Basic Server Commands

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Basic Server Commands

In Minecraft there are several important server commands you should know about to properly manage your server. Most commands require you to be a server operator. Instructions on how you can OP yourself can be found in OP Yourself on your Minecraft Server.

To be able to run these commands, you need to either run them directly from the console or through an server operator account.

Whitelist

By default, anyone with the correct IP and port is able to join your server.
In lots of cases, this can turn into a big problem when people join with the sole intention of destroying things, cheating or generally being unfriendly.
In these cases, when you wish to either play alone or with friends and want to only have them be able to join the server while denying access to everyone else, you will need to use a “whitelist”.
A whitelist can have two states, either on or off.
The whitelist will contain a list of players that are allowed to join the server, while denying access to anyone that is not present within that list. For detailed instructions, see the Enable Player Whitelist guide.
Here is the list of commands that you will need to use to work with the whitelist:

/whitelist [on/off] will toggle whether the whitelist is active or not.
/whitelist list will show you all players that are currently whitelisted.
/whitelist add Jeff will add the player with the username Jeff to the whitelist.
/whitelist remove Jeff will remove the player with the username Jeff from the whitelist.

Moderation

If players are doing bad things on your server that go against your rules, you will need a way to punish them.
Thankfully, Minecraft has some built in commands that allow you to do just that.
Using these commands, a player can be kicked off the server, although they may rejoin if they want to (meaning that it serves more as a warning than a permanent solution).
Or you may also decide to permanently suspend access to your server for that particular person if they keep on breaking the rules.
/kick Jeff [optional message] will kick the player back to the server list, showing a message if it was set.
/ban Jeff [optional message] will ban Jeff from the server permanently, with an optional message being shown.
/unban Jeff will unban Jeff and allow them to join again.

Time & Weather

In Minecraft there are 3 different types of weather events, clear (in other words no particular weather), rainstorm and thunderstorm.
Sometimes, it can become very annoying to play during rainstorms or thunderstorms, and you may want to fix the weather to play under a clear sunny sky.
Here are some examples of the 3 different types of weather:
Clear:

Rain: (or snow in certain biomes)

Thunderstorm: (essentially the same as rain, but where thunder can randomly spawn and set things on fire / deal damage to entities)

It is also possible to change the time of day, which when combined with weather manipulation gives you as the server owner or operator the ability to set the ideal scenario for your specific needs.
To change the weather, you can use the following command:
/weather clear which will make it sunny

The options for this command are clear/rain/thunder.
The command format is /weather thunder [<duration>] which would in this example set the weather to thunder for a specified duration in seconds.

When you want to change the time of the server, in other words whether it’s day, night, evening etc.
There are two main ways to do so using the same command, either with a written text-based value like noon, night or with a number like 10, 12.

The image above demonstrates how the different times could be set using a numerical value, where the value 6000 would represent noon.
You can use the following command to change the time on the server:

/time set [day/noon/sunset/night]
/time set [numerical representation of the time]

Admin Management

If you want a player to be able to execute the same commands as the console which may require additional permissions, such as the weather and time chance commands, you need them to be an operator.
This can be done with the following commands:

/op Jeff will make Jeff an operator.
/deop Jeff will remove Jeff as an operator.

Note that to make someone an operator, you must either already be an operator inside of the game or run it directly from the server console. Be careful with who you provide operator privileges to, as they will have full control of the server.

Gamemode

In Minecraft, there are 4 different gamemodes.
If you want to set a specific player’s gamemode without changing the server configuration, you can do so with the gamemode command:

/gamemode [creative/survival/adventure/spectator] [username] will make a specific user the gamemode you wish them to be.

Reload Plugins

Sometimes when adding new plugins to a server or changing their settings, it’s necessary to “reload” the server so that it reads the new configuration for existing plugins and/or load new ones that have been added.
This can be done using the reload command:

/reload followed by /reload confirm will perform a reload.

Note that some plugins may break during reloads, which is why it is recommended to completely stop the server and start it again to prevent that from happening.

Game Performance

Sometimes the server may feel slower than it should, like for example when breaking a block it may take a couple of seconds to appear where it was broken.
If you suspect the server is experiencing lag, you can run the “tps” command which will display the server performance in a numerical value from 0 to 20, 20 being the value it should be at all times.

/tps shows the server TPS.

If the “tps” command shows that the server is experiencing a value below 20, you may have one of the following problems:

Someone in the server made a lag machine, which means they have a lot of redstone whose entire purpose it is to make the server lag.
The entity count configuration is incorrect and there are way too many entities present in the server.
Too many chunks are being generated. This can be caused due to render distance settings being too large or players loading chunks way too quickly (through either flyhack or flying very quickly with an elytra).

If you require further assistance, you can open a support ticket here.

Feedback and suggestions can be submitted here or further discussed on our Discord server.

Basic Server Commands
Whitelist
Moderation
Time & Weather
Admin Management
Gamemode
Reload Plugins
Game Performance