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Getting started with your Enshrouded server

Complete your first server boot, apply gameSettingsPreset difficulty rules, manage saves, and secure backups to protect player data.

Updated August 19, 2026
Enshrouded

Enshrouded is a co-op survival action RPG with voxel building. Dedicated server support is built in and well-supported.

First Boot

  1. Open your hosted Enshrouded server in the panel.

  2. Click Start.

  3. First boot downloads the dedicated server (about 3 GB), which takes 5 to 10 minutes.

  4. The server is up when the console prints [Session] 'HostOnline' (up)! and the
    finished transition from 'Lobby' to 'Host_Online' line after it.

To connect: in Enshrouded, Multiplayer > Join > enter the IP and port from the Address at the top left of your panel.

Game Difficulty Settings

Difficulty is set with gameSettingsPreset in enshrouded_server.json, which takes Default, Relaxed, Hard, Survival or Custom. Custom values only apply when the preset is Custom, and they live in a gameSettings block.

See Enshrouded Server Settings and Config File for every value, the permission groups, and the nanosecond duration format.

Mods

No official mod support yet

Enshrouded does not have official mod support yet. Some community tools exist for save editing and inventory management, but no plugin-style mods load into the running server.

Keen Games have not committed to adding it. Their own FAQ answers the question directly: mods are "something we would love to implement in the future", but "at this stage, we cannot make promises that the game will be moddable". Treat any guide announcing a modding SDK, Steam Workshop support or a date for either as speculation.

World Management

The save is at savegame/. To move an existing singleplayer or co-op world into it instead, see transferring your Enshrouded world. To wipe:

  1. Stop the server.

  2. Delete the contents of savegame/ (or rename it to keep as a backup).

  3. Start. The server generates a fresh save on first boot.

To restore a save, replace savegame/ contents with the backup files.

Backups

The save folder is the only critical data. The panel Backups tab covers it. Take daily snapshots; long sessions with lots of building benefit from more frequent backups (every 6-12 hours).

Common Issues

  • Cannot connect: Connect to the Address shown at the top of your panel, not to the queryPort value inside the config. There is no gamePort key — Enshrouded uses a single queryPort, and the panel rewrites it to your allocated port every time the server boots, so editing it by hand achieves nothing. Also confirm the player has one of the four group passwords from the Startup tab.
  • Server lags after extended play: Daily restarts help. The voxel world accumulates entity state.
  • Save corruption: Restore from backup. Enshrouded writes saves continuously; mid-write crashes can corrupt the save file.
  • Player gets disconnected on chunk load: Slot count is too high for the available RAM. Lower the slot count or upgrade the plan.

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