Final Fantasy XIV is a large MMORPG with a somewhat unusual server structure. In this guide, we explain how it works and which server might be best suited for you.
These are the data centers: When you log in to FFXIV for the first time, you will be presented with a choice of where you want to play. Therefore, it is useful to know what the data centers are and how they work. If you are already familiar with this, you can skip to the section “Which server should I choose”.
Basically, the servers in FFXIV are divided into a total of 10 data centers, whose locations are in various regions of the world:
- The Light and Chaos data centers belong to Europe
- The Aether, Crystal, Primal, and Dynamis data centers belong to North America
- The Elemental, Gaia, Mana, and Meteor data centers belong to Japan
- The new data center Materia belongs to Oceania
There are no restrictions on where you can create your characters. In theory, you can go to Japanese servers and play there.
However, a far location like Japan or Oceania can also mean higher latency when playing, so it is advisable for German players to start on European servers.
How the data centers work: The servers of a data center in FFXIV are all interconnected. When you engage in group content, such as raids or dungeons, you will be playing alongside players coming from different servers.
Thanks to the “World Travel” system, it is also possible to physically visit other servers within a data center with your character outside of instances. The free option can be used by right-clicking in the character selection or in-game at one of the Aetheryte crystals in the three starting cities.
You can choose the target server, and your character will be transferred there, but this is subject to some restrictions. You cannot sell anything on other servers and also cannot access your expanded inventory of minions. However, you can still complete content and quests or hunt monsters.
Additionally, the data centers within a region are interconnected and can be freely traveled. This option works similarly to world travel, but can only be done from the character selection.
Which server should I choose as a German player?
Different players always have various criteria based on which they choose their server. Here are some of them and how they might affect your server choice in FFXIV. Based on this, you can then decide on a server.
Language – Where are the German communities in FFXIV?
Generally, all European servers are international, meaning there are no dedicated German servers like in WoW. The largest and most well-known German community is located on the Shiva server. German is also spoken a lot in the newcomer chat there.
However, Shiva is very full, and it is often not possible to create a character there. So if you really want to end up on a server with many German players, you will need to camp the server status page and wait for Shiva to open.
Or you can create a character on any other server, as there are also German players there. With the exception of perhaps very new servers like Alpha, Raiden, Phantom, and Sagittarius, whose population is generally not very high.
To connect with German players, you can alternatively:
- Ask in the chat in the capitals
- Search in the official FFXIV forums
- Look for free companies (guilds) that consist of German players on Lodestone
- Ask on social media like Twitter or in Facebook groups
Population – Where is there a lot going on?
Players have different preferences regarding population density. Some prefer densely populated servers, while others like to start fresh and new. Both options are currently available.
In summer 2022, a whole series of new servers for FFXIV went online. In the EU data centers, they are:
- Alpha and Raiden on Light
- Omega and Phantom on Chaos
The status of the remaining servers is currently “Standard”, meaning their population density is approximately balanced. So if you want to start on fuller servers, where there might be more activity in the hubs or you can find a suitable free company more easily, you can choose one from the list.
However, it can also be worthwhile to start on less populated servers. FFXIV offers players many incentives for this. For character creation on new worlds, there are rewards such as:
- Double EXP up to level 79
- 1 million Gil per account
- 15 days of free playtime, etc.
You can find the full list of benefits on the official page. There are also many free houses available on new servers that you can apply for during lotteries, and the competition is comparatively not as high as on older servers.
Preferred Activities – Hardcore or Casual Players?
The type of content you enjoy can also influence server choice. However, with the open server structure of FFXIV, this is less decisive.
Regardless of your content preferences, you can freely team up with players from other servers to complete content.
- Thanks to the world and data center travel, you can freely visit meeting points and venues of role players, for example
- Raiders can team up across servers and data centers with like-minded players.
- The same goes for PvP fans, with the caveat that Ranked PvP is not available on other data centers. There is no PvP in the Open World in FFXIV, on any of the servers.
- Those who enjoy content in the open world, such as hunting or treasure maps, can also jump from server to server and participate
Within a region, everyone can play with everyone. It may sometimes be necessary to change servers, but this rarely takes longer than a few minutes.
What does this mean for me? Overall, you have a lot of freedom in your server choice in FFXIV, and the likelihood of suffering serious gameplay disadvantages due to a “wrong” choice is very low.
If you prefer to go solo, you can check out our guide on solo jobs:
