Ready to set up your own server? check our Minecraft server hosting plans — AMD Ryzen 9, NVMe SSD, DDoS protection, instant Pterodactyl setup.
Two Different Ways to Run a Server
"Minecraft hosting" and "running Minecraft on a VPS" sound similar but are genuinely different products, and picking the wrong one makes life harder than it needs to be.
Managed Minecraft Hosting
With managed hosting (like SkyRainCloud's Minecraft plans), you get a control panel — you upload your world, pick your server software, install plugins or mods, and manage backups, all through a web interface. No Linux knowledge required. This is the right choice for the vast majority of Minecraft server owners.
Running Minecraft on a VPS
A VPS gives you a raw Linux (or Windows) server with root access and nothing pre-installed. You SSH in, install Java yourself, configure the server manually, set up your own backup scripts, and handle security (firewalls, updates) on your own. It's more work, but it also gives you full control — useful if you want to run multiple game servers side-by-side, host a Velocity/BungeeCord proxy network, or run something alongside Minecraft like a Discord bot or a website.
Which One Should You Pick?
If you just want a Minecraft server running with minimal fuss, managed hosting is almost always the better choice — it's simpler, faster to set up, and you're not responsible for server administration. If you're comfortable with Linux, want to run a proxy network across multiple servers, or need to run other software on the same machine, a VPS gives you that flexibility at the cost of doing more setup yourself.
SkyRainCloud offers both — seven tiers of managed Minecraft hosting for the straightforward path, and Intel Platinum or AMD Ryzen VPS plans if you want to build your own setup from scratch.