Do I need to wipe my Palworld server for 1.0?

No. Your existing world carries over and there is no forced wipe. Pocketpair suggest starting a fresh character to see the reworked early game, but that is a choice, not a requirement. Some mission and Pal-spawn data is reset automatically; your levels are kept.

What does Palworld 1.0 add for dedicated server owners?

The map is roughly twice as large, in-game voice chat can be switched on per server, guilds get roles and permissions, and PvP is a proper mode you enable in the config. The bigger world means most busy servers want more RAM than they did in early access.

Is there server clustering in Palworld 1.0?

Not in any usable form. Despite the pre-launch talk, 1.0 shipped with no supported way to configure clustering, and the official docs do not mention it. Run separate servers for now and move Pals between them with the global Palbox.

Palworld 1.0 for server owners: what actually changed

Palworld 1.0 is live. The changes that matter if you run a dedicated server: a doubled map, in-game voice chat, guild roles, PvP, and what to do about your existing world.

Palworld left early access on 10 July 2026, and the 1.0 patch notes ran to about twenty-seven pages. Most of that is content you will meet in-game. This page is only the part that changes something for you as the person running the server, so you can decide what to do before your group logs in tonight.

Your world is fine, but read this first

The question everyone asked before launch was whether 1.0 would wipe saves. It does not. Your existing world loads on 1.0 and your Pals and levels come with it. Pocketpair's publishing lead put it plainly: you do not need to wipe, though he then suggested a fresh character gives you the best run at the reworked early game. That is a taste call for your group, not a technical requirement.

A few things do change automatically when an old world loads on 1.0, and it is better to know before someone panics in chat: main and side mission progress is reset (tower-boss missions you have already beaten are marked complete), and the random-Pal-spawn placement from the old version is not carried over. Accumulated experience is rebalanced to the new levelling table, but player levels are not reduced. None of this touches your bases or your Pals.

The full backup-and-update routine, including the one step that trips people up if they run mods, is in Updating your Palworld server to 1.0 safely. Read it before you patch.

The map roughly doubled

1.0 opens two new regions: Sunreach, a set of floating sky islands, and the World Tree, which is the story's climax. Add seven new small islands and a stack of new settlements and you are looking at close to twice the landmass of the 2024 launch, plus seventy-two new Pals. More world for the server to keep simulated means more memory in use on a busy save, which is the main reason a group that sat comfortably on a small plan through early access may want to size up now. Numbers are in How much RAM does a Palworld 1.0 server need?.

In-game voice chat is a server setting

This is the new toggle most groups will want. 1.0 adds proximity voice chat, and on a dedicated server it only works if you switch it on in the world settings. Two extra settings control how far your voice carries before it fades. One caveat worth knowing: voice chat is not available on the Microsoft Store build of the game, so a Game Pass PC player will not have it even when the rest of your group does. The exact settings are in Tuning Palworld world settings.

Guilds finally have roles

If you run a community rather than a friend group, this is the quiet upgrade that matters. Guilds now support multiple roles with their own permissions, structures that only certain roles can touch, login and logout notifications, and measures against name impersonation. It makes handing a trusted player some authority far less risky than it was.

PvP is a proper mode now

1.0 ships an official PvP mode, and you turn it on in the config rather than per player. If you want a server where people can actually fight, the setup and the death-penalty decision that goes with it are in Setting up a Palworld 1.0 PvP server.

The clustering everyone expected did not arrive

Plenty of pre-launch coverage, ours included, treated server clustering as a 1.0 headline. It is worth being straight about the reality: the 1.0 server binary carries some groundwork for it, but there is no supported way to configure a cluster, and the official docs say nothing about it. If you were planning around linking servers, hold off. What you can actually do today, and how to move Pals between separate servers in the meantime, is in Palworld server clustering: the honest state of it.

Updating on Hostd is one restart

Our Palworld image pulls the latest server build from Steam every time the container boots, so getting to 1.0 is a single restart from your dashboard, no tickets and no SteamCMD commands to run yourself. Take a backup first anyway, for the reasons in the update guide. If you are joining fresh rather than updating, start at Picking the right Palworld server plan.

Where to go next

Last updated 2026-07-10. Notice a mistake? Tell us.