DDoS-Protected VPS for Minecraft
If your Minecraft server is public — listed on server lists, open to anyone, or involved in competitive play — it will be DDoS attacked. Not might. Will. The Minecraft community has a well-documented DDoS culture: banned players, PvP rivals, and competing server owners use cheap booter services to take servers offline. A $10/month stresser can generate enough traffic to overwhelm an unprotected VPS. The question isn't whether you need DDoS protection, it's which provider handles it.
How Minecraft DDoS works
Minecraft servers are vulnerable to DDoS in ways that web servers aren't:
- Protocol amplification. The Minecraft handshake protocol can be abused to make the server perform expensive operations (world loading, entity processing) with minimal client input. A flood of connection attempts forces the server to allocate resources for each one.
- Low-volume effectiveness. Web servers behind CDNs can absorb gigabits of traffic. A Minecraft server on a 1Gbps VPS port can be disrupted with sustained traffic well under that threshold because the server process itself can't handle the packet rate, even if the network can.
- Public IP exposure. Server list sites (minecraft-server-list.com, etc.) publish your IP. Players connecting directly see it. There's no CDN layer to hide behind like there is for websites.
- UDP reflection. While Minecraft Java uses TCP, query ports and Bedrock Edition use UDP. UDP-based attacks are harder to filter because there's no connection state to validate.
Types of DDoS protection
Not all "DDoS protection" is equal. The protection needs to understand game traffic:
Network-level (volumetric) protection
Most VPS providers include basic volumetric DDoS protection — they detect large traffic floods and null-route or filter them at the network edge. This handles SYN floods and UDP amplification at the packet level. Hetzner, OVH, Vultr, and most tier-1 providers include this. It stops your server from being knocked offline by raw bandwidth, but it doesn't stop application-layer attacks that use valid-looking Minecraft connections.
Application-layer (game-aware) protection
Game-aware filtering understands the Minecraft protocol. It can distinguish between a real player connection and a bot flood. OVH's Game line provides this: their mitigation systems inspect game protocol packets and drop malformed or suspicious ones while passing legitimate traffic. This stops bot join floods, handshake abuse, and protocol-level attacks that volumetric protection misses.
IP hiding (proxy/tunnel)
Instead of filtering attacks, proxy-based protection hides your real server IP behind a intermediary. Players connect to the proxy IP, which forwards traffic to your actual server. TCPShield and Cosmic Guard are Minecraft-specific proxy services. The advantage: even if the proxy IP is attacked, your server stays up and you can rotate the proxy IP. The disadvantage: added latency (5-20ms depending on proxy location) and a dependency on a third-party service.
Which providers have it
| Provider | Protection type | MC-specific? | Starting price | CPU for MC |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| OVH Game | Network + application | Yes (game-tuned) | ~€50/mo | Excellent (dedicated, high-clock) |
| BuyVM | Network (DDoS-filtered IP) | No | $3.50 + $3/mo | Moderate (shared) |
| Hetzner | Network (standard) | No | €4.51/mo | Good (CCX = dedicated) |
| Netcup | Basic | No | ~€10/mo (RS) | Excellent (dedicated) |
| Contabo | None stated | No | ~$7/mo | Poor (shared 2GHz) |
| RackNerd | Basic | No | ~$11/yr | Poor (shared) |
OVH Game: the premium choice
OVH's Game servers include their most advanced DDoS mitigation, specifically tuned for game server protocols. The hardware is bare-metal dedicated servers with high-clock CPUs, so you get both protection and performance. The starting price (~€50/month) is steep compared to VPS options, but if your server is regularly attacked, the protection pays for itself in uptime.
BuyVM + DDoS IP: the budget choice
BuyVM offers DDoS-filtered IP addresses for $3/month as an add-on to any VPS plan. The base VPS starts at $3.50/month, so a DDoS-protected Minecraft setup costs $6.50/month total. The filtering is network-level (volumetric), not game-aware, but it handles the majority of attacks that budget Minecraft servers face. The CPU is shared and not ideal for large servers, but for 5-15 players with DDoS protection on a budget, nothing else comes close on price.
Hetzner: included standard protection
Hetzner includes standard DDoS protection on all servers. It handles volumetric attacks but isn't tuned for game traffic. Combined with Hetzner CCX's dedicated CPU (good for Minecraft performance), it's a solid choice for servers that face occasional attacks but aren't persistent targets.
Cloudflare won't help here
Cloudflare is the standard answer for DDoS protection on websites, but it doesn't work for Minecraft. Cloudflare's free and Pro tiers only proxy HTTP/HTTPS traffic. Minecraft runs on TCP port 25565. Cloudflare Spectrum can proxy arbitrary TCP traffic but is only available on Enterprise plans (hundreds of dollars per month) and adds latency that's acceptable for web traffic but noticeable in real-time game play.
For Minecraft-specific proxy protection at reasonable cost, look at TCPShield (free tier available for small servers) or Cosmic Guard instead.
Hiding your server IP
If your real server IP is already known, switching providers or adding DDoS protection doesn't help immediately because attackers will target the known IP. When migrating to a DDoS-protected setup:
- Get your new server running on the protected IP
- Update your DNS/server list entries to point to the new IP
- Keep the old server running briefly to redirect players
- Once all traffic is on the new IP, decommission the old one
Going forward, never expose your real server IP directly. Use a proxy service or the provider's DDoS-filtered IP as the public-facing address.
FAQ
Why are Minecraft servers DDoS targets?
Large young playerbase + easy grudge motivation + cheap booter services + publicly visible server IPs + fragile game protocol = frequent attacks. Public MC servers will be attacked eventually.
Best DDoS-protected VPS for Minecraft?
OVH Game (best protection, game-aware filtering, ~€50/mo). BuyVM + DDoS IP (best budget, $6.50/mo). Hetzner CCX (good standard protection included, ~€15/mo).
Can I use Cloudflare?
Not practically. Cloudflare free/Pro only proxy HTTP, not Minecraft's TCP traffic. Spectrum (Enterprise-only) costs hundreds per month and adds latency. Use a game-specific proxy (TCPShield) or provider-level protection instead.