Schedule automatic restarts for your server
Published on 3 October 2026
A schedule under Schedules restarts your server automatically, every night for example. Your players get a warning first and the world is saved. Watch out for one thing: the game panel works in UTC, not in your local time.
Why restart automatically?
A restart frees up memory and lets updates to your game and plugins take effect. For most servers, once a day at a quiet moment is plenty.
How do you create a schedule?
- Open your server in the game panel and go to Schedules, under the Actions heading.
- Click Create schedule and give it a name, for example
Nightly restart. - Fill in the time under Minute, Hour, Day of month, Month and Day of week. For every day at 03:00 UTC: Minute
0, Hour3and a*in the other three fields. Show Cheatsheet gives more examples. - Turn on Only When Server Is Online, so the schedule never starts a server you switched off on purpose.
- Leave Schedule Enabled on and click Create schedule.
How do you warn your players?
Open the schedule and click New Task for each step. Action decides what happens. Time offset is the number of seconds after the previous task, up to 900. For Minecraft, this works well:
| Task | Action | Payload | Time offset |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Send command | say Restarting in 5 minutes. Grab a slice of cake! | 0 |
| 2 | Send command | say 1 minute to go, find somewhere safe. | 240 |
| 3 | Send command | save-all | 50 |
| 4 | Send power action | Restart the server | 10 |
Then click Run Now to test it. You’ll see the messages appear in the console.
What about the time zone?
Times in a schedule are in UTC. In winter, the clock in the Netherlands and Belgium is one hour ahead of UTC and in summer two hours; in the UK it matches UTC in winter and is one hour ahead in summer. Next run at shows when the schedule runs in your own time, so check it after saving, and again when the clocks change in March and October.
Can a backup be part of it?
Yes: add a Create backup task before the restart. If all your backup slots are full, a scheduled backup replaces the oldest backup that isn’t locked. How backups work is explained in Create and restore a backup.
What are the common mistakes?
- Forgetting the time zone. The restart then lands an hour or two early, right in the middle of your gaming evening.
- Leaving Only When Server Is Online off. The schedule then starts a server you had switched off on purpose.
- An offset over 900 seconds. The game panel won’t accept it. Spread long waits over more tasks.
say and save-all are Minecraft commands; other games have their own, see Use your server console. A restart through Send power action works for every game. Just getting started? Read First steps after your order first.
