So you've been playing Satisfactory solo and you've got a factory you're proud of. Maybe you've finished a milestone, scaled up a production line, or just don't fancy rebuilding everything on a fresh server. Good news – you can upload your singleplayer save to a dedicated server. It takes a few minutes and some care with file paths, but it's straightforward.
Where Satisfactory Saves Live on Your PC
Satisfactory stores save files in your local AppData:
C:\Users\<YourUsername>\AppData\Local\FactoryGame\Saved\SaveGames
To get there quickly, press Win + R, type %LOCALAPPDATA%\FactoryGame\Saved\SaveGames and hit Enter. You'll see one or more .sav files – each is a manual save – along with subfolders named after your play sessions that hold the auto-saves. Sort by date modified to find the most recent.
Each .sav is self-contained. If you want your auto-save history too, grab the whole session folder. If you just want your last known-good state, one .sav file is enough.
Before You Do Anything
Two things. Both important.
Stop your server first. Go to control.low.ms, find your Satisfactory service, and stop it. Uploading files while the server is writing a save is asking for corruption.
Back up the server's existing save. Even if the server is fresh and there's nothing worth keeping, build the habit. In the LOW.MS Control Panel, go to Cloud Backup in the sidebar and create a backup. Takes seconds, saves headaches.
Uploading via File Manager
The panel's built-in File Manager works fine for this:
- Log into control.low.ms and select your Satisfactory server
- Click File Manager in the sidebar
- Navigate to
FactoryGame/Saved/SaveGames/ - Upload your
.savfile – and its session folder if you want the auto-saves too - If a save with the same name already exists, overwrite it
File Manager is fine for single .sav files. Once you're uploading a full session folder with hours of auto-saves, SFTP is usually faster.
Uploading via SFTP
SFTP is on port 8822. You'll need a client like WinSCP or FileZilla. Your connection details are in Service Settings on the panel.
- Protocol: SFTP
- Host: your server's address (shown in Service Settings)
- Port: 8822
- Username/Password: same as your panel credentials for this service
Once connected, navigate to FactoryGame/Saved/SaveGames/ on the server side and drag your file (or session folder) across. SFTP handles large transfers more reliably than the browser File Manager, especially once your save runs into hundreds of megabytes.
Starting Up
Start the server back up from the panel. Give it a minute or two for the first boot with your imported save – it takes longer than a normal start while the server indexes the save data.
Check Web Console to watch the startup logs. Once the server is fully loaded, launch the game, open Server Manager, connect to your server, and select your save from the Manage Saves panel to load it.
A Few Things to Know
.sav files are a packed binary format. You can't meaningfully edit them in a text editor – treat them as opaque blobs for a transfer. There are community tools that'll parse and modify them if you ever need to dig in, but you don't need any of that for a straight upload.
Version mismatches will bite. If your client has updated to a new game version but the server is still on the old one (or the reverse), the save won't load. Keep both on the same version – use Steam Update in the panel to update the server.
If something goes wrong after uploading, that's what your backup is for. Go to Cloud Restore, pick the backup you made earlier, and you're back where you started.