Realms



Minecraft Realms, also known as Realms, were added in snapshot 13w09b and is a work-in-progress feature that allows for paid public servers hosted by Mojang. Realms provide an easy and faster way to create Minecraft servers and allows more control for the creator.

Minecraft Realms have been in development since Minecon 2012, when Mojang revealed that they wanted to host their own servers.

About 100 players were selected by a computer algorithm to test the first publicly released version of Realms. However, only active or high profile accounts and accounts with strong relations with Mojang were chosen among the random algorithm.

The chosen players can create their own Minecraft worlds, and can invite up to four players into the world, whether or not they were originally chosen to test. Only one server can be made at a time if hosting. Players that are invited will have the Realms option appear on the screen, which then the invited players can enter and explore the world they were invited in.

Subscriptions


Minecraft Realms are not free. Rather, players have to subscribe to use the feature. The 100 beta testers have a subscription which lasts for 90 days. By viewing the language files in Minecraft via an editor, these lines can be seen:

Settings


If you are one of the 100 beta testers, or have been invited to join a realm by a beta tester, you will see a Minecraft Realms button on the main menu screen. Clicking on it brings you to the screen above. The screen is very similar to that of the Multiplayer menu, with a few differences.



Clicking on "Configure" brings you to the configuration menu. To the left, you have the Name and Description. To the right, you have a list of all the invited players.

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.