How to Pregenerate Your Minecraft World With Chunky

A Chunky pregenerate task creates the chunks of your Minecraft world in advance, so the server does not have to build terrain while players fly around. Install the Chunky plugin, type chunky radius 5000 and chunky start in the console, and let it run until it reaches 100%. Pair it with a world border so nobody walks out of the pre-generated area.

Why pregenerate a Minecraft world

Generating a chunk means running terrain noise, caves, structures and features for a 16×16 column of the world. Loading a chunk that already exists is far cheaper. When several players explore in different directions with elytra, the server can spend most of each tick generating terrain, and that is when TPS drops and everyone feels the lag. Pregeneration moves that cost to a moment you choose, like the night before you open the server.

It also helps with maps (web maps render faster when the area exists) and with predictability: you know how big the world folder will be before launch. If your server already lags for other reasons, our Minecraft server lag fix covers the rest of the checklist.

Install Chunky

Chunky is open source (its code is on GitHub under pop4959/Chunky) and Modrinth lists builds for Paper, Spigot, Folia, Fabric, Forge, NeoForge and Sponge, including the 26.x versions. Download the build that matches your server software and Minecraft version:

• Paper, Purpur, Spigot or Folia: put the jar in the plugins folder. Our guide on installing plugins on a Paper server shows the full process.
• Fabric, Forge or NeoForge: put it in the mods folder; check the Modrinth page for any dependency the loader needs.

Restart the server. When it loads, typing chunky in the console lists the commands.

How to Chunky pregenerate your world step by step

Run these in the server console, where commands go without a slash. In game you need the chunky.command.* permissions (operators have them).

1. Make a backup first. On TheGameHosting, open the Backups tab and create one.
2. Pick the world: chunky world world. On Paper the dimensions are separate worlds named world, world_nether and world_the_end; press Tab after chunky world to see the names your server uses.
3. Set the center: chunky center 0 0, or chunky spawn to center on the world spawn.
4. Set the radius in blocks: chunky radius 5000. That is 5,000 blocks from the center in each direction.
5. Start it: chunky start. The console prints progress, chunk rate and an ETA.
6. Pause with chunky pause when players join, and resume with chunky continue. Progress is saved.
7. When it hits 100%, set a world border with the same center and radius so players stay in the generated area.

chunky world world
chunky shape square
chunky center 0 0
chunky radius 5000
chunky start

The default selection, according to the Chunky wiki, is a square of radius 500 centered at 0, 0 in the overworld (a 1000×1000 area), so always set your own radius. The radius accepts suffixes: 5k means 5,000 blocks and c counts in chunks. Add + or - to grow or shrink the current value.

How big should the radius be

A square selection of radius r covers (2r)² blocks, so the work grows fast. Every chunk is 16×16 blocks:

Double the radius and you have four times the chunks, the time and the disk space. Start small; you can always run a second task with a bigger radius later and Chunky skips chunks that are already generated.

The Nether, the End and the world border

Each dimension is its own task. The Nether is scaled 1:8 against the overworld, so a 5,000-block overworld border matches 625 blocks in the Nether:

chunky world world_nether
chunky center 0 0
chunky radius 625
chunky start

If you already set a world border, skip the center and radius and use chunky worldborder: it copies the border's center and radius into the selection. Since Minecraft 1.21.9 every dimension has its own border, so set one per dimension. Our world border guide has the exact commands.

Useful options and warnings

• If the server restarts mid-task, run chunky continue. To resume automatically, set continue-on-restart: true in plugins/Chunky/config.yml (it is false by default).
• Pregeneration keeps the CPU busy. Run it when nobody is online or pause it during play.
• Keep an eye on disk space in the Files tab while large tasks run.

Pregenerate faster on TheGameHosting

World generation is CPU work, which is why a TheGameHosting Minecraft server runs on AMD Ryzen 9950X and 7950X3D CPUs up to 5.7 GHz with NVMe storage. Install Chunky from the Plugins tab, run the task in the Console, make a backup in Backups before you trim anything, and leave it working overnight: the server stays online 24/7 without your PC. Plans start at $1.90 USD/month; see plans and pricing and use FULL2026 for 15% off for life.

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