Save your Valheim world and set autosave

Valheim's server saves your world by itself, so you rarely need to do anything. What you can control is how often it saves, how many automatic world backups it keeps, and what to do when you want a save right now, before a restart or a risky change. The settings are all in the Startup tab.

When the world saves

Valheim writes the world to disk in three situations:

• On a timer. The game's default is every 30 minutes.
• After players sleep.
• When an admin runs the save command in the game.

Don't count on stopping or restarting the server to save the world, so treat the last save as the point it comes back to.

A save is quick. The Valheim wiki puts the memory copy at roughly 20 to 300 milliseconds, with the write to disk running in the background, so players may notice a brief hitch at most. After a save, the Console tab shows a pinned World saved just now row above the log. In the File Manager, the world's folder in .config/unity3d/IronGate/Valheim/worlds_local gets a new set of _main.<number> files, and the number is one higher each time.

Change how often it saves

1. Open the Startup tab and find the Saves and backups card.
2. Set Save every (minutes). It takes 1 to 1440, and the default is 30. A shorter gap loses less if the server crashes: 10 or 15 minutes is a sensible choice for an active group.
3. Click Save changes. The panel says "Your changes are saved and take effect the next time the server starts." Start or Restart the server to apply it.

If you restart often, a short interval matters more, because the world comes back at its last save.

Save right now

There's no save button in the dashboard. If you're on the admin list, you can save from inside the game before a planned stop or restart. Iron Gate's patch notes say a manual save "can be called to a dedicated server if you are on the admin list", and the Valheim wiki lists the save console command as one that "Forces the game to save". So open the in-game console and run save. Turn the console on first (the Valheim wiki says to add -console to the launch options in Steam, then press F5 in the game). Add admins to your Valheim server shows how to get on the list. A manual save also restarts the timer, so the next timed save is a full interval later.

Automatic world backups

Valheim also keeps its own rolling backups of the world, in the same folder as the world. The other three fields in the Saves and backups card control them:

By default Valheim takes its first backup 2 hours after the world starts and another every 12 hours after that. Each backup is a full copy of the world, so a high Backups kept uses more disk. On a brand-new world the console says Skipping backup. World session not long enough. until the world has been running a while. Change the fields, click Save changes and restart.

These backups sit beside the world and are separate from the Backups tab, which copies the whole server. Valheim's folder names them with the date, for example Dedicated_backup_auto-20261003-152541, and restoring one means renaming folders in the File Manager, in .config/unity3d/IronGate/Valheim/worlds_local. Take a Backups tab backup as well before a big change, as in How to create and restore backups.

Common problems

• The world went back in time. The server stopped or crashed some time after its last timed save, and came back at that save. Lower Save every (minutes) to shrink the gap.
• A setting didn't change. Saving the card isn't enough on its own. Restart the server so the new value is passed to Valheim.
• Disk is filling up. Lower Backups kept, or delete older backups from the world's folder in the File Manager.