Before you pick a plan or a host, the more useful question is what kind of server you actually want to run. Vanilla survival, a plugin SMP, a modded pack, and a minigame network are four very different projects, with different amounts of work, different hardware needs, and different audiences. This guide walks each one, so you can match the type to what you want to build and how many players you expect, then points you at the deeper guide for the path you choose.
The honest starting point is that there is no best type, only the one that fits what you want to do. A quiet survival world for six friends and a public minigame network are both good servers, and they ask for completely different things from you and from the machine. Work out which description below sounds like your plan.
Vanilla or near-vanilla survival
This is Minecraft as it ships, or very close to it. You run the game with little or no modification, players build and explore, and the appeal is that everything works exactly as the wiki and every tutorial says it does. It is the lowest-effort type to start and to maintain, because there are no plugins or mods to manage, update, or debug.
The trade-off is that you get no admin tools out of the box. No permissions system, no land claims, no grief rollback, no economy. That is fine for a small whitelisted group of people who trust each other, and it gets risky the moment you open it to strangers. Hardware needs are modest, and single-thread CPU still matters more than a big RAM figure even here. Vanilla suits a handful of friends who want the pure game with none of the plumbing.
A plugin SMP
An SMP with plugins is the most common serious server, and for good reason. You keep the vanilla survival experience players expect, then add server-side plugins for the things vanilla lacks: permissions, homes and warps, land protection, grief rollback, a live map, an economy. Plugins are server-side only, so players join with an unmodified client and nothing to install, which keeps the barrier to entry low.
This is more work than vanilla, because every plugin needs choosing, configuring, and keeping updated, and every plugin costs a little tick time. It is also where server software choice starts to matter, because a performance fork with a sensible config carries far more players on the same hardware than stock software does. A plugin SMP suits anyone building a lasting survival community, from a dozen regulars to a few hundred. It is the path the pillar guide to running a Minecraft SMP covers end to end, from the box underneath to the last plugin.
A modded pack
A modded server runs mods that change the game itself: new blocks, machines, dimensions, mobs and mechanics. This is the type with the most creative range and the most setup work. Mods run on both the server and the client, so every player has to install the same pack at the same version, which raises the barrier to entry compared with a plugin SMP.
Modded servers are the hungriest for hardware. Mods load far more into memory, so RAM needs climb, and each tick does more work, so single-thread CPU still leads. The first real decision is which mod loader you build on, because Forge, NeoForge, Fabric and Quilt are separate worlds and a mod for one will not run on another. That choice shapes which mods you can use, so make it deliberately: choosing a mod loader walks the differences. Modded suits players who want a specific experience a pack delivers, and who do not mind that everyone has to install it.
A minigame server or a network
Minigames are a different shape of server entirely. Instead of one persistent world, you run game modes: skyblock, bedwars, parkour, a hub that sends players out to matches. At small scale a single server with the right plugins can host a minigame or two. At any real size this becomes a network, with a proxy in front of several backend servers, a lobby that routes players, and separate servers for each game mode.
This is the most technical type to run and the most demanding to grow, because you are operating several servers at once and the routing between them. The reason a network splits across many backends is structural: a single tick thread has a hard ceiling on how many players and how much simulation it can carry, so past a point you spread players across servers rather than pushing one harder. A proxy like Velocity is what makes that work, and scaling with Velocity covers how the pieces fit. Networks suit people building something public and large, who are ready to run infrastructure rather than a single world.
How to choose
Two questions settle most of it: what do you want players to do, and how many do you expect. If you want the pure game for a small trusted group, vanilla is enough. If you want a lasting survival community that strangers can join safely, a plugin SMP is the default answer and the one most people should start with. If you want a specific modded experience and your players will install a pack, go modded, and pick your loader first. If you want to run competitive game modes at scale, plan for a network from the start rather than painting yourself into a single server.
Effort and hardware climb roughly in that order too. Vanilla asks least of you and the machine, a plugin SMP asks more of both, modded asks the most of the hardware, and a network asks the most of you as an operator. There is no wrong choice, only the one that matches the time you want to put in and the players you want to serve.
Whichever you land on, the underlying hardware priorities are the same: fast single-thread CPU and cache first, enough reserved RAM for the type you chose, and fast storage for the world. Get that foundation right and any of these server types runs well on it.
If you want to see what runs on each type of plan, browse our game hosting and pick the one that fits the server you have decided to build.