How to allocate more RAM to ‘Minecraft’ and help your game or server run more smoothly

But the bigger and more beautiful your “Minecraft” world is, the more RAM it needs to run. And if not enough RAM is allocated to the game, it’ll load slowly, frames will stutter, and it might even crash.

Fortunately, there’s a solution. There are several different ways to allocate more RAM to “Minecraft,” each of them fairly simple and straightforward.

And if you run your own “Minecraft” server, you can also allocate more RAM to it, which makes it so more people can play on the server at once.

Here’s a rundown of all the ways to allocate more RAM to ‘Minecraft.’

How to allocate more RAM to ‘Minecraft’

To change how much RAM “Minecraft” can use, you’ll have to change the settings of your Minecraft Launcher app. The launcher app is the program you use to launch “Minecraft.”

There are several different launcher apps you might use, depending on what sort of mods you have installed. We’ll go through three of the most popular ones, starting with the standard “vanilla” launcher that most people use.

Allocating RAM using the default ‘Minecraft’ launcher

If you’re familiar with “Minecraft,” you’re probably also familiar with the game’s default launcher app, called “Minecraft Launcher.” Here’s how to use it to reallocate RAM.

1. Open the Minecraft Launcher and select the “Installations” tab at the top.

It doesn’t matter whether you play Java with or without mods.
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2. Scroll your mouse over the “Minecraft” version that you want to allocate RAM to, then click the three dots on the right and select “Edit.”

You’ll have to reallocate RAM to each version of “Minecraft” individually.
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3. Select “More Options” in the lower-right corner of the screen to reveal two additional fields.

4. At the beginning of the “JVM Arguments” field, there’s a bit of code that reads “-Xmx2G” or something similar — the “2G” represents how many gigabytes of RAM “Minecraft” can currently use (in this case, 2GB). Change that number to change how much RAM is allocated. Leave the rest of the text as is.

Change the numbers in this code to change how much memory is used.
Emma Witman/Insider

5. Tap “Save” to finalize your changes.

Allocating RAM using the CurseForge ‘Minecraft’ launcher

1. Launch the CurseForge app. Access “Settings” by clicking the gear icon in the lower left corner of the screen.

CurseForge can also be used to mod other games as well, although “Minecraft” is by far the most popular.
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2. There’s a “Game Specific” section in the column on the left side of the settings page. Select “Minecraft.”

3. Scroll down to “Java Settings” where you’ll see “Allocated Memory” with a slider. From here, simply drag and drop the orange ball on the slider to your preferred RAM allocation. Any change will be automatically saved.

If you don’t see the word “RAM,” don’t worry — “RAM” and “memory” are often used interchangeably.
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Allocating RAM using the ATLauncher ‘Minecraft’ launcher

1. Boot up the ATLauncher and click “Settings,” located on the right panel.

ATLauncher is one of the many third-party launchers compatible with Minecraft.
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2. At the top of the settings page, you’ll see several tabs. Click the “Java/Minecraft” tab.

3. You’ll see a list of adjustable properties. The second listed is for “Maximum Memory/RAM” and that’s the number you’ll want to increase. It’s listed in megabytes, so remember that 1024MB equals 1GB.

Make sure you’re not giving it too much RAM, or too little.
Emma Witman/Insider

4. After you’ve adjusted the max RAM, make sure you click “Save” at the bottom to confirm your changes.

How to allocate RAM to a Minecraft server you run on a PC

Finally, you may be running your own Minecraft server. If the server doesn’t have enough RAM, it won’t be able to load or support users playing on it, and any changes you make in-game will lag.

If you want to increase how much RAM your server can use, here’s how. Just note that these steps are for servers running from a Windows 10 PC — the method to do this on a Mac or Linux computer will differ.

1. Open the folder that houses all your Minecraft server files.

2. Right-click on any black space in the folder, then select “New” and “Text Document.” You can leave the document unnamed for now.

3. Open the document, then paste the following code:

Emma Witman is an Asheville, NC-based freelance journalist with a keen interest in writing about hardware, PC gaming, politics, and personal finance. She is a former crime reporter for a daily newspaper, and has also written extensively about bartending for Insider. She may or may not judge your drink order when behind the bar.Follow her on Twitter at @emwity.