Realms

Minecraft Realms is an official subscription-based server hosting service that allows players to create and manage their own private Minecraft servers. Hosted by Mojang, Realms provides an easy and fast way to create servers and allows the owner to manage them from inside the game, without prior knowledge of the concepts for hosting on the Internet. Realms also allows players to choose from a list of minigames (updated by Mojang approximately every 2 weeks) to play temporarily, as well as several pre-made world templates, adventure maps, and experiences. Realms are not intended for large public servers, but for groups of friends or as a family server.

Requirements
Realms is a service that can only be used by players that meet these requirements :


 * You must have a Mojang account and must have a premium copy of Minecraft or Minecraft: Pocket Edition
 * You must have a working internet connection
 * You must be age 13 years or older to join the Minecraft Realms community

Subscriptions

 * Manage your Realms subscriptions here.

Realms is a subscription-based service. The link above will take you to your Mojang account page and will allow you to extend a current Realm or buy a new one ($7.99 per month for PC/Mac, and $4.99 per month for Pocket).

There are two types of subscriptions: Auto-renew and manual-renew. Auto-renew subscriptions automatically renew the Realms subscription every 30 days without you having to do a thing (this can be canceled). Manual-renew subscriptions need to be renewed manually and come in 30-day, 90-day, and 180-day packages for PC/Mac, as well as two-friend and ten-friend packages for Pocket.

All players are able to have a 30-day free Realms trial, providing they have not had a free trial on their Mojang account before.

Maps & templates
Within the Realms service, users can elect to temporarily replace their regular world with a Minigame or permanently replace their regular world with maps from the categories: World templates, Adventures, Experiences, or Inspiration. You also cannot use most of the commands or options while your realm is using a preset minigame. These maps are selected from community submissions by the Realms team. Certain maps may not be currently available on Realms due to being phased out or incompatible with the current update.

Minigames
Minigames are temporary games designed to be played and reset continuously.

Adventures
Adventures are maps designed for long term play.

World templates
World templates are maps designed for usage as custom survival world spawns. Normal terrain generates beyond the hand-made spawn area.

Experiences
Experiences are maps designed for observation and exploration. These maps lack a goal that the player is actively working towards completing.

Inspiration
Inspiration maps are designed to inspire others to create new things in Minecraft. These maps intend to encourage new and exciting builds for players to try themselves.

Limitations
Although Realms is hosted by Mojang, and therefore safe and secure, it has some limitations. These limitations can be avoided by using the standard server software or a third-party hosting website.


 * Only whitelisted servers with up to ten players at once are allowed. Larger servers cannot be made.
 * Players can not be invited/uninvited or opped/deopped in-game - you must quit to the menu to do this.
 * All players are de-opped - even the host - while in a mini-game.
 * Minecraft must be running to configure your Realm.

Realms version history
As of Minecraft 1.7.10, Realms has its own versioning system. Below is a changelog of all those updates:

Minecraft version history
Originally, Realms updates were tied into regular Minecraft updates, until the release of Minecraft 1.7.10. Below is a changelog of all those updates.

Availability
The following chart shows when Realms was introduced in the respective countries.

Trivia

 * The Mojang blog closing signature was signed // The Minecraft and Minecraft Realms teams instead of the usual // The Minecraft team starting with the blog Minecraft Snapshot 13w09a.