07/26/2026

Best Palworld server settings (2026)

• Palworld
• Guides

Every Palworld server setting lives in one single file — PalWorldSettings.ini. And almost every problem people have with it comes down to two things: a badly formatted file the server silently ignores, and WorldOption.sav quietly overriding everything you typed. Since 1.0 landed on 10 July 2026 I get the same questions every week, so here it is in order — where the settings live, which ones actually matter, which ones quietly eat your CPU, and three ready-made presets you can copy.

If you're still setting the server up, start with the setup guide — this post picks up where that one ends.

Where the settings actually live

On Linux the file sits at Pal/Saved/Config/LinuxServer/PalWorldSettings.ini, on Windows at Pal\Saved\Config\WindowsServer\PalWorldSettings.ini. Next to it you'll find DefaultPalWorldSettings.ini — that one is only a template. Copy from it, but don't edit it, because the server never reads it.

The format is unforgiving: the file must be exactly two lines. Line one is the header [/Script/Pal.PalGameWorldSettings], line two is a single OptionSettings=(...) block with every value comma-separated. Miss one comma, quote or bracket and the server doesn't throw an error — it just ignores the whole file and boots on defaults. If your settings aren't applying, check the formatting first.

Settings are only read at startup, so a restart after every change is mandatory. The full parameter list is in the official documentation.

The trap: WorldOption.sav

This is the single biggest source of frustration and hardly anyone mentions it. Once the world has been generated, the server copies most world settings into WorldOption.sav and reads them from there ever after — not from the .ini. You can change ExpRate as often as you like and nothing will happen in game.

The exceptions are the things that aren't part of the world: server name, passwords, ports and slot count still come from PalWorldSettings.ini. That's why some settings apply and others don't — and why people conclude the file is broken.

• Delete WorldOption.sav — stop the server, back up the entire save folder, delete WorldOption.sav, start it again. The server rebuilds it from your .ini. The backup is not optional.
• palworld-worldoptions — a tool that generates a matching WorldOption.sav from your PalWorldSettings.ini. This is what I use when the world already has hours on it and I don't want to touch it.

The rates that actually change the game

Out of roughly a hundred settings, these few decide how the server feels. All default to 1.000000 unless noted; the complete list with defaults is on the Palworld wiki.

• ExpRate — XP multiplier for players and Pals. For a group playing two or three hours a week I set 1.5 to 2.0. Go above 3.0 and you'll clear the tech tree in the first weekend.
• PalCaptureRate — how easily Pals go into the sphere. 1.5 feels good, 2.0 removes basically all risk.
• PalEggDefaultHatchingTime — the default is 72 hours. Seventy-two. On a private server this is the first thing I lower, usually to 1 or 2.
• DeathPenalty — defaults to All, meaning you drop everything. Options are None, Item, ItemAndEquipment and All. For co-op with friends I use Item.
• NightTimeSpeedRate — night is the dullest part of the game. 2.0 halves it and nobody has ever complained.
• WorkSpeedRate and CollectionDropRate — how fast Pals work in base, and drops from ore and trees. 1.5 on both takes the grind out without making the game pointless.

Name, passwords, slots and crossplay

WorldOption.sav doesn't touch these, so you always change them in the .ini and they always apply.

• ServerName and ServerDescription — this is what people see in the community list. On a public server, this is the name they find you by.
• AdminPassword — empty by default. Set it immediately: without it you have no admin commands, and on a public server an empty password is an open door.
• ServerPassword — empty for public, set for private.
• ServerPlayerMaxNum — the range is 1 to 32. Set it explicitly; sources disagree on the default, so don't rely on it.
• CrossplayPlatforms — defaults to Steam, Xbox, PS5 and Mac. Leave it unless you deliberately want to lock a platform out.

One thing that catches everyone out: console players cannot type in an IP address. PS5 and Xbox only see servers in the in-game community list. If your server is private and hidden, console players simply can't reach it.

Settings that quietly kill your performance

A Palworld server doesn't fall over because of player count — it falls over because of how much it has to simulate. These four do the most damage.

• BaseCampWorkerMaxNum — how many Pals work in one base, default 15. This is the setting with the biggest performance impact: every worker means pathfinding, hunger ticks and task assignment every few seconds. Above 20 you feel it. One note from practice — it has been unreliable across versions, so after changing it, check in game that it actually took effect.
• BaseCampMaxNum — default 128, and that's a limit for the whole server, not per player. If you've got ten people who like building, this is the first number you lower.
• PalSpawnNumRate — how many wild Pals the world holds. Drop it to 0.7 and the server runs noticeably calmer while the world still feels alive.
• DropItemMaxNum — default is 3000 items on the ground. 2000 is plenty and takes a good chunk of load off.

And one that isn't a rate: bEnableInvaderEnemy=False turns off base raids. That's the single biggest win for stability, because the invader system is tied to a memory leak that pushes RAM up until the server crashes. I covered that in detail in the post about RAM.

Three ready-made presets

These are values I actually set. Anything not listed stays on default.

Chill co-op — the group that plays at weekends

• ExpRate 2.0, PalCaptureRate 2.0, WorkSpeedRate 1.5
• PalEggDefaultHatchingTime 1, NightTimeSpeedRate 2.0
• DeathPenalty None, bEnableInvaderEnemy False

Balanced — vanilla feel, less grind

• ExpRate 1.5, PalCaptureRate 1.5, CollectionDropRate 1.5
• PalEggDefaultHatchingTime 4, DeathPenalty Item
• BaseCampWorkerMaxNum 15, DropItemMaxNum 2000

Hardcore — for people who want it to hurt

• ExpRate 1.0, PalCaptureRate 1.0, PalEggDefaultHatchingTime 72
• DeathPenalty All, PlayerDamageRateDefense 0.7
• bEnablePlayerToPlayerDamage True

Admin: RCON is dead, use the REST API

If you search for Palworld admin commands, most guides will tell you to enable RCON. That advice is out of date. The official documentation states plainly that RCON is deprecated, that you should consider the REST API instead, and that RCON is scheduled to stop functioning in an upcoming update.

You enable the REST API with RESTAPIEnabled=True and RESTAPIPort=8212, and it authenticates over HTTP Basic with the user admin and your AdminPassword. You get info, metrics, announce, kick, ban, save and shutdown — all as clean JSON, which is far nicer for scripts and monitoring than RCON ever was.

A warning that's in the official docs too: the REST API is not built to sit on the internet. Basic auth runs over plain HTTP, so whoever can reach port 8212 with your password owns the server. Keep it on localhost or behind a firewall.

Commands you run in game still take a leading slash: /ShowPlayers, /Save, /Broadcast, /KickPlayer, /BanPlayer, /Shutdown. The full list is in the official docs.

What to skip

• Don't edit DefaultPalWorldSettings.ini. The server doesn't read it. Copy from it and edit PalWorldSettings.ini.
• Don't paste from generators blindly. Settings generators are handy, but they emit a block for the version they were written against. Check it against the wiki list before you paste.
• Myth: 32 in ServerPlayerMaxNum means 32 players. It doesn't. The slot count is permission; RAM is reality.
• Don't crank BaseCampWorkerMaxNum to 50. I see this constantly. You get the factory of your dreams and a server choking on pathfinding.
• Don't run a server with an empty AdminPassword. No admin commands, and if it's public it's wide open.

Where to run all this

The settings are free — but they're only as good as the box underneath them. BaseCampWorkerMaxNum, slot count and stability all come back to RAM and CPU clock in the end. On mcbalkan you get full access to PalWorldSettings.ini and the console, with no restrictions on what you're allowed to change, and when something breaks you talk directly to me — no ticket queue, no bot. See the Palworld hosting.