Minecraft Whitelist: Turn It On and Add Players

Updated: 30 October 2026

Turn it on

Either works:

Set white-list=true in server.properties and restart.
Run whitelist on in the server console (or /whitelist on in game as an operator).

Also set enforce-whitelist=true so players removed from the list are kicked immediately.

No slash in the console. In game you need operator permission and type /whitelist add Name.

Exact name: the Java profile name; case does not matter.
The server must be online: it looks up the account's UUID. Names that do not exist cannot be added.
Renamed players: entries are stored by UUID, so a later name change still works.

The list lives in whitelist.json in the server folder. After editing it by hand, run whitelist reload. Adding with the command avoids UUID typos.

Check the name appears in whitelist list.
Check the spelling.
Check online-mode=true. With online-mode off the whitelist only checks names, so anyone can pretend to be a listed player.

Bedrock calls it the allowlist: set allow-list=true and add players with allowlist add Name. It is saved in allowlist.json.

Whitelist vs operator: the whitelist decides who can join; operators can use commands. Friends do not need to be operators.
Open the server for a while: whitelist off keeps the list for when you turn it back on.
Hosted servers: most control panels have a console where these commands work.

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