Backing Up Your Minecraft Java Server

Backing up a Minecraft server means knowing which folders hold the data you care about, because the world, the plugins or mods, and the server configuration all live in different places. WinterNode also takes automatic snapshots of your whole server every 12 hours as an additional safety net, taken between 2AM-3AM and 2PM-3PM CST and kept for 45 days.

Where your data lives

Everything below is relative to your server root, which is what you see when you open the File Manager or connect over SFTP.

World data

The main world folder is named after the level-name setting in server.properties, which is world by default. How the Nether and End are stored depends on the server software:

If you changed level-name, the word world in each of those names is replaced with whatever you set. A Paper server with level-name=survival has survival, survival_nether, and survival_the_end.

The main world folder also holds level.dat (seed, spawn, game rules), playerdata (inventories and ender chests), stats, advancements, and datapacks. On Paper and Spigot, player data stays in the main world folder even though the Nether and End are split out, so a copy of world on its own still captures every player’s inventory.

Plugins, mods, and configuration

These are not inside the world folder. Losing them does not affect your world, and restoring the world does not bring them back:

• plugins on Paper and Spigot, with each plugin’s config and data in its own subfolder. This is where CoreProtect’s database.db and BlueMap’s render output live.
• mods and config on Fabric, Forge, and NeoForge.
• server.properties, ops.json, whitelist.json, banned-players.json, banned-ips.json, and usercache.json in the server root, plus bukkit.yml, spigot.yml, and config/paper-global.yml on Paper.

A full manual backup should include the world folders, the plugin or mod folder, and those root files. If you only have room for one thing, take the world folders.

Restoring from a WinterNode snapshot

Our snapshots are a copy of your whole server directory, taken between 2AM-3AM and 2PM-3PM CST and kept for 45 days. Request one with the /request-backup-files command in a Discord ticket, or by ticket in the Client Area with your server’s Node, UUID, and the backup window you want. Restores are usually done well inside 24 hours.

Moving the restored world into place

1. Wait for the bot to post its Backup Restoration Complete message in your ticket
2. In the Game Control Panel, select your server and click Stop
3. In the sidebar, click File Manager
4. Rename your current world, world_nether, and world_the_end folders (for example to world.old) so you can fall back to them
5. Open the /backup-restore folder
6. Move the restored world, world_nether, and world_the_end (or just world on Vanilla, Fabric, and Forge) into your server root
7. Click Start

Your server should now show as Online with the restored world loaded. Restoring Your Server from a Backup walks through the move with screenshots.

You do not have to move everything. If a griefer wrecked the Overworld but your plugins are fine, move only the world folders and leave the rest of /backup-restore alone. If a plugin update broke the server, move plugins and leave the world as it is.

What the snapshot leaves out

Individual files over 5GB and MySQL databases are excluded. This bites Minecraft more than most games:

• CoreProtect keeps its log in a single SQLite file, plugins/CoreProtect/database.db. On a busy server it grows past 5GB within a few months, and once it does it is left out of every snapshot. Rollback history from before your last manual copy is gone if the file is lost.
• BlueMap render data can cross the same line, so a restore may come back with the map needing a full re-render.
• MySQL databases you created under Management > Databases are never included. Plugins that store data in MySQL (some economy, permissions, and stats plugins) need their own export.
• Backups made by plugins such as DriveBackupV2 are excluded too. That is fine when they are being uploaded off-server, which is the point of using them, but a local-only backups folder is not protected by our snapshot.

If you rely on any of these, keep your own copy. The manual backup steps below cover it.

Taking a manual backup

Minecraft has no built-in automatic backup. Take one yourself by copying or downloading the folders listed under Where your data lives while the server is stopped, so nothing is being written mid-copy.

The quickest way is to select the world folders in the File Manager, compress them into a single archive, then download that archive over SFTP or from the File Manager. Back Up Your Server Files Manually shows each step. Downloading gives you a remote copy, so even if every file on the server is cleared you still have something to restore from.

For backups that run on their own, DriveBackupV2 uploads scheduled archives to Google Drive, OneDrive, or an SFTP destination on Paper and Spigot servers. It is the best option for large CoreProtect databases, since it is under your control and not subject to the 5GB limit.

Restoring a manual backup

1. In the Game Control Panel, select your server and click Stop
2. Rename or delete the world folders you are replacing
3. Upload your copies over SFTP, using the same folder names as before
4. Click Start

See Restoring from a Personal Backup for the full upload walkthrough.

Still Not Working?

If your restored world does not load or the files are not where you expect, contact our support team with:

• Your Server UUID
• The backup date and time you requested
• What is currently inside /backup-restore and which folders you moved