Here Is How Much RAM You Should Allocate to Minecraft

petra pralica game horizonByPetra Pralica Published on
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If you’ve ever played Minecraft Java Edition, you’ll be familiar with the game lagging on occasion. Sometimes, if you’re playing multiplayer, it can be related to internet connection problems, but it can certainly happen even in single-player games. You’ve probably heard about RAM affecting gaming performance and giving FPS boosts to end the lag problem, and you’ve likely also heard that you can allocate more RAM to Minecraft. So the question is, how much RAM should you allocate to Minecraft?

The recommended amount of RAM you should allocate to Minecraft is 4 GB, but this only applies to ideal conditions. If you’re playing on a server or have a computer with low memory, you should allocate even more to it. This, however, does not have anything to do with actual gameplay. These are the recommended specs of your computer. For vanilla Minecraft, it’s best to allocate 2 GB.

Now that we’ve covered how much RAM you need optimally for Minecraft, it’s time to analyze why. If you’re interested in what RAM does and how to improve your performance if you’re lacking enough RAM, stay with us and keep reading!

What does RAM do?

The purpose of RAM is to store short-term data that your PC requires to operate correctly. The more RAM you have, the more actions you can take without the computer lagging. Everything you do on your computers takes RAM, even browsing the internet.

The gaming community, for example, has an issue with one of the most used browsers out there: Google Chrome. The simple explanation is that Google Chrome sucks up a lot of your RAM apart from the fact that it never stops collecting user data to adjust how they display ads and which ads they show you.

There are browsers with far better RAM allocation than Google Chrome. I personally use Opera GX because it allows me to set a RAM limit so it won’t spend any more RAM than I assign it, but I digress.

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Minimal and recommended system requirements for Minecraft

It used to be that you didn’t need a beast of a PC to run Minecraft. While that still holds true to some extent, in practice, it’s far from it. Today, you have the minimum and the recommended system requirements for running Minecraft. The minimum ones will allow you to run it, but it’s almost guaranteed that you’ll experience low FPS and a ton of lag, so I’ll only mention the recommended system requirements.

CPU – Intel Core i5-4690 3.5GHz / AMD A10-7800 APU 3.5 GHz or equivalent
RAM – 8GB
GPU – GeForce 700 Series or AMD Radeon Rx 200 Series
HDD – 4GB, but SSD is better
OS – 64-bit recommended, Windows 10, macOS, Linux from 2014 and above

When you look at these requirements, it turns out that you need an excellent mid-range PC to run Minecraft properly. Mid-range PCs aren’t expensive, but they don’t come cheap either. The 8 GB of RAM does not mean Minecraft will use up all that RAM just to run; PCs use RAM to function, let alone play games.

Should You Give Minecraft More RAM?

Both too much and too little RAM are terrible news regarding how much you allocate to the game. It might seem like too much can’t be wrong, but it’ll affect performance in the same way that too little does, so you should allocate RAM according to your needs and what applies to you.

I’m not saying Minecraft doesn’t run better with more RAM, but allocating too much will affect your PC performance. As mentioned previously, PCs need RAM to boot up and run, so taking that RAM away is a terrible business.

So how much RAM should I give Minecraft?

The simplest way to figure out how much RAM you need to allocate to Minecraft is to follow the rules in this table. Take what applies to you, and change the RAM allocation accordingly.

The ConditionRecommended RAM Allocation
Playing Vanilla Minecraft2 GB
Playing With Lightweight Mods4-6 GB
Playing With Complex Modpacks6-8 GB
Playing With Most Complex Modpacks And Other Visual Mods8-10 GB
Source

It’s clear now that Minecraft doesn’t take a lot to run, but thanks to our ability to mod it (only if you’re a Java Edition player), it takes more and more to run correctly. Since part of the fun with Minecraft is that you can mod it, you have no choice but to either buy better components or not use that many mods.

These are just references, and many users report that the RAM allocation sweet spot is 4 GB. any more than six and you’ll run into problems. However, that is not always the case, so it’s best to allocate it depending on your situation. You can look at the debug screen to know where you stand.

Using the debug screen to learn how much you should allocate

meM

To open up the debug screen, press F3. Then look at the upper right corner, and you’ll see a row that says Mem:. Mem stands for memory, and it’ll look something like this with the number varying: Mem: 31% 1878/3008MB. Let’s dissect what each of the components means.

The number before the slash is how much RAM Minecraft is currently using to run, and the number after the slash tells you how much RAM you’ve allocated. Take some time to look at the percentage. The peak percentage should be between 60 and 80%. Any higher than that, and I’ll affect your performance.

So to translate, the lower the percentage is, the better it is. If it’s too high at its peak, you need to allocate more, and if it’s low all the time, perhaps you’re giving too much and can lower it.

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Which Game Engine Does Minecraft Use?

How to allocate more RAM to Minecraft?

Allocating more RAM to Minecraft can be done in many ways, but the easiest one is to go into your Minecraft launcher and change the values, so follow these steps to do just that:

  1. Open up your Minecraft launcher and navigate to the Installation tab
  2. Once you’ve opened it, click on the three dots located to the right of the Latest Release
  3. Select Edit
  4. A new window will open and take you to the setting of Minecraft. Once you’re there, click on More Options
  5. Scroll down and find the JVM arguments. Within the text, you should locate the text that mentions a number followed by the letter G. It should be at the beginning of the text.
  6. Change the number value to whatever you see fit but don’t overdo it.
  7. Click Save and restart Minecraft.

Where to learn about PC specifications?

If you’re running a Windows 10 or 11 PC, you should click on your Start Button, go to Settings and click on System. From there, you should scroll down and click on About, which should show you your PC specs. The process is a bit different if you’re a Mac user but it yields the same results.

In your Apple Menu, go to System Settings and navigate to General in the sidebar. Click on About, located on the right, and finally, press System Report. A shortcut would be to press and hold the option key and then choose Apple Menu and System Information.

How does RAM affect games in general?

We’ve already discussed how allocating too much RAM to Minecraft can affect performance but didn’t discuss why that is. If you allocate too much RAM to Minecraft, specifically when the game only uses about 4GB max, the remaining GB is left unused. In games, enough RAM usually means you’ll get slightly better FPS, the game will run more smoothly, and the loading times will be reduced.

There’s a lot more that affects how the game plays on your PC; RAM is just a minor part. As games get more demanding regarding how strong of a computer you need to run them, RAM requirements increase, but it’s not the only thing that increases. A good PC is balanced throughout all of its components.

petra pralica game horizon

Petra Pralica has been a content writer for over three years and is based in Zagreb, Croatia. She studied economics in high school and went to college to get her English language and literature degree but decided against proceeding with her studies after three years since an opportunity arose for her to work as a content writer full-time. Petra’s interests span wide, which is clear from her content writing history. She spent around a year and a half writing content about animals and animal products for Petovly, making sure to educate people about the responsibilities that come with pet ownership, especially when it comes to non-traditional pets like parrots, rats, and ferrets. Then she went on to write about all things related to kitchens. After that affair ended, she educated herself on advertising through social media and search engines. Still, she decided to postpone a career change for the future since she got the opportunity to write about another one of her old passions: games. Whether it’s a board game or a video game, Petra will play it. She’s more into the old-school games she used to play on her PS1 and PS2 and her old computer brick. After video games went online and started to focus more on the PvP aspect like many MOBAs and battle royale games do, she decided to stick to her guns but in a different format. Nowadays, she mostly plays games where she can write out a story or live through a story on the PC screen. Part of the reason she likes League of Legends so much is because of the game’s lore, and part of the reason she enjoys Minecraft so much is that you are free to do whatever you want and write out your own story. She’d spend hours in high school playing games like Skyrim, GTA San Andreas, Need for Speed Most Wanted, Crash Twin Sanity, and Assasin’s Creed. This is a salad of genres, but they all have one thing in common: they all tell a story. Although Petra likes to live in fantasy worlds and fantasize about how epic it would be to live out her life through these alternate worlds, her writing isn’t all that creative and imaginative. She’ll write about facts and try to make things easier to understand and figure out. Of course, she’ll never pass up on an opportunity to write about her favorite characters and why they’d win or lose in a fight with a character from a different universe. She will give you direct answers to all of your questions and then present you with a bunch of if’s, but’s, and what if’s. After all, she can’t completely let go of her creative and imaginative nature.

Here’s Why Your Minecraft Skin Keeps Resetting & How to Solve It

petra pralica game horizonByPetra Pralica Published on
Minecraft Skins resetting
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Minecraft doesn’t allow for endless customization when it’s a matter of adding your own personality to the game. It makes up for it because you can do practically anything in the world, but for those that want customization to be more straightforward, you can choose to upload your own skin instead of using one of the defaults. What if there’s a bug and you can’t show your skin off? Why does your Minecraft skin keep resetting, and how do you fix it?

The main reason why your Minecraft skin might keep resetting is that you’re probably offline. If getting online doesn’t help, you might also want to try and reset your skin on Minecraft.net, or you might just have to wait it out because the problem is with skin servers and not you.

Are there ways to completely get around the reasons for skins resetting, and are there any other reasons why it might happen? How long has this issue been a thing, and why does it keep resurfacing as a problem? Let’s explore the answers to all the questions you might have in the rest of this article.

The basics of skin resetting

Before I go into detail about why your skin might keep resetting, I first want to move out of the way the likeliest reason why your skin might not show up in the first place. I do have to say that you might not always be the problem. Sometimes the people you’re playing with are the problem, and they must also change their settings.

In Minecraft, under Options, there’s a ‘Skins’ tab. You can go there and ensure the option to hide skins isn’t toggled on. This is a viable solution to the problem only if your skin never showed in the first place.

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How to Add Friends in Minecraft Java Edition?

Skins resetting on servers

Usually, we use skins to show them off to our friends and the people on servers. It’s a simple way to be recognized and stay remembered, but often, your skin will reset to the default Steve, Alex, or with newer versions of Minecraft, one of the seven other skins that have been added in 1.19.

The skins keep resetting on servers because everyone on the server is signed into Xbox Live, and when that’s the case, your custom skin can only be used for a limited time before it resets. To make a long story short, whenever you exit the game, it’ll change your skin to the last one you wore before the custom one.

To fix this, you’ll need to delete your cache. To do this, follow these steps:

  1. Go into your search bar on your desktop and type in temporary files
  2. You’ll then either be able to delete temporary files right from the search bar, or you will be able to enter the temporary internet files and then select the ‘Delete Files’ option.
  3. Deleting your cache on the computer should also delete the Minecraft cache.

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Minecraft 1.20 Update ‘Trails & Tales’ Has an Official Release Date

If you are worried about what will happen when you delete your cache, let’s see the potential risks of deleting your cache and how you can do it on a console.

As suggested in the guide on how to delete cached data, this is only temporary data and will not affect your gameplay, nor will it delete your worlds. You can also clear cached data on consoles. I’ll give you an example of how to clear cached data in Minecraft Bedrock Edition.

Clearing the cache should be the same across all platforms since Bedrock Edition has the option built into the game itself.

  1. Open Minecraft, and in the main menu, go into Settings.
  2. Then, scroll down and head on over to Storage.
  3. Once there, go into Multi Select
  4. Then, click on Cached Data and select all of the resource packs that you found there.
  5. Once you’ve selected all of them, click on Delete, and you’re done

Other players can’t see your skin, but you can

This problem has nothing to do with you and more with the settings of other players. If the players are your friends, you can ask them to change their settings for them to see your skin. If the problem is with other players that are a part of some larger server, likely, you won’t be able to do anything about it.

Apart from the option to hide skins, you also have the option to only allow trusted skins. By trusted skins, Minecraft is likely thinking about skins that you bought through their store.

To disable this option, players will have to go into Settings while in Minecraft, go to Profile, and toggle the Only Allow Trusted Skins option off. This will not, in any way, put you at risk of catching a virus r something else entirely.

Disabling the only allow trusted skins option Minecraft

Adding your skin as the default

Minecraft skins resetting isn’t something new. It has been a problem for some ever since the game officially launched. Back then, players used to fix the problem by adding their skin as the default. This means they made the game think their skin is the default, Steve’s or Alex’s.

RELATED:

How to Fix ‘Invalid or Corrupt’ Skin Error in Minecraft?

They used to do this by changing the resource/texture pack folder, finding the default Steve or Alex skin, and switching it up with your chosen skin. Unfortunately, it’s been a while since you could do this.

petra pralica game horizon

Petra Pralica has been a content writer for over three years and is based in Zagreb, Croatia. She studied economics in high school and went to college to get her English language and literature degree but decided against proceeding with her studies after three years since an opportunity arose for her to work as a content writer full-time. Petra’s interests span wide, which is clear from her content writing history. She spent around a year and a half writing content about animals and animal products for Petovly, making sure to educate people about the responsibilities that come with pet ownership, especially when it comes to non-traditional pets like parrots, rats, and ferrets. Then she went on to write about all things related to kitchens. After that affair ended, she educated herself on advertising through social media and search engines. Still, she decided to postpone a career change for the future since she got the opportunity to write about another one of her old passions: games. Whether it’s a board game or a video game, Petra will play it. She’s more into the old-school games she used to play on her PS1 and PS2 and her old computer brick. After video games went online and started to focus more on the PvP aspect like many MOBAs and battle royale games do, she decided to stick to her guns but in a different format. Nowadays, she mostly plays games where she can write out a story or live through a story on the PC screen. Part of the reason she likes League of Legends so much is because of the game’s lore, and part of the reason she enjoys Minecraft so much is that you are free to do whatever you want and write out your own story. She’d spend hours in high school playing games like Skyrim, GTA San Andreas, Need for Speed Most Wanted, Crash Twin Sanity, and Assasin’s Creed. This is a salad of genres, but they all have one thing in common: they all tell a story. Although Petra likes to live in fantasy worlds and fantasize about how epic it would be to live out her life through these alternate worlds, her writing isn’t all that creative and imaginative. She’ll write about facts and try to make things easier to understand and figure out. Of course, she’ll never pass up on an opportunity to write about her favorite characters and why they’d win or lose in a fight with a character from a different universe. She will give you direct answers to all of your questions and then present you with a bunch of if’s, but’s, and what if’s. After all, she can’t completely let go of her creative and imaginative nature.

How Long Is a Fortnite Match?

petra pralica game horizonByPetra Pralica Published on
How Long is A Fortnite Match
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In today’s world, we’re surrounded by shorter content that gets us that dopamine high so that we can get it all over again once we change the channel, so to speak, to get another dopamine high all over again. Besides, the world is getting increasingly fast-paced, and we no longer have as much time to grind out our favorite games. With all these things considered, would you have the time to throw in a quick round of Fortnite, though? How long is a Fortnite match, exactly?

Numerous factors affect how long a Fortnite match is, but on average, you’ll have to set aside an average of 20 minutes for a single game of Fortnite. Of course, this is the time it’ll take you to end the match if you plan on winning or at least want to get close to winning.

So how is one Fortnite match conceived, and is there any way that a match might last longer than that? What was the longest Fortnite match ever, and is there a limit to how long a match can last? Let’s find the answers to these and many other questions in the rest of this article.

The longest Fortnite match

We must mention a few notable matches before getting into the longest Fortnite match in history. In 2020, a new record for the longest Fortnite match was set. It was made by Lazarbeam, an Australian Youtuber and professional gamer who played a match of Fortnite that lasted 1 hour, 15 minutes, and 39 seconds.

After the record was set, the X2Twins beat it quickly, but only by 2 minutes. The record was broken once more shortly after by Creamy and Lachlan, which made the X2Twins try and beat the record again. The record to beat was 10 minutes longer than their first set world record. Crazy enough, they beat the record again by over 30 minutes.

In total, the twins were in a single Fortnite match for 1 hour, 52 minutes, and 48 seconds and there is a chance that this record will never be broken again, but why is that?

Storm sickness

Storm sickness is a mechanic in Fortnite that gives players a debuff. It’s fairly simple to understand. When you enter a storm area, you will begin losing health until you enter a safe zone. The storm area grows and shrinks the playing area. Essentially, it forces the players to end the match early.

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There are 12 phases to the storm, but after the ninth circle, the storm no longer has a grace period nor a shrink time. The storm eye is the safe zone you can be in during the storm. So keeping in mind that eventually, the storm will kill all players in a match, how long will it take for the storm to completely close in and kill all players and end the match prematurely?

The Storm

Maximum Fortnite match duration limit

Well, every storm cycle has a grace period: the time it takes for the storm to start moving and closing in and a shrink time that decreases as you go through the storm cycles.

The storm forms 1 minute after the battle bus reaches its last stop. Let’s round it up and say that the battle bus reaches the last stop in 1 minute. In the first storm cycle, you have a 2-minute grace period and a 2-minute shrink time. The 2nd cycle has a 1-minute 30-second grace and shrink period; the third cycle has a 1-minute 45-second grace period and a 1-minute 30-second shrink period. The 5th, 6th, and 7th cycles all have a 1-minute grace and shrink period. Overall, the storm will completely close in without any storm eye to protect you in a little under 25 minutes. From then on, it’s just a matter of you surviving the storm, but that’s hardly likely.

So the duration limit depends on how fast the storm closes in. The storm duration and how fast it closes in can change as new versions are released. For example, in previous versions, the storm only had nine cycles, and the first cycle grace period was 3 minutes and 20 seconds. I won’t go into all the details, but the match duration will depend on the developers and how they think the game should be balanced regarding playtime.

The shortest Fortnite match

Funnily enough, the shortest Fortnite match lasted only 1 second. Of course, this can’t mean that the match was actually played. Instead, a player named GlitchKing, as his name would suggest, exploited an error that made him win the match after all the other players left.

Match length depends on skill level

This claim might frustrate some people, but that match length will indeed, individually, depend on skill level. Once you’re killed in Fortnite, you won’t respawn and continue playing like in Deathmatch game modes in other games. Once you’re dead, you’ll be presented with the score and your final placement. After that point, you leave the game, so for all you know, in your personal experience, a match can last 5 minutes.

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How to Take Off Bush in Fortnite? (Or See Through Them)

The better you are at the game, the higher the chance for you to finish first, which means you’ll play the entirety of the match. If not, you’ll play for a shorter amount of time.

petra pralica game horizon

Petra Pralica has been a content writer for over three years and is based in Zagreb, Croatia. She studied economics in high school and went to college to get her English language and literature degree but decided against proceeding with her studies after three years since an opportunity arose for her to work as a content writer full-time. Petra’s interests span wide, which is clear from her content writing history. She spent around a year and a half writing content about animals and animal products for Petovly, making sure to educate people about the responsibilities that come with pet ownership, especially when it comes to non-traditional pets like parrots, rats, and ferrets. Then she went on to write about all things related to kitchens. After that affair ended, she educated herself on advertising through social media and search engines. Still, she decided to postpone a career change for the future since she got the opportunity to write about another one of her old passions: games. Whether it’s a board game or a video game, Petra will play it. She’s more into the old-school games she used to play on her PS1 and PS2 and her old computer brick. After video games went online and started to focus more on the PvP aspect like many MOBAs and battle royale games do, she decided to stick to her guns but in a different format. Nowadays, she mostly plays games where she can write out a story or live through a story on the PC screen. Part of the reason she likes League of Legends so much is because of the game’s lore, and part of the reason she enjoys Minecraft so much is that you are free to do whatever you want and write out your own story. She’d spend hours in high school playing games like Skyrim, GTA San Andreas, Need for Speed Most Wanted, Crash Twin Sanity, and Assasin’s Creed. This is a salad of genres, but they all have one thing in common: they all tell a story. Although Petra likes to live in fantasy worlds and fantasize about how epic it would be to live out her life through these alternate worlds, her writing isn’t all that creative and imaginative. She’ll write about facts and try to make things easier to understand and figure out. Of course, she’ll never pass up on an opportunity to write about her favorite characters and why they’d win or lose in a fight with a character from a different universe. She will give you direct answers to all of your questions and then present you with a bunch of if’s, but’s, and what if’s. After all, she can’t completely let go of her creative and imaginative nature.

Minecraft 1.20 Update ‘Trails & Tales’ Has an Official Release Date

valentina kraljik game horizonByValentina Kraljik Published on
Minecraft 1.20 Update Trails Tales Has an Official Release Date
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Following a lengthy silence, fans of the planetary popular sandbox game Minecraft can rejoice as the release date for the long-awaited ‘Trails & Tales’ update has been revealed. 

‘Trails & Tales’ will arrive on June 7, 2023, Mojang revealed on social media.

The ‘Trails & Tales’ Update introduces several new features to Minecraft 1.20. It includes a new biome called the cherry grove, which is rare but beautiful with its pink appearance. Two new wood sets, bamboo and cherry, will be added, allowing players to craft and build with them. The bamboo wood set includes a raft that can be crafted with or without a chest.

A new mob called the camel will be introduced, which can be ridden by one or two players. The camel has long legs that allow it to travel anywhere, providing a safe mode of transportation as melee mobs cannot reach the rider. 

The second mob added to the game is the Sniffer. This was decided during Minecraft’s 2022 community mob vote. This gentle giant was once extinct but can now be brought back to the Overworld by finding its eggs, hatching them, and watching the snifflet grow into a full-grown sniffer. 

Cherry Blossom biome Minecraft

Players will also be able to share their stories through wearable storytelling. Armor trims are being added, which can be found in different dimensions of Minecraft. These trims can be dyed in ten different colors and added to armor using a smithing table, allowing players to showcase their victories and accomplishments to others.

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New Soundtrack Released for the Upcoming Minecraft Trails & Tales Update

New features also include the ability to hang signs, providing a way to leave notes for friends or deceive enemies. Players can now create playable mob sounds by placing a mob head, including the new piglin mob head, on a note block. 

For those who want to document their adventures, a new chiseled bookshelf will be added, where players can safely store books, enchanted books, and even books and quills. Redstone can be added to the bookshelf for added movement, creating a dynamic library experience.

The update also brings calibrated skulk sensors, which are more sensitive and offer exciting possibilities for redstone contraptions.

The ‘Trails & Tales’ update will be available for download on June 7 for Minecraft: Java Edition on Windows, macOS, and Linux; and Minecraft: Bedrock Edition on Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, iOS, Android, and Chromebook. 

You can find out more about the update on the official Minecraft site. 

valentina kraljik game horizon

Valentina Kraljik is a writer and editor at Game Horizon with a deep love for everything related to video games. With a degree in Information Sciences, she brings a well-informed and unique perspective to her work. Valentina's writing is known for covering a wide range of video game genres, but she truly shines in her expertise in open-world RPGs. From offbeat euro-jank games like "Gothic" to critically acclaimed titles like "The Witcher," Valentina is well-versed in this exciting genre. Her passion for imaginative storytelling is reflected in the topics she writes about, with favorites like "Disco Elysium," "Elder Scrolls: Morrowind," "World of Warcraft," and "Mass Effect" influencing her tastes in games. Even though nothing beats a good high-fantasy setting, she often wanders into the realm of first-person shooters, occasionally even hitting the target. With a commitment to objectivity and insightful analysis, Valentina strives to bring a fresh perspective to the subjects she covers, even when exploring genres that may be unfamiliar to her. Her blend of academic rigor and creative flair sets her apart in the world of media writing.

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