Palworld Server Troubleshooting Guide

This is the catch-all we point people at when their Palworld server is misbehaving. "Connection Timed Out" is the #1 reason people end up here, so that's section one. After that: crashes, memory blowups, settings that seem to be ignored, save data panic after a patch, and mods.

If you only read one thing: most connection problems are a closed UDP port or CGNAT, most crash/memory problems are bEnableInvaderEnemy=True plus a huge base, and most "my settings aren't working" problems are the OptionSettings= line getting broken across multiple lines.

1. Connection Timed Out

If you're seeing "Connection Timed Out" when joining, it's almost always one of:

The server is offline or stuck starting.
You're connecting to the wrong IP:PORT.
A firewall/router/security group is blocking the UDP game port.
You're self-hosting behind CGNAT (your ISP won't allow inbound connections).

60-second triage

Confirm the exact connect string. Ask the server owner for the IP and port (example: 203.0.113.10:8211). On LOW.MS, the control panel shows the correct IP:PORT on the service page.
Try a different network. If you're on the same LAN as the server, your router might not support NAT loopback. Test from mobile data or ask a friend outside your network to try.
If you can join locally but not remotely, it's port forwarding, firewall, or CGNAT. Read on.

Confirm the server is actually listening

Default listen port is UDP 8211, set via -port=8211 on the command line. If you changed it, substitute your value everywhere below.

Windows:

netstat -ano | findstr :8211

Linux:

ss -lunp | grep 8211

Nothing listening? The server isn't running, or it crashed during startup. Skip to section 2.

Open the right ports (and don't open random ranges)

UDP 8211 — game traffic (or whatever -port= you set)
UDP 8212 — Steam query / server list visibility (game port + 1)
TCP 25575 — RCON, only if you actually use it

Linux (UFW):

sudo ufw allow 8211/udp
sudo ufw allow 8212/udp
sudo ufw allow 25575/tcp   # only if you use RCON
sudo ufw reload

Windows Firewall (elevated PowerShell):

New-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName "Palworld UDP 8211" -Direction Inbound -Action Allow -Protocol UDP -LocalPort 8211
New-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName "Palworld UDP 8212" -Direction Inbound -Action Allow -Protocol UDP -LocalPort 8212

Self-hosting at home

Forward UDP 8211 (and 8212 if you want community listing) to the server PC's LAN IP. Give that machine a static LAN IP or a DHCP reservation, otherwise the rule breaks on reboot.

Then check CGNAT: if your router's WAN IP doesn't match what whatismyip shows, your ISP is double-NATing you and inbound UDP will time out forever. You'll need to ask for a public IPv4, use a tunnel (Tailscale, Playit), or move to a host.

VPS / datacenter

Even with the OS firewall open, most providers layer a "security group" on top. Check that one too. Inbound UDP 8211 needs to be allowed there as well.

Docker gotcha

If you're running Palworld in Docker, you must publish the game port as UDP explicitly — -p 8211:8211/udp. A plain -p 8211:8211 publishes TCP only and the server will look up but nobody will be able to join.

PublicIP and PublicPort aren't the listen port

This one bites everybody at least once. PublicIP and PublicPort in PalWorldSettings.ini only affect the community server listing. They do not change the port the server actually listens on. Players direct-connecting still need the real listen port (default 8211, or whatever you set with -port=). If you're not using the community browser, you can leave both alone.

Client-side checks

Prefer Direct Connect with IP:PORT. On LAN, use the LAN IP to dodge NAT loopback.
Match versions. After a Palworld patch, clients and servers must be on the same build. If your host hasn't updated yet, you'll get timeouts.
Steam → Library → right-click Palworld → Properties → Installed Files → Verify integrity of game files.
When nothing else makes sense, reset Windows networking in an elevated prompt and reboot:
```
ipconfig /flushdns
netsh winsock reset
netsh int ip reset
```
Turn off the VPN. VPNs love to break UDP routing. If disabling your antivirus "fixes" it, add an exception instead of leaving AV off.

2. Server crashes on startup

Symptom: you hit start and the process dies within seconds, or never gets past loading.

The overwhelmingly common cause is a broken PalWorldSettings.ini. Palworld stores every option on a single massive line that starts with OptionSettings=( and ends with ). If a text editor has wrapped that line, or you've pasted in a value that accidentally split it, the whole file is ignored or the server refuses to boot.

Check these first:

Open Pal/Saved/Config/LinuxServer/PalWorldSettings.ini (or WindowsServer on Windows) in Configuration Files on the control panel. The OptionSettings=(...) line must be one line, no line breaks inside the parentheses.
If you can't work out what's wrong, delete the file and let the server regenerate a clean default on next start, then re-apply your changes one at a time.
If you recently added mods, rule them out — see section 6.
If the server was fine yesterday and dead today, restore from automatic backup in Backup Manager / Cloud Restore.

Use Log Viewer to read the startup output. Palworld is noisy but the real error is almost always in the last 50 lines before the process exits.

3. Runtime crashes, lag, and memory blowups

Palworld has known memory issues when bases get large and lots of Pals are being simulated. Honestly, this is the single most-reported problem after connection timeouts.

The one setting that matters most

In PalWorldSettings.ini, set:

bEnableInvaderEnemy=False

This disables the "raids on your base" mechanic. The community has consistently found this to be the single highest-impact memory leak fix on dedicated servers. If your RAM usage climbs forever until the server falls over, start here.

BaseCampWorkerMaxNum

Lowering BaseCampWorkerMaxNum reduces per-base simulation load and helps memory a lot. Important caveat: on an existing world, changes to this value in PalWorldSettings.ini don't take effect until WorldOption.sav is regenerated. Our walkthrough for that is at /knowledgebase/increasing-max-pals-on-your-server — the same procedure applies here, you're just going the other direction.

Other knobs

Drop PalSpawnNumRate to reduce wild Pals being tracked.
Drop BaseCampMaxNumInGuild to cap how many bases each guild can build.
Ask players to demolish bases they no longer use. Abandoned bases with Pal workers still burn resources.
A scheduled restart once a day clears accumulated leaks. Not a fix, but a decent band-aid.

Isolating a runtime crash

If the server crashes mid-game at no obvious trigger, check Log Viewer for the last error before the crash. If it looks mod-related, see section 6. If it's always the same point in the map, you probably have a corrupted save — roll back via Backup Manager / Cloud Restore.

4. Settings not taking effect

You edited PalWorldSettings.ini, restarted, and nothing changed. Four things to check, in order:

Full restart, not reload. Palworld only reads the config on process start. Stop and start the service, don't just /reload in-game.
The OptionSettings=(...) line must be one line. Same rule as section 2. If your editor soft-wraps it, that's fine — but there must be no real newline characters inside the parentheses.
Keys are case-sensitive. ExpRate works, exprate does not. Same for every other key. One wrong capital and the entire line can silently revert to defaults.
You're editing the right file. On Linux: Pal/Saved/Config/LinuxServer/PalWorldSettings.ini. On Windows: Pal\Saved\Config\WindowsServer\PalWorldSettings.ini. Not DefaultPalWorldSettings.ini, not anything else.

And the big gotcha: a handful of values (most notably BaseCampWorkerMaxNum) are stored inside WorldOption.sav once the world exists, and the .ini no longer wins. See /knowledgebase/increasing-max-pals-on-your-server for the workflow.

Full settings reference: /knowledgebase/server-configuration-for-palworld.

5. Save data gone after an update

Don't panic. LOW.MS runs automatic cloud backups. Open Backup Manager or Cloud Restore in the control panel and restore the most recent pre-update snapshot. The server will stop, swap in the old save, and start back up.

If you're migrating a save from another host or from local Windows into Linux, the paths and formats are slightly different — see /knowledgebase/converting-palworld-save.

6. Mods crashing the server

Post-patch 0.4.1.5, Palworld requires the Palworld-specific RE-UE4SS build (from pwmodding.wiki), not the generic UE4SS binary. If you dropped the old generic UE4SS into Win64/ and the server crashes on startup, that's your culprit. Grab the Palworld-specific build and replace it.

When a mod is the suspect:

Move every mod out of the mods folder using File Manager.
Start the server. If it's stable, you've confirmed mods are the problem.
Add mods back one at a time, restarting between each, until the bad one surfaces.
Check the mod's page for version compatibility — after every Palworld update, expect at least a few mods to need their own updates.

Install instructions: /knowledgebase/how-can-i-add-mods-to-my-palworld-server.

7. Crossplay and the server browser

Crossplay has been stable and default-on since v0.5.0 (March 2025). PC, Xbox, and PS5 can all play together without extra setup. Two things still catch people out:

Console players cannot direct-connect. Xbox and PS5 players can only find your server via the in-game community browser. If your server isn't showing up there, console friends can't join at all. Make sure PublicIP / PublicPort are set correctly and UDP 8212 is open so the query listing works.
Version mismatches after a patch. When Pocketpair ships an update, everyone needs to be on the same build. If your server is on an older version than the client, you'll get timeouts. Use Steam Update in the control panel to pull the latest.

For server-list visibility specifically (it's been historically flaky under load), see /knowledgebase/palworld-server-list-and-password-issues.

Admin commands reference (useful once you're actually connected): /knowledgebase/palworld-rcon-commands. Note that Pocketpair has deprecated RCON in favour of the REST API, so newer builds prefer that — the commands are the same, the transport is different.

Still stuck

Grab these before you open a ticket, it genuinely halves the turnaround:

Self-hosting or on a host?
Exact IP:PORT you're joining.
Can the server owner join locally?
Can someone on a different network join?
Server OS and whether you changed -port=.
The last 50 lines of Log Viewer output from around the problem.

Support is 24/7 and we'll dig in. Pricing and plan info is over on /game-servers/palworld-server-hosting if you're looking to move up a tier.