Citizens vs Mindustry
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted game servers options
— licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one
replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Compare Citizens with
choose an app… Lichess OpenRCT2 papermc-docker ArchiSteamFarm Cytopia Note - games browser alt 2048 Nakama Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead Paper Note - PaperMC server alt Spigot Unciv
Compare Mindustry with
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Feature Citizens Mindustry Category Game Servers Game Servers License ISC GPL-3.0 Language Java Java Setup difficulty Medium Easy Min. RAM 256 MB 512 MB Deployment bare-metal docker, bare-metal, binary, source GitHub stars ★ 722 ★ 28,532 First released 2011 2017 Replaces commercial NPC plugins Factorio
Why pick each one
Choose Citizens if… Released under the ISC license Written in Java Tiny footprint — runs in 256 MB RAM Citizens details
Frequently asked questions Is Citizens or Mindustry better? Mindustry is the stronger all-round pick: it has both the larger community and the simpler easy setup. Consider Citizens if its specific feature set fits your needs better.
Are Citizens and Mindustry free and open-source? Yes. Citizens is licensed under ISC and Mindustry under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Citizens and Mindustry with Docker? Citizens: check the project docs for container support. Mindustry: yes.