How to make a Valheim server

A Valheim server keeps your world online so your group can play any time, even when you’re not around. On Wilderack you pick Valheim, choose a plan and a name, and your world is ready in about a minute.

This guide covers what you need, the first start, making yourself admin and inviting friends.

What you need

• Your own copy of Valheim. Every player needs one. Steam players can join any Valheim server. Players on Xbox, PlayStation 5, Switch 2, the Microsoft Store (Game Pass on PC) and the Mac App Store need crossplay turned on.
• A plan with enough RAM (the server’s memory). 4 GB runs a small group on a fresh world. We recommend 6 GB for a full group of 10 or a world with big bases, and more with mods. See Valheim server performance for the details.

The server program is Iron Gate’s free Valheim Dedicated Server. It installs from Steam, the official source, so it’s always the real thing.

Create your server

1. Pick Valheim as your game.
2. Choose the server type. Vanilla is the game as Iron Gate made it. Pick BepInEx if you want mods. You can switch later in Settings.
3. Choose a plan and a region. We have EU and US East. Pick the one closest to most of your players.
4. Choose a name, like vikings. It becomes your address, vikings.play.wilderack.com. Names use 3 to 32 characters: lowercase letters, numbers and hyphens.
5. Set the world name and a server password. Valheim needs a password of at least 5 characters. Don’t use any part of the server name, world name or seed in it, or the server won’t start.

The first start

The first start creates your world. It usually takes 30 to 90 seconds. Open Console to watch. When the log shows Game server connected, the server is ready for players.

Your address and port are on the address card on Overview. They look like vikings.play.wilderack.com:30412. Your port is picked for your server, so use the one on your card, not Valheim’s usual 2456.

Join your server

On Steam, open Valheim, pick your character, go to Join Game and choose Add server. Type the address and port from your address card, connect, and enter the password.

For every other way in, including crossplay and the join code, see how to connect to your Valheim server.

Make yourself admin

Admins can kick and ban players from inside the game. Valheim keeps admins in a file called adminlist.txt, one player ID per line.

1. Join your server and press F2. Copy your player ID exactly as it’s shown there: a platform prefix, an underscore and a long number.
2. In the panel, open Settings and add the ID to the admin list. If your Wilderack account is linked to Steam, you can use Make me admin instead.
3. Restart the server so Valheim reads the new list.

Now press F5 in game to open the console and use commands like kick and ban. The full list is in the config reference.

Invite friends

To play: send your friends the address and port from the address card and the server password. The How to join card on Overview has the steps for each platform. If crossplay is on, send the join code and your wake link too.

To help run it: open Friends and create an invite link with a role. A Moderator can start and stop the server and watch the console. An Admin can change settings, mods and backups too. Only you can see billing or delete the server.

Sleeping and waking

Your server naps when nobody’s playing, so you aren’t paying for an empty server to sit awake. Before it sleeps, it saves your world. It wakes when someone joins, usually in a couple of seconds.

With crossplay on, joins travel through Microsoft’s relay and don’t reach us first, so a join can’t wake the server. Friends open your wake link, play.wilderack.com/w/vikings, then join a few seconds later. The crossplay guide explains why.

If you’d rather the server never sleeps, change the mode in Settings > Sleep.

What to read next

• How to connect to your Valheim server
• Valheim server config reference: world modifiers, admin lists and launch options
• Valheim crossplay server guide
• Valheim mods on your server
• Valheim backups and worlds