How to Use a Custom Seed on Your Minecraft Server

How to Use a Custom Seed on Your Minecraft Server

A seed is the value Minecraft uses to generate a world. The same seed on the same Minecraft edition and version gives you the same terrain, so you can play a world you found online or reuse one from singleplayer.

The one thing to know up front: a seed only matters when a world is generated. Changing the seed does nothing to a world that already exists. To use a seed, you always create a new world.

Option 1: the Worlds tab (easiest)

1. Open your server in the game panel and go to the Worlds tab
2. Click New world
3. Enter a World name and paste your seed into Seed (optional)
4. Click Create world
5. If a world with that name already exists, choose Keep the old one (rename to a backup) or Delete the old one
6. Restart the server (the panel shows a Restart now button). Minecraft generates the new world from your seed

Your old worlds stay in the list unless you chose to delete one, so you can switch back later with Make active.

Option 2: edit server.properties by hand

1. Stop the server
2. In the Files tab, open server.properties
3. Find the line level-seed= and put your seed after it, for example:

level-seed=-382189602

4. Make sure the server generates a new world. Either change level-name= to a name that does not exist yet (for example level-name=seedworld), or delete the current world folders: world, and on Paper or Spigot also world_nether and world_the_end
5. Save the file and start the server

Note: The key is level-seed. A line called seed= is ignored by Minecraft.

How do I find a seed?

• Sites like Minecraft Seeds and the Chunkbase seed map let you browse seeds and preview them
• In an existing world, the /seed command shows its seed (you need operator rights on a server, or cheats enabled in singleplayer)

Important notes

• Take a backup in the Backups tab first if you want to keep your current world
• A seed only gives the same result on the same edition (Java or Bedrock) and a similar game version. Seeds from before 1.18 generate different terrain on newer versions
• Deleting a world folder also deletes the player data stored inside it, such as inventories and advancements

Having trouble with your seed? Open a support ticket and we will help.