Pre-release

Kith is under active development. Formats and behavior can change between releases, and mistakes can break your servers. Back up anything you can't afford to lose.

Why kith?

Server panels promise to simplify server management, but every one I tried was missing something I needed. One did everything but back up Minecraft worlds. Another did everything except install or update modpacks. I even tried forking one to add the feature I wanted, and it turned out to be a lot more work than just adding the feature. Web panels just weren't that helpful to me in practice, so I went looking for something simpler and more direct.

That landed me on the itzg/minecraft-server image, which already does almost everything a Minecraft server needs: modpack installs and updates, config patching, automated backups. What I didn't enjoy was setting up and maintaining Docker Compose stacks for all my servers by hand. I actually like Docker, but I wanted all of this at a level where I manage the servers directly, without keeping every detail of the Compose setup in my head.

Who is kith for

Kith is for the hobbyist homelab and Minecraft server admin. You probably run a handful of servers, off and on, as the two-week Minecraft phase comes back around. It's not meant for large-scale or enterprise deployments on Kubernetes. But it's not a plug-and-play solution like Realms either. You get control and flexibility without the repetitive work of maintaining multiple Docker Compose projects.

What kith is not

• Not a server panel. There's no daemon, no database, no web UI. Kith is a terminal app that reads and writes the same files you would.
• Not a lock-in. Remove kith and your servers keep running. They're plain Docker Compose projects, so docker compose commands work in their directories without kith installed at all.