Enable Trains on Your Rust Server

Trains in Rust come with the world: a procedural map generates a rail network, and the game spawns work carts and wagons on it. For above-ground railways the thing you control is how big the map is, because they only generate on maps of 4250 or larger.

Checked against Rust server build 2635 and Facepunch's wiki and rail update posts, October 2026.

How big the map must be

Facepunch's Zipline and Rail update introduced the procedural rail network and said any map size of 4250 or larger should have a railway in a ring around the island. Facepunch's wiki page on procedural generation repeats it: the map must still be 4250 to get above-ground rails, and you will not get them on smaller maps. That wiki page also shows world config switches, AboveGroundRails and BelowGroundRails, both true by default. The wiki documents them, but we have not tested them on our servers.

Our default World Size is 3000, so a fresh server has no above-ground railway. The Startup tab accepts a World Size from 1000 to 6000, so 4250 or more is allowed.

Turn trains on

1. Check your plan has the memory for a bigger map. How much RAM does a Rust server need? has the sizes, and bigger maps need more.
2. Take a backup in the Backups tab. Changing the map is a wipe, and a wipe cannot be undone.
3. In the Startup tab, set World Size to 4250 or higher and press Save.
4. Also change World Seed to a new number and press Save, so the server builds a new map.
5. Press Restart now in the Restart to apply notice. The first boot on a bigger map takes several minutes.

Rust server setup: connect, admin and wipes explains a manual map wipe, and the Wipes tab can schedule one.

What spawns on the rails

Facepunch's Above-ground Trains update added work carts and wagons on branch lines that split off the main rail and rejoin it. The work cart engines take low grade fuel, and several can be coupled to pull a longer train. Facepunch's earlier Freight Transit Line update added a separate underground rail network with drivable work carts, reached through train entrances that sit next to monuments.

Train convars worth knowing

You can list the game's own train settings by typing find train in the Console tab. These come from the game's output on build 2635:

Put changed values in server/rust/cfg/server.cfg, one per line without a +. A new server has no server.cfg yet, so Rust server.cfg and admin commands shows how to create it. The same output lists vehicle.killtrains, a command that destroys every train on the server, which is handy if a stuck train blocks the line.

Common problems

1. There are still no tracks. The map is under 4250, or the server did not generate a new one. Check World Size and that you changed World Seed.
2. Out of memory after the change. The map is too big for the plan. Go back to a smaller World Size or look at a larger plan on the Rust page.
3. Trains vanish. The game lists traincar.decayminutes as how long before a train car despawns, with a default of 30.