AleForge Best Value Per GB Game server hosting launched 2018. Three hardware tiers (Apprentice, Master and Legendary) from £0.75/GB ($1), 40+ games, a London location, and a custom Blacksmith’s Portal panel with Game Swap and offsite backups. 145 Trustpilot reviews at 4.9/5.
AleForge is the best value-per-GB provider on this list. Apprentice starts at £0.75/GB ($1), Master is £1.50/GB ($2) with unlimited CPU and 3.4GHz+ processors, and Legendary is £2.26/GB ($3) with DDR5 ECC memory, unlimited NVMe storage and 4.0GHz+ processors. The Blacksmith’s Portal — their heavily modified version of Pterodactyl — includes Game Swap, twice-daily offsite backups, real-time monitoring and a Thunderstore mod manager for Valheim. The 4.9/5 Trustpilot score across 145 reviews is one of the highest ratings of any provider on this list. AleForge now lists London alongside Frankfurt, New York and Chicago, which makes it a more natural fit for UK groups than before. The location network is still smaller than Apex’s, and not every tier is offered everywhere, so check London availability for your tier at checkout.
Who are AleForge?
AleForge launched in March 2018, starting with Minecraft hosting and steadily expanding to support over 40 games. The company grew out of frustration with the hosting industry’s standard of overselling shared hardware — AleForge’s founding principle is dedicated resources per customer, with public server statistics so you can see exactly what you are getting. They have never moved away from that transparency-first approach, publishing real-time performance metrics and avoiding the fine-print slot and storage limitations common among budget hosts.
Over the first few years they expanded their locations progressively in response to customer requests: Virginia, Oregon, Germany and beyond. Their 2024 infrastructure update brought enterprise-grade DDoS protection to every server on every plan — previously an upgrade-only feature at many hosts. Today they serve over 10,000 customers with a 4.9/5 Trustpilot score across 145 reviews — one of the highest satisfaction ratings of any provider we have reviewed.
The name is intentional — the whole brand leans into a dwarven forge theme, including their control panel being named the “Blacksmith’s Portal” and their support team referred to as “support dwarves.” It is a bit of fun, but more importantly the personality reflects a team that plays the games they host.
Three tiers — Apprentice, Master and Legendary
AleForge has renamed and reworked its hardware tiers. The old Budget, Standard and Premium tiers are now Apprentice, Master and Legendary, and AleForge says every tier gets the same panel features. The differences are CPU class, CPU limits, storage and backup slots. AleForge publishes minimum base clocks rather than exact CPU models; it cites older Ryzen 3000-series-class hardware for Apprentice, Ryzen 5950X/7950X-class for Master and Ryzen 9950X-class for Legendary. Some games, Valheim included, start at Master.
- 2.5 GHz base clock or better
- 4 CPU cores
- 40 GB NVMe storage
- 2 user backups
- Same panel features as other tiers
- ⚠ Not offered for every game
Best for: small vanilla servers and lighter games where price matters most.
- 3.4 GHz base clock or better
- Unlimited CPU cores
- DDR4 3200 MHz RAM
- 60 GB NVMe storage
- 4 user backups
- Unlimited player slots
Best for: most servers — friend groups to active communities.
- 4.0 GHz base clock or better
- Unlimited CPU cores
- DDR5 ECC RAM
- Unlimited Samsung NVMe storage
- 6 user backups
- Unlimited player slots
Best for: large communities, competitive servers, heavy modpacks.
Plans and costs
AleForge prices by RAM per GB. You pick the tier and the amount of RAM you need. Below are example monthly prices from AleForge’s Minecraft page. AleForge currently shows a discounted first payment on Master and Legendary, so the tables use the renewal price. Monthly, annual (AleForge says save 20%) and hourly pay-as-you-go billing are offered. Prices are in US dollars and can change, so check the live price at checkout.
Master tier — example prices
| RAM | Price/mo (renewal) | Best for | Storage |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 GB | £3.00 ($3.99) | Small Minecraft group | 60 GB NVMe |
| 4 GB | £6.01 ($7.99) | Modded Minecraft / most games | 60 GB NVMe |
| 6 GB | £9.02 ($11.99) | Growing community | 60 GB NVMe |
| 8 GB | £12.02 ($15.99) | Heavier modpacks | 60 GB NVMe |
| 12 GB | £18.04 ($23.99) | Large public servers | 60 GB NVMe |
| 16 GB | £24.05 ($31.99) | Very large communities | 60 GB NVMe |
Conversion used: £1 = $1.33
Legendary tier — example prices
| RAM | Price/mo (renewal) | Best for | Storage |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 GB | £4.50 ($5.99) | Small server, best hardware | Unlimited NVMe |
| 4 GB | £9.02 ($11.99) | Minecraft / Terraria with mods | Unlimited NVMe |
| 8 GB | £18.04 ($23.99) | Competitive and modded servers | Unlimited NVMe |
| 16 GB | £36.08 ($47.99) | Large modded communities | Unlimited NVMe |
Conversion used: £1 = $1.33
Apprentice on the same page runs from £1.50/mo ($1.99) for 2 GB to £24.05/mo ($31.99) for 32 GB, £0.75 per GB ($1).
Per-game starting prices
| Game | Starting price | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Minecraft | from £1.50/mo ($1.99) | 2 GB Apprentice |
| Factorio | from £1.50/mo ($1.99) | Starting price listed by AleForge |
| Terraria | from £3.00/mo ($3.99) | Starting price listed by AleForge |
| Palworld | from £6.01/mo ($7.99) | Starting price listed by AleForge |
| Project Zomboid | from £7.51/mo ($9.99) | Starting price listed by AleForge |
| Valheim | from £9.02/mo ($11.99) | 6 GB Master; Valheim starts at Master |
Conversion used: £1 = $1.33
The Blacksmith’s Portal
AleForge built their control panel — the Blacksmith’s Portal — on top of the open-source Pterodactyl framework, then heavily modified it over years of in-house development. The result is one of the more feature-complete panels on this list. Real-time CPU, memory and network monitoring is built into the dashboard so you can spot issues as they happen, not after players complain about lag.
The Game Swap feature is a genuine differentiator: you can switch your server to a different supported game without buying a new plan. For communities that rotate between Valheim seasons, Minecraft modpacks and other games, this avoids paying for separate servers. Automatic offsite backups run every 12 hours and are kept for 5 days — protection against world corruption without any manual setup. AleForge also says the panel now shows 30 days of usage history and has mod managers for Valheim, Factorio and Project Zomboid.
Switch between 40+ supported games on the same plan. No new subscription needed.
Automatic backups every 12 hours, kept for 5 days. Stored offsite with one-click restore.
CurseForge, Modrinth, FTB, Technic and Voidswrath. Thunderstore mod manager for Valheim.
CPU, memory and network performance stats live on the dashboard.
Per-server firewall rules configurable from the panel to block malicious actors.
Edit server settings via a graphical interface — no direct config file editing needed for common options.
Note on Apprentice tier: AleForge says the old Budget limits are gone: Apprentice no longer suspends when empty and gets the same panel features as Master and Legendary. The trade-off is older, slower hardware with a 4-core CPU limit, so Master is the safer choice for modded or busy servers.
Customer support
AleForge offers 24/7 live chat, ticket support and a Discord community. Their 4.9/5 Trustpilot score across 145 reviews is one of the highest of any provider we have reviewed, and the recurring theme in customer feedback is fast response times combined with staff who understand the games — reviewers describe agents who stayed in chat until their Terraria server was fully configured, and others who resolved complex modpack conflicts the same day.
Support quality at scale is always harder to maintain than at a smaller operation, and AleForge’s review count (139) sits between Aim2Game (7) and the larger providers like Apex (8,054) and Host Havoc (1,515). The score is genuinely excellent — though the relatively smaller sample should be noted when comparing against providers with thousands of verified reviews.
11 listed data centre locations, now including London
AleForge lists 11 locations across the US, Europe, Oceania and Asia, with Mumbai currently shown as out of stock. London, New York and Chicago are the notable additions since our first review. Not every tier is offered in every location — AleForge’s Valheim page lists 7 locations for Master and 5 for Legendary — so check London availability for your tier at checkout. The order page includes a real-time ping test so you can check your latency to each location before committing.
- San Jose, California
- Dallas, Texas
- Vint Hill, Virginia
- New York
- Chicago
- Bend, Oregon
- London, UK
- Frankfurt, Germany
UK groups should pick London where it is offered for their tier, with Frankfurt as the fallback.
- Sydney, Australia
- Singapore
- Mumbai, India (out of stock)
Location list checked on AleForge’s website on 27 October 2026.
Pros and cons
- ✓ Low price per GB — from £0.75/GB ($1) on Apprentice
- ✓ 4.9/5 Trustpilot — one of the highest satisfaction scores on the list
- ✓ Legendary tier: 4.0GHz+ CPUs, DDR5 ECC and unlimited NVMe
- ✓ Game Swap — change game without new subscription
- ✓ Twice-daily offsite backups kept 5 days, included
- ✓ No overselling — dedicated resources guaranteed
- ✓ London location now listed
- ✓ Thunderstore mod manager for Valheim
- ✓ 48-hour full refund, no questions
- ✓ Real-time server stats public and visible
- ✓ Pay for exactly what you need — no fixed plan sizes
- ✗ Not every tier is offered in every location — check London for your tier
- ✗ 11 listed locations vs 18 at Apex
- ✗ Apprentice tier limited to 4 CPU cores on older hardware
- ✗ Discounted first payment on Master and Legendary — budget for the renewal price
- ✗ Launched 2018 — shorter track record than LOW.MS, Host Havoc
- ✗ 145 Trustpilot reviews — good score, smaller sample than top providers
Find the best hosting for your game
AleForge supports 40+ games. Click any game below to see how AleForge compares to every other provider in a full side-by-side.
AleForge also supports Rust, Conan Exiles, Factorio, Space Engineers, Icarus, Soulmask, Eco, Abiotic Factor, Vintage Story and 20+ more. See the full list at aleforge.net/games ↗
AleForge frequently asked questions
AleForge — from £0.75/GB ($1)
Apprentice, Master & Legendary tiers · 11 locations incl. London · 4.9/5 Trustpilot · Game Swap · 48hr refund
Minecraft from £1.50/mo ($1.99) · Terraria from £3.00/mo ($3.99) · Valheim from £9.02/mo ($11.99)
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