Minecraft is a video game created by Swedish programmer Markus “Notch” Person and later developed and published by Mojang. In Minecraft, players will have to build elements from the simplest of homes to the grandest of castles.
In 2011, PC Gamer conducted a test using various computer setups with different hardware specifications to see how much space was needed for each medium size map generated in Minecraft.
How much space does Minecraft take up?
The amount of space your Minecraft world takes up largely depends on how much you play. If you’re a casual player, running around for an hour or two at a time every few days, then 5GB should be plenty enough. On the other hand if you are planning to go on epic adventures lasting many hours whilst using mods and resource packs, to build massively detailed structures with amazing castles and cities, maybe 10GB might not cut it.
For most players though somewhere, between 1-5GB will do just fine. This is particularly true if all you want to do is build small things without needing too many resources. See below for tips on cutting down your storage usage further still if needed.
Minecraft Small Size Map Requirements
- Average PC Middle-of-The-Road 7zip File Size: 2.16 GB.
- At max settings, this size map provides you a field of view up to fifty blocks in any direction at one time.
The Small size is what Minecraft refers to as the default map. A new player’s first experience is on a small world, which measures 1024 by 1024 blocks (or 16×16) and has an elevation of zero. The recommended computer specs for this setting is 2 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor 1 GB of RAM (1.5 GB if on Windows Vista 32-bit) 256 MB Video Card that supports Pixel Shader v1.1 A flat-screen color monitor that runs at least 800×600 resolution.
Interesting Fact: If you were to fill each square block with one torch, it would take 735,921 torches (average middle-of-the-road pc) to light the entire surface.
Minecraft Medium Size Map Requirements
- Average PC Middle-of-The-Road 7zip File Size: 4.15 GB.
- At max settings, this size map provides you a field of view up to 100 blocks in any direction at one time.
Minecraft Large Size Map Requirements
- Average PC Middle-of-The-Road 7zip File Size: 8.23 GB.
- At max settings, this size map provides you a field of view up to 200 blocks in any direction at one time. This is ample space for most gamers and is what Minecraft refers to as the “long range” view distance.
Minecraft Huge Size Map Requirements
- Average PC Middle-of-The-Road 7zip File Size: 20.97 GB.
- At max settings, this size map provides you a field of view up to 400 blocks in any direction at one time. This is what Minecraft refers to as the “far” view distance.
Functions of huge map size
Huge maps are only recommended for use on server because it requires too much data and rendering to be displayed at once (even for an average computer). This map will make everything appear ultra smooth even if the framerate is low, which causes lag or stuttering when large numbers of objects are rendered on screen at once.
If you were still determined to play on an incredibly large world, there is an option to view it only in the “far” distance. To do this, select Video Settings in Minecraft and choose a far render distance in Advanced Video Settings. Of course, since normal render distances are smaller in size than huge worlds, you will have a hard time locating ores and other important objects.
Read More: How To Turn On Hitboxes In Minecraft? Interesting Facts And Figure About Hitbox.
How to manage world size?
As for managing your world size, the F3 key opens up the debug screen which displays map coordinates when clicked on. Pressing P will toggle between different types of views showing X/Z coordinates along with height differences from each layer. The top left box shows how many chunks have been generated so far.
How much space does Minecraft Java Edition take up?
The “vanilla” or untouched Minecraft Java Edition file size requirements are between 1 GB of HDD space (minimum) and 4 GB of SSD space (recommended), however it is likely that you need considerably less storage than this. As an example, my installation takes up 815 MB on my external hard drive and the boot time has increased from 20 seconds to 32 seconds compared to when I had 1 GB available.
Space occupy at first download
When you first download Minecraft, the download itself takes up about 150+ MB. However, if you have downloaded Minecraft before, there will be a cached version available for use which only takes up about 2-3 MB even though it will be if no internet connection is available. Once the Minecraft launcher is open, there are numerous ways to control how much space your installation takes up.
Space occupy due to mods
Secondly, most significantly, are mods. If you have played with them before and they’ve been placed in the Minecraft “mods” folder, then these can take up a significant amount of space which otherwise could have been used for more vanilla features. For example, my Tekkit Lite mod pack has taken up approximately 240 MB of additional storage on my hard drive even though I only use mods which aesthetic changes such as those for additional construction blocks.
Space occupy due to custom texture
Thirdly, custom texture packs are another file type which will increase the space your installation takes up. However, there are a number of ways to deal with this problem if you would like to use customized textures without impacting on the amount of storage used by Minecraft. Here’s some information I found useful about how it can be done. Minecraft Launcher, Change Resource Pack Location.
What size of hard drive?
These values were calculated by comparing my installation to Technic’s Java Edition – Game Repacks, post which displays the data stored in three different installations (minimum, recommended, maximum).
The storage space was calculated using gb = GB or GiB = gibibyte or 1024^3 bytes. Note that actual installed sizes may vary slightly due to differences in computer hardware and operating systems.
Minimum:
- 1 GB HDD or 512 MB SSD
Recommended:
- 4 GB HDD or 2 GB SSD
Maximum:
- 8 GB HDD or 4 GB SSD + a few extra gigs for customizability with resource packs and mod packs.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Is it easy to clear the space?
Yes, it is quite simple and easy.
- Does minecraft takes more space with the time?
Yes, as you played regularly it takes more space because everyday it updraged.
