Install Chunky: Pre-Generate Your Minecraft World (Beginner Guide)

Install Chunky and pre-generate your Minecraft world

Chunky builds the terrain of your Minecraft world in advance, before anyone walks there. Normally the server only calculates new areas when a player enters them, and that is exactly what slows small servers down while exploring. With Chunky you install the plugin in the panel, type chunky radius 3000 and chunky start into the console and wait until the task is done. From then on the server only loads those areas from disk.

In short:

Question	Answer
What is Chunky for?	Generating the world in advance so exploring no longer lags
Which servers?	Paper, Spigot, Purpur, Folia (plugin), Fabric, Forge, NeoForge (mod)
Where do I install it?	Panel → Mods & Templates → Mods → search for “Chunky”
Most important commands	chunky radius 3000, chunky start, chunky pause, chunky continue
Do I have to keep Chunky?	No. The generated areas stay saved in the world
Does Chunky cost anything?	No, Chunky is free and open source

What is a chunk and why does exploring lag?

A Minecraft world is made of chunks, areas of 16 × 16 blocks. When a player walks into an area nobody has visited yet, the server has to calculate terrain, caves, trees, villages and structures right then. That takes a lot of processing time. On a server with little RAM you notice it as stutter, blocks snapping back or mobs moving in jumps.

Chunky does this work beforehand. The server calculates the chunks at its own pace, for example at night or before your friends come online for the first time. Later it only has to load them, and loading is much faster than generating.

Which Chunky version do I need?

Chunky exists for almost every server software. The only thing that matters is that the version matches yours:

Server software	Chunky variant	Folder	Also required
Paper, Purpur, Spigot, Folia	Plugin (Bukkit)	plugins	nothing
Fabric	Mod	mods	Fabric API
Forge, NeoForge	Mod	mods	nothing

As of November 2026, Chunky 1.5.3 supports Minecraft up to 26.3 on Paper, Spigot, Folia and Fabric. Forge and NeoForge get Chunky 1.5.4. Which software your server runs is shown at the top of the overview in the panel, or in the marketplace under “Your server runs”. The differences are explained in Minecraft Server Types Compared.

Install Chunky in the RespawnHost panel

1. Find Chunky in the marketplace

Open your server in the panel and click Mods & Templates on the left. Choose the Mods tab at the top and type “Chunky” into the search box. Pick the entry Chunky by pop4959, that is the developer.

2. Pick the version and install

Click Chunky. The window already preselects your server’s game version and software, for example “26.3” and “paper”. The matching Chunky version is listed below. Click Install.

3. Restart the server

The server only loads a plugin on startup. Click Restart on the overview. The console then shows the line [Chunky] Enabling Chunky v1.5.3. The file now sits in the plugins folder, and Chunky creates a Chunky folder next to it with its settings file.

Pre-generate the world: the commands step by step

Type all commands into the console at the bottom of the Overview, without a slash. In game they work with a slash (/chunky start), but you need operator rights.

1. Check what Chunky would generate

chunky selection

Chunky shows the current selection. Without changes that is the overworld (world), as a square around the center 0, 0 with a radius of 500 blocks.

2. Set the radius

chunky radius 3000

The radius is the distance from the center to the edge, in blocks. With 3000 Chunky generates a square of 6000 × 6000 blocks. Start smaller and extend later, Chunky skips chunks that already exist.

To generate around the spawn instead of 0, 0, stand at the spot in game and type /chunky center, or use chunky spawn in the console.

3. Start

chunky start

Every second the console prints a progress line: generated chunks, percentage, estimated time left (ETA) and speed in chunks per second (cps).

4. Do not forget the Nether and the End

Chunky only generates the world that is currently selected. For the Nether and the End you switch the world and start again:

chunky world world_nether
chunky radius 1500
chunky start

chunky world world_the_end
chunky radius 1000
chunky start

World names depend on the software:

World	Paper, Spigot, Purpur	Fabric, Forge, NeoForge
Overworld	world	overworld
Nether	world_nether	the_nether
End	world_the_end	the_end

A smaller radius is enough in the Nether, because one block there equals eight blocks in the overworld.

Pause, resume and cancel

Command	What it does
chunky progress	shows the current progress
chunky pause	stops and saves the progress
chunky continue	resumes where the task left off
chunky cancel	stops and deletes the task; chunks already generated stay
chunky silent	turns the progress lines in the console off or on again

Does Chunky continue after a restart?

No, not on its own. Chunky saves an unfinished task when you pause it and when the server stops normally, but after the next start you have to type chunky continue.

To let Chunky resume automatically, change it in plugins/Chunky/config.yml:

1. Stop the server.
2. In the file manager open plugins → Chunky → config.yml.
3. Change continue-on-restart: false to continue-on-restart: true and save.
4. Start the server again.

In the same file, language: de switches messages to German, and other languages are available too.

Auto-stop and billing while Chunky runs

This is the most important point for RespawnHost servers: auto-stop only sees players, not Chunky. If nobody is online, it can shut the server down in the middle of pre-generation. For long runs you have two options:

• Turn auto-stop off in your server’s Settings while pre-generating and switch it back on afterwards.
• Or set continue-on-restart: true, then Chunky resumes on its own after the next start.

With pay-per-use you pay for the runtime even when only Chunky is working, so plan the run and do not forget to stop the server at the end. According to the Chunky docs the server should not pause during pre-generation, so check that server.properties contains pause-when-empty-seconds=-1.

How long does pre-generation take?

Mostly it depends on the radius, because the area grows with the square. Double the radius means four times as many chunks.

Radius	Area	Chunks (approx.)
1000	2000 × 2000 blocks	16,100
3000	6000 × 6000 blocks	142,000
5000	10,000 × 10,000 blocks	393,000

What we measured: On our test server with 2 GB RAM, Paper 26.3 and an Eco plan, Chunky generated a radius of 1000 in the overworld (16,129 chunks) in 7 minutes 39 seconds, about 35 chunks per second on average. At the same speed a radius of 5000 would take a little over three hours. Mods, datapacks with custom world generation and friends playing at the same time slow it down. The most accurate estimate is always the ETA in the console.

How much RAM and disk space does Chunky need?

• RAM: Memory use rises noticeably while pre-generating, because chunks are loaded and unloaded quickly. That is normal. If the server crashes during the run, it needs more RAM. How much makes sense is covered in How Much RAM Does a Minecraft Server Need?.
• Disk space: Every generated region ends up as a file in your world folder. Its size grows like the area, with the square of the radius. On our test server a radius of 1000 in the overworld took about 200 MB; a radius of 5000 would be roughly 25 times that, around 5 GB. For a rough estimate the Chunky developer recommends the World Size Calculator at onlinemo.de/world. How full your server is shows at the top of the file manager under Disk usage.

What RespawnHost recommends

• Small group of friends: overworld with a radius of 3000 to 5000, Nether with 1500. That is enough for weeks of play.
• Bigger server or SMP: set the world border first, then pre-generate exactly that far. Players then never reach ungenerated areas.
• Map plugins such as Dynmap or BlueMap: turn them off briefly during pre-generation. According to the Chunky docs it is faster, and the map renders once afterwards.
• After pre-generating you can keep Chunky installed. Without a running task it costs no performance.

Use Chunky with a world border

A world border defines how far players can walk. If you already set one, Chunky takes its center and radius:

chunky worldborder
chunky start

You set a border in the console like this: worldborder center 0 0 and worldborder set 10000. The number after worldborder set is the diameter, so twice the radius Chunky uses.

Common problems with Chunky

Problem	Cause and fix
chunky is not recognized	Server not restarted after installing, or the variant does not match the software (plugin on Fabric, mod on Paper)
Command does not work in game	You need operator rights (op YourName in the console)
Chunky suddenly stops	The server was stopped, for example by auto-stop. Type chunky continue or enable continue-on-restart
Server crashes while pre-generating	Not enough RAM, or another plugin or mod conflicts. Test with only Chunky installed
No mobs after pre-generating	World border was smaller than the area, see above
Treasure maps lead nowhere	Known Minecraft bug. On Paper, set find-already-discovered for loot-tables under treasure-maps in config/paper-world-defaults.yml to false
Dynmap or BlueMap do not show the new areas	Render the map once more

Chunky FAQ

Is Chunky free?

Yes. Chunky is free and open source, the code is on GitHub at pop4959/Chunky.

Do I have to uninstall Chunky after pre-generating?

No. The chunks stay saved in the world whether Chunky stays installed or not.

Can I pre-generate an existing world?

Yes. Chunky skips chunks that already exist and only generates the missing ones. Your builds stay untouched.

Can players be online while Chunky runs?

Yes, but it gets slower for everyone. It is fastest and smoothest before players arrive or at night.

Which radius should I use?

Start with 3000 in the overworld. If that is not enough, set a larger radius later and start again.

Does Chunky work with modpacks?

Yes. Chunky lets the server generate the chunks itself, with all mods and datapacks. With many mods it takes much longer than vanilla, though.

What is the difference between chunky pause and chunky cancel?

pause remembers the progress and continue picks it up again. cancel deletes the task completely, but the chunks already generated stay.

Read more

• Optimize Minecraft Server Performance: view-distance, simulation-distance and Spark
• The Best Minecraft Plugins: more plugins for Paper and Spigot
• Minecraft Server Types Compared: Paper, Fabric, NeoForge and more

No server yet? At RespawnHost you can rent a Minecraft server and install Chunky straight from the marketplace.