Minecraft Java 26.3 "Wilderness Bound" is out: what it means for your server

Mojang has shipped Minecraft Java Edition 26.3, and it is a big one. Wilderness Bound adds a new forest biome, a campsite structure that generates across most wooded biomes, and a pile of new decorative blocks. Underneath all of that sits one of the largest data pack overhauls in years, a new windowing backend on the client, and a default setting change in server.properties that may catch a lot of server owners off guard!

Here is what is new, and more importantly, what you need to check before you automatically update your server at Nodecraft.

Allowlist is now default for Minecraft Servers

The Allowlist, formerly known as "whitelist", protects your server from unknown players joining it. With this update the white-list setting is now set to true by default.

If you spin up a new 26.3 server and hand the IP to your friends, nobody gets in until you add them. Existing servers keep whatever value is already in the file, so this only affects new installs and any setup that regenerates the config from scratch.

How can I Disable the Allowlist or Whitelist for my Minecraft Server?

• With Nodecraft, you can disable settings within the Players tab of the Minecraft server you created. Just make sure you restart the server, after.

• If you are hosting your Minecraft server yourself, you'll need to edit the server.properties file and set white-list=false . Save the file and restart your server.

• If you want to keep your server secure (our recommendation): Leave the feature enabled and then add players directly to your server's allowlist.. Nodecraft makes this easy with our custom control panel. You won't need to lookup the player's Minecraft UUID or edit files.

Minecraft Server Log lines are going away, use the Management Protocol instead

A handful of log lines that server software, wrappers, and bots have historically parsed have been removed. If you have automation that greps the console for events, test it against 26.3 before you upgrade your production instance.

The intended replacement is the Minecraft Server Management Protocol, now at version 3.1.0, which gained notifications for world upgrades on startup: upgrade started, upgrade progress, upgrade finished, and upgrade failed. That last one is genuinely useful if you automate version bumps across multiple worlds and want to catch a failed conversion before players join.

Mojang has asked for feature requests on the Feedback site if the protocol is missing an event you relied on in the logs.

Minecraft Server Performance Fixes

Two changes here should show up in tick times and world load:

• Structure location is faster. This affects /locate, explorer map generation, and anything that searches for structures at runtime.

• Chunk generation is faster generally.

A related bug fix is worth calling out for anyone watching disk usage: locating a structure previously created an empty region file for every candidate chunk in ungenerated terrain. On a busy server with players running around with explorer maps, that adds up.

Terrain rendering now uses MultiDrawIndirect on supported hardware, and level.dat keeps a version_history list of prior data versions, which makes diagnosing a world that has been upgraded through several versions much easier.

Datapack & Resource Pack Migrations

Data Pack format is now 121.0 and Resource Pack format is 97.1. Nearly all complicated datapacks will not work with this new format. Here are the highlights of the changes:

Number providers split in two. The old minecraft:number_provider is gone, replaced by minecraft:context_int_provider and minecraft:context_float_provider, each with a full library of math operations (add, sub, mul, div, mod, pow, sqrt, trig, rounding, weighted lists, score and storage lookups). Loot tables, villager trades, and enchantment values all now point at these.

References are now inline everywhere. Fields that used to accept a single value will generally accept a namespaced ID, a list of IDs, an inline object, a list of inline objects, or a tag ID. As a consequence, minecraft:reference has been removed from both loot functions and predicates, since every field can now reference directly.

Renamed fields across the board. In loot pool entries, conditions became condition and functions became modifier. In loot functions, function became type. In predicates, condition became type. minecraft:block_state_property is fully replaced by the new minecraft:match_block condition, and minecraft:value_check split into integer and float variants.

Brewing and pottery are data driven. Potion brewing now uses the minecraft:brewing recipe type with input, reagent, and output slots, and any item can go in any slot. Pottery sherds are data driven too, and minecraft:pot_decorations now stores four named item stacks instead of a list of four IDs. The #brewing_fuel item tag is gone, replaced by the new minecraft:brewing_fuel component, alongside a matching minecraft:cooking_fuel component for furnaces.

Cooking times changed. cookingtime is no longer optional, and Smoker and Blast Furnace recipes now use the same value as their Furnace counterparts, with the speedup handled by a number provider on the fuel. Custom recipes for those blocks need their cookingtime doubled. If you relied on the old default, use 200.

Worldgen registries moved. worldgen/configured_feature is now worldgen/feature with config inlined at the root, and worldgen/configured_carver is now worldgen/carver. Biome spawn settings moved out of biome files into the new Environment Attributes system. Density functions now evaluate in single precision rather than double, which can shift results for packs that leaned on floating point behavior.

Sign click events are off by default. Commands and other click events in sign text no longer fire, and text components on newly placed signs are not resolved. A new allow_op_features boolean restores the old behavior. Signs saved before this version are grandfathered in with the flag set to true, but anything you create from now on needs it set explicitly. Worth reviewing if your server uses command signs for warps or shops.

There are two new commands to go with all this: /posteffect for applying post-processing shaders to a player's screen, and /compute for evaluating the new number providers in a given context. /item picked up fill and override subcommands, and /execute gained a slots condition.

New Content Highlight for Minecraft 26.3

• Dappled Forest, a new biome generating near cold biomes, with poplar trees in red, orange, and yellow variants, each with matching falling leaf particles.

• Abandoned Camps, a new structure with a custom design for each of the eighteen biomes it generates in, stocked with chests and barrels.

• Cushions in all sixteen colors, crafted from three wool slabs, that you can place and sit on.

• Straw Beds, craftable from three hay bales for four beds, that let you skip the night without setting your spawn. Single use only, and they will not work in the Nether or the End.

• Wool and concrete stairs and slabs for every color. Wool variants still dampen vibrations, and concrete variants work in a stonecutter.

• Shelf Mushrooms growing on poplar trees, which are slightly bouncy, and Red Shrubs.

• Explorer Maps are real items now, each with its own icon, including new maps for Ancient Cities, Trial Chambers, Mineshafts, and more. Existing maps convert on world load.

• Order-independent transparency replaces the old Improved Transparency setting, fixing a long list of translucency rendering bugs at a higher performance cost. Players on weaker hardware may want it off.

• Spectators can now use portals, and the client has moved from GLFW to SDL3, which fixes a long list of input and fullscreen issues, especially on macOS and Linux.

Before You Update your MC Server. We Recommend:

• Back up your world. Non-negotiable on a version with worldgen and data format changes this deep.

• Check white-list in server.properties and set it deliberately.

• Test every data pack against format 121.0 on a copy of your world first. Assume it needs work.

• Audit any command signs for the new allow_op_features flag.

• Test log-parsing automation, or migrate it to the Management Protocol.

• If you run mods or plugins, wait for your platform to publish 26.3 builds before updating a live server.

To download the new server or client JAR for this Minecraft update we have made the files easy to download directly from Mojang here. You can also read the full changelog for Minecraft 26.3 on the official announcement.