When he started playing with friends, we recognized that as parents, we should be able to supervise who he was playing with, when he could play, and how long he could play for.

We looked into other Minecraft hosting services, but discovered that they are designed for experts — not parents that just want to get their kids playing with friends easily and safely.  We had no desire to learn how to edit config files, use FTP, or navigate complicated and opaque billing plans, but there we were.

We also looked into Realms, and realized it puts the person using the Minecraft application in control, so it's not ideal for parents.

After navigating those issues, we discovered how hard it was to get everybody playing together since there are two incompatible editions of Minecraft: Java and Bedrock.  Some friends might be playing on phones & tablets, others on gaming consoles, PCs, laptops, Chromebooks, or Macs.  Our playdates started with a long protracted battle of getting everyone connected and disappointing those on the "wrong" device for the edition we were playing on.

These observations coupled with our experience delivering software services led to us becoming server hosting experts.  Along the way we discovered solutions to enable everyone to play together.  We've taken that expertise and packaged it up so you can take advantage of it!

We hope you enjoy MC Playdates, and it offers you exactly what you need to host your own playdates. Let us know by leaving us feedback!

— Tad & Danielle & Alex