Common Questions and Helpful Tips for Valheim Dedicated Servers

Table of contents

• What specs should my server have?
• How do I update my Valheim Server
• How do players connect to the server
• How often does the server save?
• Can I force the server to save?
• How do I change my server password
• How do I add an admin to my server
• How do I edit a file
• How do I connect via ssh

Server Specific Questions

What specs should my server have?

Below are the spec recommendations:

Test results from lab environment
* Software: Linux Server distro.
* Minimal Hardware: 1CPU 1GB RAM 4GB Storage (STUFF WILL BREAK but it will start... for how long... results will vary )
* Recommended Hardware: 4CPU+ 16GB RAM 256GB Storage
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1-3  players 1 CPU 1GB RAM 4GB Storage    (using cloud services will be hit or miss to keep server running)
2-5  players 2 CPU 4GB    RAM 64GB  Storage 
5-7  players 3 CPU 6GB    RAM 100GB Storage
8-10 players 4 CPU 8-16GB RAM 256GB Storage (16GB RAM+ for larger servers)
Network Connection 5 players 10MBps (up/down) Latency 1-20ms

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How do I update my Valheim Server?

The server updates whenever it's started. So you just need to stop & start the server/service.

For a detailed walkthrough on updating your server see the wiki page: How to Update Your Valheim Server

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How do players connect to the server?

v0.145.6 added a "Join IP" button to the community tab in-game. You can now just click that and enter your service IP:PORT

Example: 123.123.123.4:2456 where 123.123.123.4 is your server IP and 2456 is the default server port. If you didn't tinker with this, use 2456.

To auto-connect to the game: Open the Valheim page in steam (game no store) and click the gear icon > properties. On the bottom of the first page you should see Launch Properties with an input field. In that field enter:

+connect 123.123.123.4:2456

Again, 123.123.123.4 should be replaced with your server IP. There's no save button in that window, so just click the X and run the game.

When you launch the game everything will be the same, just choose your character and the game will automatically try to join the server.

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How often does the server save?

As of release v0.145.6 the server saves the data every 20 mins by default

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Can I force the server to save?

According to the patch notes for v0.145.6, any player on the admin list can open the console by hitting f5 and type in save to trigger a world save.

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How do I change my server password?

Edit the start_valheim.sh file by using the command below:

vi /home/steam/valheimserver/start_valheim.sh

At the end of line 8 you'll see -password "**XXXXXX**" replace XXXXXX (your current password) with your new one.

Save & restart the valheimserver service.

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How do I add an admin to my server?

To add an admin, you need to add the user's steam id to the adminlist.txt file located in the /home/steam/.config/unity3d/IronGate/Valheim directory

To do this, ssh into the server and use:

vi /home/steam/.config/unity3d/IronGate/Valheim/adminlist.txt

Add the player's Steam 64 id to the file and save. Restart the valheimserver.service

General information

How do I edit a file?

There's numerous ways to edit the files on the server. All of our examples and instructions edit via the terminal editor vi. Below are some basic references if you're unfamiliar with the vi editor.

• Edit a file: vi /path/to/file.sh
• Move within a file: Arrow keys or press J (down), K (up), H (left), L (right)
• Insert or remove text within a file: Press i to enter insert mode at your cursor, edit text normally. Hit the esc key when finished.
• Save a file: To save a file in vi hit esc to insure you're out of edit/insert mode, then type :w! and press enter.
• Exit a file: To exit, hit esc until you're out of edit/insert mode, the type :q! to exit.
• Save & Exit a file: Same as above, but combine the 2 commands and enter :wq!

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How do I connect via ssh?

This is beyond the scope of this project, but you can check out this guide from DigitalOcean.