Ark: Survival Evolved Server Hosting

Map choice sets the tone of an entire server. The Island and Scorched Earth are compact and forgiving on resources, while Ragnarok, Valguero and Fjordur are large, dense and considerably heavier on memory. Workshop maps work the same way once their mod ID is active. Changing map is a startup parameter edit plus a restart, and the one-click version changer keeps your build current.

Because save data stays on unmetered NVMe storage, you can archive the previous map's SavedArks folder instead of deleting it, then return to that world months later without paying for extra disk. Downloading a copy over SFTP before any map swap takes a minute and protects every tribe's progress.

Modded ARK starts with ActiveMods in GameUserSettings.ini, where a comma-separated list of Workshop IDs tells the server what to download on the next start. Order matters for stacking and structure mods, so keep your list deliberate. Rates and multipliers live across GameUserSettings.ini and Game.ini: taming speed, harvest amounts, XP, maturation, imprint intervals and per-level stat gains.

Both files open in the panel file manager, and the live console shows mod download progress after a restart. With ten rolling daily backups you can experiment with a new stacking mod and restore the previous configuration if it misbehaves.

A cluster is several ARK servers that share a transfer directory, letting survivors move characters, items and dinos between maps through obelisks. Set a shared cluster ID and transfer path across your instances, keep them in the same location for consistent latency, and disable the transfer filters you do not want. Unmetered ports and allocations mean the extra endpoints a cluster needs cost nothing extra.