, there’s usually a most important survival world, another creative-mode world, and possibly a 3rd world for mini-video games. Normally there’s a central hub or lobby, with warp points that let you teleport between the totally different worlds.
PvP and PvE: PvP stands for “player vs. player”, while PvE stands for “player vs. environment”. Most public servers - particularly household-friendly ones - are PvE; that is, you battle monsters, not players. Nevertheless, some servers have particular PvP arenas where you may battle other gamers. (Typically, in case you die in a PvP enviornment, you don’t lose all of your stuff, as you'd in a regular survival world. It’s just for enjoyable.)
Spawn: Often your player will spawn (start) at a set point on the earth, normally referred to simply as “spawn”. Sometimes that is in, or near, a central town or metropolis, or in some sort of foyer space. You can normally sort the command /spawn to return to your spawn level.
Rules: Almost all servers have rules as to what you can and cannot do, and - as you’d think about - family-friendly servers are inclined to have a giant checklist of strict guidelines. Be sure to learn all the foundations totally. (While you first join some servers, they actually drive you to stroll past a number of indicators with the foundations on!) For those who don’t comply with the principles, you might be banned temporarily and even completely from the server.
Griefing and grief protection: An enormous potential drawback on public servers is griefing; that's, demolishing different players’ buildings or stealing their stuff. Many - but not all - servers use varied plugins to stop griefing. Typically these plugins allow you to lock your chests, doors and furnaces, and you can even claim a patch of land as your own - which means nobody else can create or break blocks inside your claim. As well as, griefing is all the time forbidden in the server guidelines; griefers are warned after which banned, and most server admins can “roll back” your building to the state it was in earlier than it was griefed.
Textual content chat: Minecraft has constructed-in textual content chat (the ‘T’ key), which is the default approach that your child will talk with different players. Chat will be public or personal (that's, one-to-one). Clearly your kid will want some studying potential to participate in chat, though you might help them if you’re enjoying online too. Most family-pleasant servers make use of computerized filtering to stop swearing in text chat. As with all online chat, be sure to remind your kid never to present out private details when chatting.
Voice chat: Some servers link up with voice chat servers similar to Mumble, TeamSpeak or Ventrilo to enable gamers to speak with each other while enjoying. If you happen to permit your kid to use voice chat then clearly you need to be careful about who they’re talking to, and what they’re speaking about!
Server commands: To get the most out of online taking part in, you’ll want to offer numerous commands to the server as you play. You give a command by urgent the / (slash) key, followed by the command name and, sometimes, some extra text. For example, /sethome sometimes sets your property point to where you’re at present standing, whereas /dwelling teleports you to your property point. The commands differ from server to server, however you’ll quickly get the hang of them.
Utilizing mods: If you’ve added mods to your Minecraft shopper, watch out when connecting to servers, since most servers ban at the least some mods - notably people who let you cheat, of course. Normally, mods corresponding to OptiFine - which simply makes your recreation run extra easily - are Okay.

How to join a server

Becoming a member of a public Minecraft server may be very straightforward. Just open the Minecraft launcher and click on Play to run the main Minecraft sport. When you reach the primary title screen, you click the Multiplayer button, then click the Add Server button to add the server.

Now sort a reputation for the server within the Server Title box, then kind the server deal with within the Server Tackle field. Typically this shall be a site title, equivalent to mc.intercraften.org, or an IP deal with, akin to 1.2.3.4. Then click Achieved so as to add the server to your server checklist:

So as to add a server, click on Add Server and enter the server particulars. You may then hook up with the server with the Be a part of Server button.

Then it’s simply a matter of clicking a server within the listing, and clicking the Be a part of Server button to connect with it.

Now let’s have a look at a couple of issues that will come up when becoming a member of a server.

Whitelisting

You can divide public Minecraft servers into two varieties:

Whitelisted servers are protected by a whitelist - that's, a listing of usernames which can be allowed to affix the server. To join a whitelisted server, you want to use to have your Minecraft username added to the whitelist. Usually, this involves filling out a type and waiting a number of hours or days. Most servers require you to place in separate functions for yourself and for your kid. As soon as you’re on the whitelist, you be part of the server as described above.
Non-whitelisted servers shouldn't have a whitelist, which suggests anyone can be part of the server just by getting into the server’s handle of their Minecraft client, as proven above.

Applying for a whitelisted server generally is a little bit of a drag - particularly when you could have an impatient eight-yr-old tugging at your sleeve - but it does present an extra diploma of reassurance that all the players on the server are known to the server directors.

Server and consumer versions

One thing to be careful for when becoming a member of a server is making sure the model number of your Minecraft consumer (sport) matches the model variety of the server. Usually speaking, the versions need to match, or you won’t be able to connect.

For instance, the current version of Minecraft is 1.7.9, however many servers are still operating 1.7.2, or even 1.6.4. Typically the server’s web site tells you what version they’re working, however typically the one approach to tell is to try it and see. For those who get an error message when utilizing the 1.7.9 shopper, try the 1.7.2 consumer as an alternative.

Luckily it’s straightforward to change to completely different variations of the Minecraft shopper. In the Minecraft launcher, you'll be able to click on New Profile to create completely different profiles that use any Minecraft version you want. Then, just select the profile you want to make use of from the drop-down listing in the launcher, and click on Play.

It’s straightforward to set up the Minecraft launcher with profiles for different versions. Here I’ve set up two profiles: one for 1.7.2 and one other for 1.7.9. (OptiFine is a helpful mod that makes your Minecraft run sooner.) The “Use version” dropdown in the topmost window allows you to choose the version.

The record of household-friendly servers

Now that you know the basics of taking part in on-line with Minecraft, here are 11 glorious Minecraft servers for you and your child to play on.

I have personally played on all of these servers. They're listed in no particular order; I feel they're all very good, and every single one comes throughout as being appropriate and welcoming for kids, mother and father and grandparents alike!

You’ll discover that every server has its own unique “feel”, so it’s worth exploring just a few of them to seek out out which one feels right for you.

Cubeville

Cubeville is a really nice server that’s dedicated to being family-pleasant. You don’t want to apply to hitch - simply enter cubeville.org into your Minecraft shopper - but the server is nicely policed and has a superb, clear listing of guidelines. It additionally has a thorough tutorial when you first be a part of.

The big Cubeville world has a big central metropolis, as well as a number of smaller towns and settlements dotted all around the map. There’s a tremendous vary of enjoyable things to explore and nice people to meet. It’s pretty crowded, so to construct you’ll must catch a ride on the transport system and head out to the sting of the map.

Cubeville also features a neat money system with quests to earn money; clever automated retailers; and a great transport community. It also has land and chest safety so you can declare your own little corner of Cubeville for yourself.

Towncraft

Replace 14 April 2019: Towncraft has now shut down.  cooper's blog The Towncraft employees members have set up one other household-friendly server referred to as Ohanacraft that nonetheless adheres to Towncraft’s guiding principles.

Replace 10 August 2020: Towncraft is again up and operating! It has the same guidelines (and server identify) as before. Yay!

Towncraft just isn't whitelisted, so anybody can be a part of - just enter play.towncraft.us into your Minecraft shopper. It additionally has a TeamSpeak server for voice chat; you can find the IP address on the Towncraft website.

What I like about Towncraft is that, quite than just being an ordinary world to discover and construct in, it has a little bit of a narrative happening. A meteor has wiped out the world, and it’s as much as you and your friends on the server to rebuild it. In the beginning of the game, you decide a commerce, resembling hunter, farmer, blacksmith or service provider, then as you enhance your abilities in that trade over time, you unlock new skills.

Towncraft doesn’t are inclined to get too busy, making for a relaxed crafting experience. There are mother and father and youngsters playing on the server, and individuals are generally are pleasant and helpful.

The server uses the Zombie Apocalypse plugin; this randomly makes a horde of zombies seem across the participant at night, which you must defeat to obtain a reward. Clearly, youthful players may get a bit freaked out by this, however it’s good fun for older children.

Towncraft uses the Grief Prevention plugin so you'll be able to protect your house and contents from griefing by other gamers.

Kolgrath, the Towncraft admin, has put together a player guide, in addition to a handy parent’s information to Towncraft that's price a learn.

Intercraften

Intercraften is a highly regarded family-friendly Minecraft server. It’s effectively deliberate out, and has extremely helpful moderators which might be good at sorting out issues and looking after everybody, parents and youngsters alike.

The server is whitelisted, so to join you first need to fill out the easy utility form.

Intercraften is a huge server with several worlds, together with New Survival (the current fundamental world), a CTF (Seize the Flag) world, a peaceful world, a creative world, a mining world, and plenty extra.

The server has a cash system, along with jobs - resembling fisherman, brewer and woodcutter - that you can perform with the intention to earn coins. You should use the money to purchase stuff in retailers, and also to assert chunks of land in order that others can’t grief your builds. In case you do get griefed, the moderators are very cautious to set every thing right once more (and ban the offender from the server).

As well as doing stuff with the standard server commands, resembling /spawn, /sethome and /dwelling, you may also use the user-pleasant Intercraften Menu e book (given free while you be part of) to select jobs, carry out commands and play mini-video games.

The Sandlot

The Sandlot is a whitelisted, family-pleasant Minecraft server that’s been running since December 2011. It’s operated by a former schoolteacher, and has an excellent set of rules and filters in place to prevent any abusive behaviour.

What I like in regards to the Sandlot is the great stability of various worlds obtainable. There’s Semi-Vanilla Survival, which is fairly close to a regular Minecraft world, with the sensible addition of Grief Prevention and likewise a digital currency system (tied to gold ingots) in order that players can arrange shops.

A extremely great world for younger kids is easy Survival. If Semi-Vanilla Survival is Scrabble, this is Junior Scrabble. Relatively than having to spend ages digging around for resources and gadgets, youngsters can choose a job (comparable to farming) to earn money, then spend their money to purchase items in a giant mall within the centre. This makes for a a lot simpler, more relaxed gameplay model. Great thought.

Other worlds within the Sandlot embody a Inventive world, and lots of PvP recreation worlds including starvation games (based loosely on the books and motion pictures), spleef and so forth. There’s additionally a skyblock world (a world with floating islands and many challenges).

All of those worlds are accessed via The Foyer, a fantastic building primarily based on Hogwarts from the Harry Potter series (check out the key passages!). This, in addition to many of the opposite Sandlot worlds, are beautifully designed, making a fun, welcoming surroundings to your kid.

CrazyPig

CrazyPig is a small family-pleasant Minecraft server with an awesome community. It was initially set up by a UK mother or father for his son, however is now open to all. It's not whitelisted; to join, simply add play.crazypig.net to your Minecraft shopper.

CrazyPig uses a “belt” system to rank gamers by how lengthy they’ve performed on the server. As you spend extra time on the server, you’re automatically given belts of upper rank, which in flip offer you access to certain worlds, as well as a better variety of “homes” which you could set and warp to.

There’s also a currency system, in addition to a simple digital marketplace where players should buy and promote objects.

As with most servers, CrazyPig options a number of interconnected worlds. There’s a central foyer area from which you can select a world to warp to. There’s the main World the place you’ll construct your house and spend most of your time; a Inventive World (you need to be Green Belt or greater to entry it); a Games World with a large chess set; and an extra Onerous world if you’re feeling brave!

Although it’s not whitelisted, CrazyPig has a pleasant, helpful group of gamers, and employs the Grief Prevention plugin to stop gamers from griefing. It additionally has pretty good computerized language filters to eliminate swearing.

A fairly novel facet of CrazyPig is the idea of areas. The primary world is automatically divided up into regions; whenever you be a part of you’re automatically added to the latest region, but you can warp between regions. This ensures that each area of the world doesn’t get overcrowded. It’s a bit complicated at first, however once you get the cling of it, it’s a reasonably good system!

CrazyPig is a superb server if you’re looking for a superb group, not too many guidelines, and freedom to construct and have enjoyable.

Addstar

Addstar is a busy Australian server that's child-friendly. It’s not whitelisted so anybody can be part of, however it is heavily moderated and comes with LWC protection (for locking issues) and Grief Prevention (for claiming land so it can’t be griefed).

Addstar follows the familiar format of a central spawn city, with warps that take you off to other worlds. There are several portals into a fairly normal survival world, in addition to a portal to a artistic world with tons of wonderful creations (solely donators to the server can construct here).

Within the spawn town you’ll also find warps to tons of mini-games, together with BlockHunt, a maze, parkour, spleef, CTF (capture the flag), survival video games, and even Join 4, checkers and chess!

There’s always loads taking place on the Addstar server, and - apart from a quick intro - you’re just about thrown in on the deep finish, so this server is probably higher for older children, or those who already know Minecraft and Minecraft servers effectively. That said, the staff are all the time useful and friendly.

MineSquish

MineSquish is a whitelisted server with a reasonably strict application course of. To use, you'll want to register on the boards, introduce yourself, and actively participate in the forums for a while. Solely then can you apply to be whitelisted. An exception is made if you’re applying on behalf of your child and they’re too younger to put up on the forums. In this case, you solely have to make an introduction post, and show that you've read by way of the server guidelines and defined them to your chid.

This relatively prolonged whitelisting course of, mixed with strict server guidelines, ensures that gamers are pretty well vetted before they play, and helps to foster an excellent community spirit.

The MineSquish server is very household-pleasant and has all types of features to make the sport secure to play for youngsters, including a monster-free spawn (beginning) town, a rail and road system to make it simple to get around and avoid getting lost, carefully managed towns, and lockable chests, doorways and furnaces.

The server doesn’t have anti-griefing block safety, so there is no means to guard your construct from being demolished by others. Nonetheless, gamers are generally well-behaved within the MineSquish community and the server admins are good at catching griefers, so griefing doesn’t are usually a big downside.

There are several worlds to discover, together with Persephone (the principle survival world, the place you construct your property), a artistic freebuild world, a tough-mode Exploration world for resource gathering that’s wiped each 2 months, a Skylands (floating islands) world, a big Construct world for constructing impressive huge buildings, and more.

Here is an efficient MineSquish starter information for parents and younger children.

SafeCraft

SafeCraft - previously Win Household Survival - is a small however rising household-friendly server built by a dedicated staff of dad and mom and kids in the UK. It uses whitelisting and strict filtering to make a kid-pleasant server the place folks help out players of all talents. The moderators are significantly open to helping out children on the autistic spectrum and children with ADHD.

The server has a enjoyable, lively really feel to it with a fantastically colourful most important foyer (see screenshot above). The protected, welcoming atmosphere means this server will appeal to children both younger and previous. The server consists of some other good touches comparable to “Server Champion” awards and recognising birthdays, which add to the sense of community.

From the foyer you may attain a normal survival world (grief protection is included); the SafeCraft world (no hostile mobs - great for littler kids); a world for useful resource gathering, and heaps of nice mini-video games including Paintball, Block Hunt, starvation/survival video games, TNT Run and Skyblock. There are also a few spleef arenas within the foyer.

Total, this is a good server for kids who favor to play in a safe, welcoming atmosphere with a detailed-knit community.

Blocklandia

Blocklandia is a enjoyable, household-pleasant whitelisted server that is appropriate for youths of all ages (some gamers are as young as 4!). The moderators are very helpful, and often offer you a guided tour whenever you first be part of. They may even offer that can assist you construct your first home!

The spawn (beginning area) is themed as a large shipyard. Each ship takes you to a unique land. Mainland is the primary survival world, whereas Peaceful is a safer mode with no hostile mobs or fall damage. There’s additionally a Creative world, reached via a reasonably sizzling air balloon.

Blocklandia has a money system based mostly on “shillings”. There are plenty of jobs that will earn you shillings, together with weaponsmith, digger, builder, sorcerer, alchemist, and even pirate!

A pleasant contact is the large library, just off the shipyard. You'll be able to write a book and add it to the library, in addition to learn other people’s books.

Although the server doesn’t let you claim land within the survival worlds, it does use the LWC plugin which helps you to lock chests, doors, furnaces and so forth. In addition, there’s a really clear, detailed algorithm (that it's a must to read once you first join), things like TNT and fireplace are typically banned, and the moderators are superb at sorting out any griefing points.

If your child is fairly new to Minecraft and wants to join a helpful, welcoming group then Blocklandia is an efficient guess.

Famcraft

Famcraft was arrange by mother and father who wished to ensure that children had a protected place to play Minecraft online. It’s been working for a few years and had developed a really good group of players, ranging in age from 5 to 77!

Famcraft just isn't whitelisted - simply add survival.famcraft.com to your Minecraft shopper, and away you go. If you first be a part of, you’ll in all probability be supplied a tour by one of the friendly staff members. There are often at least a couple of staff online at any given second.

The principle survival server is enormous, with numerous nice options. The principle spawn space is a gorgeous wooden seaside village, with stargates (warps) that hyperlink off to varied areas on the map. There are six often-changing random warps into wilderness where you can mine and build; free farms for those who want resources; cities to explore; a carnival; a sports stadium (with non-compulsory PvP); mazes; and tons of different sights. There are also many plugins that let you make cool stuff with signs and redstone, equivalent to lifts, drawbridges, iron gates and hidden areas.

In addition to pretty normal server parts, resembling a forex system, a jobs system, and grief prevention with LWC and PreciousStones, Famcraft has some additional touches that give the server its own distinctive, neighborhood feel.

For instance, there are a lot of clans you can join to work on projects collectively, and there are also a lot of big participant statues to point out appreciation for helpful players on the server.

The server workers also usually stream household friendly music with Mixlr, which actually provides a component of fun to the gameplay. They even host dance events in a incredible dance area throughout the world!

Famcraft has a Mumble server, which many gamers use for voice chat whereas playing. There’s additionally a #famcraft IRC channel, which lets gamers chat with each other even when they’re not enjoying the game. All IRC chat additionally appears in the regular Minecraft in-game chat window.

As well as the primary survival world, there’s also a world that makes use of the FTB (FeedTheBeast) modpack for further fun and games.

The Famcraft employees are attentive, helpful and chatty, and make a terrific effort to ensure everyone is enjoying safely and having enjoyable.

YAMS

YAMS - Yet one more Minecraft Server - is a small household-pleasant server run by a dedicated staff in the UK. It makes use of whitelisting; to use for the whitelist, first register for the boards, then put up a whitelist request within the “Introduce and Whitelist Yourself” discussion board.

What I actually like about YAMS is the thought that’s gone into organising a realistic world. There’s a central spawn town with a big procuring mall, and four satellite towns, reached through a complete transport network. Each satellite town has its own unique really feel and building code: for example, the buildings in one city are constructed from cobblestone; one other city features picket buildings, and so on. (To construct in a town, you first need to show you can construct a pleasant building in the sandbox throughout the spawn city.)

As nicely because the towns, there are tons of sightseeing opportunities dotted around the land, together with a powerful coliseum (complete with PvP video games), a university (in development), a theatre, a windmill, a maze, an remark tower and lots extra. There are additionally a number of hidden things to seek out throughout the map.

YAMS doesn't have chest locking or grief safety; however the server has a close-knit community and a strict algorithm that assist to keep things operating along nicely. The server admin may also restore any stolen or griefed items.

In case your kid likes playing closely with a team inside a structured environment then they'll likely get pleasure from this server.

Happy taking part in!

I hope you’ve found this guide to household-friendly Minecraft servers useful, and that you find a great server that you and your kid can enjoy. Perhaps I’ll meet you on one in every of them!