Installation

The one-line installers are the recommended way to install CraftPanel. They download the latest release from GitHub, verify its checksum and set CraftPanel up to run in the background. Nothing is built on your machine.

Works on Debian, Ubuntu, Raspberry Pi OS and other distributions with systemd, on x64, ARM64 and ARMv7.

curl -fsSL https://github.com/vctrchappot/CraftPanel/releases/latest/download/install.sh | sudo bash

What the installer sets up:

The app in /opt/craftpanel and your data in /var/lib/craftpanel.
Two hardened systemd services, craftpanel (dashboard) and craftpanel-runtime (Minecraft), running as an unprivileged craftpanel user.
Node.js: your system Node.js if it is 22.13 or newer, otherwise a private copy in /opt/craftpanel/node. Your system Node.js is not changed.
Settings in /etc/craftpanel/craftpanel.env, created once and kept on updates.

Options go after bash -s --, for example curl … | sudo bash -s -- --port 8090:

Option	Effect
`--port 8090`	Dashboard port (default 8080)
`--version 1.0.0`	Install a specific release
`--archive file.tar.gz`	Install offline from a downloaded release (verified if `SHA256SUMS` is next to it)
`--uninstall`	Remove CraftPanel; keeps your data and settings

Works on Windows 10 and 11 (x64 and ARM64). Open PowerShell as administrator, signed in with the Windows account that should own CraftPanel, and run:

irm https://github.com/vctrchappot/CraftPanel/releases/latest/download/install.ps1 | iex

What the installer sets up:

The app in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\CraftPanel and your data in %LOCALAPPDATA%\CraftPanel.
The CraftPanel Runtime Windows service (runs Minecraft, starts at boot) and a CraftPanel task that starts the dashboard when you sign in.
A Start-menu entry that opens the dashboard.
Settings in config.env in the install folder.

Options are environment variables set before the command, for example $env:CRAFTPANEL_PORT = "8090":

Variable	Effect
`CRAFTPANEL_PORT`	Dashboard port (default 8080)
`CRAFTPANEL_PROFILE`	`lan` (reachable from your network) or `local`
`CRAFTPANEL_INSTALL_VERSION`	Install a specific release
`CRAFTPANEL_ARCHIVE`	Install offline from a downloaded release
`CRAFTPANEL_UNINSTALL = "1"`	Remove CraftPanel; keeps your data

Administrator rights are only needed to register the runtime service. Later updates run as your normal account.

There is no installer for macOS yet. Run the release archive with Node.js:

Install Node.js 22.13 or newer, for example with brew install node.
Download craftpanel-vX.Y.Z.tar.gz from the latest release and unpack it.
In the unpacked folder, start the runtime in one terminal:
Terminal window
```
node apps/api/dist/runtime.js
```
Start the dashboard in a second terminal:
Terminal window
```
node apps/api/dist/index.js --profile lan
```

Data lives in ~/Library/Application Support/CraftPanel. To start CraftPanel at login, create two LaunchAgents (runtime and dashboard).

When the installer finishes, it prints the dashboard address and a one-time setup token. Continue with your first server.

Raspberry Pi

Use a 64-bit Raspberry Pi OS. Java builds for Minecraft are 64-bit.
A Pi 4 or 5 with 4–8 GB RAM runs a small Paper server well. Give it 1.5–3 GB and pick the Raspberry Pi / small VPS performance preset in the wizard.
Put worlds and backups on an SSD rather than the SD card.

VPS

Install exactly as on Linux. Two things differ on a server in a data center:

Open the Minecraft port (25565 by default) in your provider’s firewall. It is public by design.
Keep the dashboard private: reach it through a VPN, an SSH tunnel (ssh -L 8080:127.0.0.1:8080 user@vps) or an HTTPS reverse proxy. See remote access.

From source

For development, or if you prefer to build it yourself. You need Node.js 22.13+ (24 LTS recommended), pnpm and Git.

git clone https://github.com/vctrchappot/CraftPanel.git craftpanel
cd craftpanel
corepack enable            # Node 25+: npm install -g pnpm
pnpm install
pnpm build
pnpm start                 # or pnpm start:lan for other devices

pnpm start starts the Minecraft runtime and the dashboard together; Ctrl+C saves and stops your servers and closes both. Update a checkout with ./update.sh (Linux/macOS) or update.cmd (Windows).