{{Cleanup|Some parts of the article should be moved to a tutorial page}}
{{Exclusive|Java}}
[[File:Mclauncher game crash debug 2020.png|thumb|The {{el|je}} crash screen in the current launcher.]]
[[File:Out of Memory 1.21.4.png|thumb|A world crashing due to running out of memory.]]

'''Crashes''' are unexpected shutdowns of ''Minecraft'', generally caused by unhandled "exceptions" while running the game. When ''Minecraft'' crashes, it typically closes immediately, though it may show an error report marking the location of the exception that caused the crash instead of closing. A sign of a server crash during gameplay is a "Saving [[chunks]]" or "Shutting down internal server" screen.

The most common causes of crashes are [[mod]]s, pre-existing bugs, and updates. Attempting to modify the files of ''Minecraft'' or individual worlds, even with advanced editors, can also cause crashes. Crashes can also be caused by bugs in the game. Crashes can sometimes cause the corruption of save files if the player is not careful enough. Because of this, it is highly recommended that the player regularly keeps a copy of their save folder (located in the [[.minecraft]] directory), to reduce their losses should a world become corrupted as a result of a crash. Alternatively, they could make a backup. Large [[TNT]] explosions can also cause crashes.

Crashes used to have an error report screen, but that feature has been removed. Yet sometimes, an error report can quickly flash right before the game closes. ''Minecraft'' occasionally does this on startup, except it stays there, not allowing the player to play the game.
[[Tutorials/How to get a crash report|A tutorial exists]] for obtaining the report file generated by the game when it crashes so that the player can share it for diagnosis.

== Causes of crashes ==
=== Mods ===
{{see also|ftb:Troubleshooting}}

Crashes can easily occur due to bugged mods (particularly unfinished mod versions (alpha/beta), much of Fabric mods under certain conditions, etc.), mod conflicts (particularly in older Minecraft versions when mods used a config file to determine item/block IDs and they weren't changed by the end-user), or wrong versions of mods (for example, many of the [[Java Edition 1.7.10|1.7.10]] mods are not compatible in [[Java Edition 1.13|Java Edition 1.13]] due to the [[Java Edition data values|data values]] changes introduced by [[the Flattening]], but almost all mods for [[Java Edition 1.16.2]], [[Java Edition 1.16.3|1.16.3]] and [[Java Edition 1.16.4|1.16.4]] can run on [[Java Edition 1.16.5]], as Java Edition 1.16.3 and 1.16.5 are minor updates with just minor fixes).

If the player has installed several mods, if using the older launcher, they should try renaming the "bin" directory in the ''Minecraft'' folder, then start ''Minecraft'' (Or replace the current minecraft.jar with a clean minecraft.jar from either a clean backup, download a jar file from the internet or force update the game should cause the player to get a new clean jar file.). A new bin folder is created. The player should remove the problematic mod. Now, the player should install each mod they desire one at a time, starting ''Minecraft'' and assuring that there is no crashing for each mod. Once the crashing starts occurring again, the last mod installed is likely the problem, or another mod simply does not work with it. Either way, the player should either remove the mod they determined to be causing problems, or repeat the first step, except without installing the problematic mod.

=== Incorrect Java version ===
Recent versions of ''Minecraft'' require significantly newer versions of Java than versions prior to 1.16. Older versions could run on Java 6, 7, or 8, while the newer versions require Java 16, 17 or 21. Recent Java versions broke the backward compatibility that existed up to Java 8, introducing breaking changes that stop older programs from running on newer versions of Java. If the incorrect version is used, the game crashes during startup due to ''Minecraft'' attempting to use functions and commands that aren't in the Java version the game is expecting to run on, or in later versions, crashing when it detects an incompatible version of Java.

The incorrect version of Java may be used by unofficial launchers, such as MultiMC or Prism, incorrectly detecting the wrong version of Java for the game version, or defaulting to a Java 8 installation which ''Minecraft'' 1.17 and later is not compatible with, or Java 16 or later for 1.16 or earlier. Manual configuration is required to get the launcher to use the latest compatible version of Java for the ''Minecraft'' version being played.

=== Hardware problems ===
Problems with the player's computer's hardware can also easily cause crashing, or buggy behavior. If this is the case, it's likely that they are experiencing problems in other, unrelated games as well. If ''Minecraft'' is the only game experiencing issues, then it is unlikely to be a hardware issue.

If the player is indeed experiencing crashing or visual corruption in other games as well, the first thing to check is whether their computer's vents are blocked, or clogged with dust (which inevitably occurs over time). Dust or vent/fan blockages can cause overheating, which may not be severe enough to cause problems during normal computer use, but during more intensive activities such as gaming, the temperature may spike. If the player is using a laptop, they should make sure any vents on its sides or bottom are neither blocked nor filled with dust. For a desktop, the player should check obvious fan locations for blockages, and use a flashlight to peer inside the case. If there is much dust, or any internal fans appear to not be spinning, the player should either take their computer to a repair shop for a "tune-up" (mention that the player suspects there is overheating problems), or read a few tutorials online related to computer cleaning (note that a computer's internal components are highly sensitive to damage from ESD (Electrostatic Discharge, basically a static shock), so it would not be difficult for the player to accidentally damage their computer).

If the player's computer appears to not be suffering from overheating related issues, another cause of game crashing could be a damaged component, especially either the RAM, or the video card. If the problem just recently started occurring, and the player has not recently installed any major updates or software such as Anti-Virus suites, the player may want to take their computer to a shop to have it tested, or they can do it themselves using tools such as "memtest86+", "Furmark", etc. (however these tools tend to require a medium to large amount of computer knowledge).

It should be noted that even if the player's computer meets the basic system requirements of ''Minecraft'', there is a possibility that their hardware might have unique issues, one being the use of Intel GMA (Graphics Media Accelerator) cards, known for issues with OpenGL. However, if the player's graphics card is one of those cards, they can still play 1.7.10 and 1.8. <!-- Step 1: Open your version jar (let's say 1.7.10.jar). Step 2: Drag all the files from [http://www.planetminecraft.com/mod/mod-opengl-fixer/ this mod] into 1.7.10.jar. Step 3: Save the jar file. Step 4: Play. Note that you cannot use mods if you do this, but at least you can play ''Minecraft''.mainly you have to delete some of the minecraft mods or just one because it could also be the mods and not just the java,etc. -->

=== Software ===
Though unlikely, unrelated software can conceivably cause crashing in games such as ''Minecraft''. The most likely candidates are User Account Control (Windows), Gatekeeper (macOS), various types of Anti-Malware (i.e. Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware, Firewall, etc.) software, which could either consume enough system resources to choke other resource hungry applications, or could cause issues as a result of their "Heuristic" real-time scanning. If the player recently installed an application such as AV software, they should try disabling it. If Minecraft stops crashing, they know the AV program is the perpetrator. The player can either remove it (not recommended for security reasons), or configure it to ignore Minecraft's folder and executable. If they are unsure of how to, they can look up some tutorials on the Internet. Alternatively, system processes can often consume a lot of resources (most infamously Windows 10). If there is too much system overhead, there is really not much one can do besides attempting to disable those processes or switch operating systems. Another certain crash is to set all the files in the .minecraft folder to read-only.

=== JVM crashes ===
JVM crashes occur when the Java Virtual Machine, the program that runs Minecraft itself, crashes. These are almost always caused by doing large, potentially groundbreaking operations like moving many blocks, exploding a lot of TNT, or other memory or processor intensive activities, and additionally almost always are caused by running out of RAM. These are unique in that the crash message is quite different, having come from the JVM's crash handler rather than Minecraft's handler. Because of this, they do not generate a crash report in the .minecraft/crash-reports directly, but rather one directly in the .minecraft folder, with name "hs_err_pid<PID>.log" where <PID> is the Process ID of the JVM at that time. Additionally, these crashes cannot be stopped by mods that "catch" Minecraft crashes, like VanillaFix.

=== Manual initiation ===
The player can also trigger a crash manually by holding {{key|F3}} and {{key|C}}. This is used for debugging, and is the safest possible crash.
On some computers, pressing {{key|FN}}  enables the F3 key.

=== Ticking entities ===
Rarely, a ticking [[entity]] may also crash the game, either vanilla (particularly in certain development versions) or [[#Mods|modded]].

==== Ticking block entities ====
The rarest type of crashing possible is that of a ticking [[block entity]]. However, ticking non-vanilla block entities from buggy mods are very easy and common.

=== Old versions ===
Minecraft [[Java Edition Indev|Indev]] might trigger a NullPointerException when generating a new world of the size "huge". Some versions might not start and throw an exception instantly.

=== Specific development versions ===

For certain development versions, [[Java Edition removed blocks/Metadata variants#Removed in 1.8 (14w26a)|certain blocks with extreme data values such as overgrown cocoa, wheat, melon and pumpkin stems]] may cause the game to crash due to the invalid block rendering, particularly development versions from [[Java Edition 13w02a|13w02a]] to [[Java Edition 13w09c|13w09c]] of [[Java Edition 1.5|1.5]] and from [[Java Edition 14w10a|14w10a]] to [[Java Edition 14w25b|14w25b]] of [[Java Edition 1.8|1.8]].

In [[Java Edition 20w14∞]], certain biomes in the generated dimensions may cause the game to crash, depending on the seed, due to exceptions in [[wp:Java (programming language)|Java]], such as "bound must be positive" and "Exception generating new chunk". However, they are exceptionally rare to find the crashing biomes, since most dimensions do not contain the crashing biomes generated near the center of the world.

=== Server-caused crashes ===
It is very rare but possible for a server to cause the client to crash (particularly some of the buggy mods). Crashing a server using the world height limit crashes both the server and client. If a server has too much lag, it might randomly crash the client multiple times until it stops lagging.

== Witty comments ==
Witty comments are phrases shown at the top of crash reports generated using the process shown earlier in this article. They do not show on crash screens and are similar in nature to [[splash]]es. They can be changed by changing the player's minecraft.jar .class files. They are selected using the system's time in nanoseconds.
<!--

PLEASE NOTE: Any explanations left blank are too vague or too simple to have an obvious reference, unless a Mojang source is provided. Feel free to post on the talk page for possible origins, but if it isn't obvious or no quote can be found, do not make it an actual description.

-->
{| class="wikitable" style="width: 750px" data-description="Witty comments"
|-
! scope="col" width="50%" | Witty comment
! scope="col" width="50%" | Explanation
|-
| Who set us up the TNT?
| A [[wiktionary:snowclone|snowclone]] of "Somebody set up us the bomb" from a badly translated English version of the 1991 game [[wikipedia:All your base are belong to us|''Zero Wing'']].
|-
| Everything's going to plan. No, really, that was supposed to happen.
| <!-- Might be a reference to the manual debug crashes  -->
|-
| Uh... Did I do that?
| Possibly a reference to the catchphrase of Family Matters character Steve Quincy Urkel
|-
| Oops.
|
|-
| Why did you do that?
|
|-
| I feel sad now :(
|
|-
| My bad.
|
|-
| I'm sorry, Dave.
| Part of the famous quote "I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that." from the movie [[wikipedia:2001: A Space Odyssey (film)|''2001: A Space Odyssey'']].
|-
| I let you down. Sorry :(
|
|-
| On the bright side, I bought you a teddy bear!
|
|-
| Daisy, daisy...
|A second reference to the movie [[wikipedia:2001: A Space Odyssey (film)|''2001: A Space Odyssey'']], where the Hal 9000 sings a song as Dave tries to turn him off.
|-
| Oh - I know what I did wrong!
| A cross-reference to the "I just don't know what went wrong :(" witty comment.
|-
| Hey, that tickles! Hehehe!
|
|-
| I blame Dinnerbone.
| [[Dinnerbone]] is a [[Mojang Studios|Mojangsta]].
|-
| You should try our sister game, Minceraft!
| References the [[Easter eggs#Minceraft|easter egg]] in ''Minecraft'' where the title screen has a 1 in 10,000 (0.01%) chance to rearrange the ''C'' and ''E'' in the title.
|-
| Don't be sad. I'll do better next time, I promise!
|
|-
| Don't be sad, have a hug! <3
|
|-
| I just don't know what went wrong :(
| A cross-reference to the "Oh - I know what I did wrong!" witty comment. In addition to that, it is a reference to a line the character Derpy says in S2E14 "The Last Roundup" of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
|-
| Shall we play a game?
| Quote from the movie [[wikipedia:WarGames|''WarGames'']] when the character David Lightman first contacts the computer Joshua.
|-
| Quite honestly, I wouldn't worry myself about that.
| Another quote from from ''2001: A Space Odyssey''. HAL's answer to Frank: asking: ''Well of course I know all the wonderful achievements of the 9000 series, but, uh, are you certain there has never been any case of even the most insignificant computer error?''
|-
| I bet Cylons wouldn't have this problem.
| The [[wikipedia:Cylon (Battlestar Galactica)|Cylons]] are a recurring part of the show ''Battlestar Galactica''.
|-
| Sorry :(
|
|-
| Surprise! Haha. Well, this is awkward.
| <!-- Please add or improve the description, if possible. -->
|-
| Would you like a cupcake?
| 
|-
| Hi. I'm Minecraft, and I'm a crashaholic.
| The common introduction in Alcoholics Anonymous meetings (and other addiction help groups) where the current speaker starts off with "Hi, my name is _____ and I'm an alcoholic".
|-
| Ooh. Shiny.
| 
|-
| This doesn't make any sense!
|
|-
| Why is it breaking :(
|
|-
| Don't do that.
|
|-
| Ouch. That hurt :(
|
|-
| You're mean.
| This was one of the quotes from the [[Java Edition 2.0]] April fool's joke.
|-
| This is a token for 1 free hug. Redeem at your nearest Mojangsta: [~~HUG~~]
| A reference to a [https://web.archive.org/web/20191213171225/https://twitter.com/Dinnerbone/status/395658346478710784 post] [[Dinnerbone]] made to twitter prior to the 2013 Minecon entitling anyone who saw him to "1 free hug", and again other similar posts he has made throughout the years.
|-
| There are four lights!
| From <span title="Chain of Command: Part 2">Season 6, Episode 11</span> of the show [[wikipedia:Star Trek: The Next Generation|''Star Trek: The Next Generation'']] where Capt. Jean-Luc Picard is captured and tortured by Cardassians, which itself is a reference to a torture scene in ''[[w:Nineteen_Eighty-Four|1984]]'' by George Orwell.
|-
| But it works on my machine.
| An excuse some developers use when a bug occurs, claiming that it works on their machine but fails on someone else's.
|-
| Witty comment unavailable :(
| Displayed if a comment fails to get selected, which is rare due to the way the comments are coded. Ironically, this ''is'' a witty comment.
|}

==== Other types ====
{| class="wikitable" style="width: 750px" 
|+Network Protocol Error-specific witty comments
!Witty comment
!Explanation
|-
|0xBADF00D
|
|-
| +'${`%&NO CARRIER
| 
|-
|Please insert The Internet CD #4
|
|-
|Sabotage!
|
|-
|Are you sure you are not moving wrongly?
|
|-
|This time is not my fault, I promise!
|
|-
|All lines are down!
|
|-
|Maybe a shark bit some cable
|
|-
|404
|
|-
|I'm sorry, I don't speak that language
|
|-
|What we've got here is failure to communicate
|
|-
|It's the tubes, they're clogged!
|Reference to Ted Stevens' famous phrase "[[Wikipedia:Series of tubes|It's a series of tubes]]", referring to the Internet.
|-
|Abort, Retry, Ignore?
|Refers to an error message seen in DOS-based operating systems, often used in the 1980s and 1990s.
|-
|Could be worse, I guess
|
|-
|Wait, was the last bit one or zero?
|
|-
|Too many suspicious packets
|
|-
|Don't worry, I'll be fine
|
|-
|Maybe this time it will work!
|
|-
|I heard pigeons are more reliable
|Reference to RFC 1149, an April Fools' proposal to use homing pigeons for internet data transfers. 
|}
{| class="wikitable" style="width: 750px"
|+Chunk IO Error-specific witty comments
!Witty comment
!Explanation
|-
|I have failed you!
|
|-
|Let's not do it again...
|
|-
|Worst magic trick ever!
|
|-
|Remember to backup your worlds regularly
|
|-
|Pirates stole your chunk!
|
|-
|Ideally, this shouldn't be here
|
|-
|Let's hope it wasn't anything important
|
|-
|Computers were a mistake
|
|-
|Welp
|
|-
|Not my proudest moment
|
|-
|Who needs blocks in a block game, right?
|
|-
|This chunk is no more...it has ceased to be...this is an EX-chunk
|Reference to the "{{w|Dead Parrot sketch}}" from ''{{w|Monty Python's Flying Circus}}''.
|-
|loss.mca
|Reference to the webcomic ''Ctrl+Alt+Del''<nowiki/>'s "Los<nowiki/>s" strip, which has become a meme.
|}

== Hopper ==
{{About|the crash report system|the redstone component|Hopper|section=1}}
Hopper is a non-publicly viewable crash report utility, operated by Mojang, which manages, stores and maintains crash reports, originally exclusively for technical Minecraft troubleshooting.
In 2019, its help articles were moved to https://minecrafthopper.net and all Hopper pages are redirected to the new site. This new site is maintained by the community and contributions are welcome in [https://github.com/MinecraftHopper/MinecraftHopper its repository on GitHub].

=== History ===
{{HistoryTable
|{{HistoryLine||July 10, 2013|link=none|Hopper is launched.}}
|{{HistoryLine||July 14, 2013|link=none|Hopper implemented to the [[Minecraft launcher]].}}
|{{HistoryLine||July 15, 2013|link=none|Hopper submits crash reports to the database.}}
|{{HistoryLine||November 11, 2019|link=none|Hopper articles are moved to MinecraftHopper.net and starts accepting pull requests on GitHub.}}
}}

== Gallery ==
<gallery>
Minecraft Alpha Crash.png|A crash screen in [[Alpha]].
Old Minecraft crash window.png|A crash screen in [[Beta]].
Crash.png|The old ''Minecraft'' crash screen, with more options. Image for [[Launcher 1.3.8]]
Out of Memory.png|A world crashing due to running out of memory.
</gallery>

== References ==
{{reflist}}

== Navigation ==
{{Navbox Java Edition technical|general}}

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