This guide will explain the watchdog component of your server and how to take proper action in case it crashes.

❓ What is Watchdog ❓

The watchdog is a component of the server that checks how much time a single tick takes. If the tick takes longer than it should, the watchdog will crash the server on purpose to avoid world corruption. 

What is a tick ?

Like in every game, for something to happen inside it, some code has to run. This code loops over and over to spawn mobs, calculate the result of damage, grow crops, change blocks with WorldEdit, and so on.

When that game loop happens (updates), we call that a tick.

The game normally runs at a fixed rate of 20 ticks per second, so one tick happens every 0.05 seconds (50 milliseconds, or five-hundredths of a second, or one twentieth of a second), making an in-game day last exactly 24000 ticks, or 20 minutes.
Source: Minecraft Wiki


Within a second, there are 20 ticks, meaning the game loop happens 20 times per second. So every tick takes at most 50 milliseconds. 

20 is known as TPS (ticks per second)
50 is known as MSPT (milliseconds per tick)

So by default, the watchdog crashes your server if a tick takes more than 60 milliseconds when it should normally take only 50 milliseconds.

🎯 How to Identify a Watchdog Error 🎯

Usually, if your server is crashed by the watchdog, you will see the following error in your console:

[FATAL]: A single server tick took 60.00 seconds (should be max 0.05)
[FATAL]: Considering it to be crashed, server will forcibly shutdown.

Also, a crash report should be generated, and it should start like this:

--- Minecraft Crash Report ----


Time:
Description: Watching Server

⚙️ How to Solve a Watchdog Error ⚙️

To solve the watchdog error, we suggest you try identifying the source of your lag that makes the server ticks take longer than they should. If you are on our Premium plans, or have the Premium Support Addon, our support can help you identify the cause and get it fixed, just open a support ticket!

After identifying the cause, you will be able to take action, depending on the case.


A possible cause of the situation may be a ticking entity or block on your server, or even a ticking world, as they can create huge amounts of lag and even crash the server.

Our guide explaining ticking entity errors and how to solve them can be found here.

World or chunk corruption can also be the source of the issue, causing significant lag and even crashing the server.

Our guide explaining how to remove specific chunks from your world using MCASelector is available here.

Improving server performance should help at any time.

We have guides for improving your Minecraft server performance here, Forge modded server performance here, and Fabric modded server performance here.

Disabling the watchdog by setting the max-tick-time value in the server.properties file to -1 is a last resort, but we do not recommend it because the watchdog crashes the server when it detects that a tick took longer than expected, which usually means your server is already crashed or unplayable.

Our guide explaining how to edit your server configuration files, including the server.properties file, is available here.

🎯 How to change the time a tick can take before crashing the server 🎯

This is changed from the max-tick-time option found in server.properties. Here is our guide explaining how to edit your server configuration files, including server.properties.


The maximum number of milliseconds a single tick may take before the server watchdog stops the server with the message A single server tick took 60.00 seconds (should be max 0.05). Considering it crashed, the server will be forcibly shutdown.
Source: Minecraft Wiki

This option is set by default to 60000 and we suggest you leave it like this.
Setting this option to -1 will disable the watchdog component permanently, but we do not recommend doing so.

If you have any issues regarding a watchdog error on your server, please contact us on live chat or via the ticket system.

❕Useful Links❕

- How to Downgrade Your World to an Older Version
- Corrupted World Error Type
- How to Edit Your Server Configuration Files

Updated on: 01/08/2023